'EWA BEACH — Richard Alonso remembers his father walking out the door of their Pohakupuna Road house, telling him to let his mother know if she called from work that he would be able to pick her up from the Long's Drugs Store after his Tuesday evening bowling outing.

Moments later, Richard Alonso saw his father, Adolfo "Junior" Alonso Jr., 65, lying on the front lawn bleeding to death from stab wounds.

The death was the second violent death to befall a member of the family. Richard Alonso said his brother, Leonard Alonso, was shot and killed in Kalihi in 2005 and that his murder has never been solved.

Tuesday's killing was the 12th homicide of the year on O'ahu.

It was also the sixth violent incident resulting in death that has occurred in the 'Ewa Beach area since November 2006. In each of the cases, the victims knew their attackers, and in five of the cases, they were either related and/or living in the same home.

The younger Alonso, a 29-year-old Army sergeant home for a few weeks from active service on the Mainland, said he tried to render aid to his father but was warded off by his uncle, Jose Tubera Jr., who was swinging a knife at him. He went to find the phone in the nearby washroom to call 911 and when he returned, his uncle had fled down the street, Richard Alonso said.

He tried to administer first aid to his father, but to no avail, he said.

"When I finally got to him, he'd lost a lot of blood already," Richard Alonso said. "It was too late, you know?"

Junior Alonso was pronounced dead at Hawaii Medical Center-West where he was taken shortly after the 6 p.m. incident.

Tubera, 59, was being held last night pending charges of second-degree murder in the death of his brother-in-law and first-degree terroristic threatening for pointing a knife at his nephew. Tubera was arrested by patrol officers a short time after the incident several blocks from the house.

The younger Alonso declined to discuss other specifics of Tuesday's incident while speaking to reporters through a black, wrought-iron gate in front of the house, only a few feet from where his father died.

Alonso said until he joined the military, he had lived in the house all his life. He said his father left about a decade of service in the Navy so that his family could return home to settle down after he and his brother were born.

Richard Alonso said his mother was devastated by the sudden and violent loss of her husband.

"My mom's a mess right now," he said.

Junior Alonso had two passions after retiring from a longtime career as an electrician for the U.S. Coast Guard: fishing on his boat and bowling in several senior citizens leagues.

"He was a happy-go-lucky guy," Richard Alonso said.

His father was always supportive, Richard Alonso said.

"He was always there, you know? If I needed someone to talk to, especially if I had problems, whether I was in North Carolina, deployed or whatever, I could always talk to him. Ever since my brother died, my parents were the only ones I had left."

Richard Alonso said that besides his parents, his grandmother on his mother's side and his father's brother lived at the house. "And I guess ... that guy," Alonso said.

Asked about his uncle, the younger Alonso said, "I don't call him that no more."

Neighbors of the Alonsos said the family posed no problems and that Junior Alonso was a friendly man who would talk story with them.

"He's been over here and we've chatted under the hood of the car, that kind of thing," said Carl Minks, 41, a next-door neighbor. Junior Alonso appeared to express interest in the "hydrogen-on-demand" kits for automobiles that he had been manufacturing in his home, Minks said.

On the Fourth of July, the family set off fireworks but promptly quit at midnight when the law said they should stop, Minks said.

About a year ago, family members built an extension to the Alonso house, he said.

Mike Teruya, 63, who lives down the street, said the neighborhood is a quiet one. He and Junior Alonso spoke several times.

"He was an easygoing guy," Teruya said.

Teruya said that only in recent years did he see additional family members move into the house to join Junior, his wife, Emma, and a grandmother.