Suspect in 2-Day Rampage Caught : Shootings: Police acting on tip find fired postal worker in Huntington Beach bar. He allegedly killed two and wounded five, including two at an ATM.

Fired postal worker Mark Richard Hilbun, suspected of killing two people and wounding five others in a two-day rampage, was arrested peacefully early Saturday morning when police found him watching television in a sports bar.

Half an hour before he was arrested at 12:30 a.m., Hilbun shot and wounded two customers at an automated teller machine in Fountain Valley about 150 feet from the city’s police station, officials said.

Authorities believe they were the sixth and seventh people attacked by Hilbun. He allegedly stabbed his 63-year-old mother to death Thursday morning and shot a letter carrier to death at the Dana Point post office a short time later.

The violence triggered a chilling fear throughout some of Orange County’s most exclusive communities. Throughout the distressed area, news of Saturday’s arrest brought a collective sigh of relief.

At the Dana Point post office, where workers were busy processing a backlog of Mother’s Day mail, there was spontaneous applause before dawn, when news of the arrest came. Hilbun, a diagnosed manic-depressive, was fired from his job as a letter carrier at the Dana Point post office in December, in part because he was stalking a female co-worker.

The subject of a massive police search, Hilbun remained in the area, changing his appearance and the license plates on his car. Then he spent his last hours of freedom in a manner so bold that one police officer suggested, “It’s almost like he wanted to be caught.”

Just after midnight Saturday, police said, Hilbun drove from the Fountain Valley shooting to the sports bar--about two miles away--in the same gray pickup truck that he used to escape from the post office shooting.

The bar was crowded with about 150 people who had just watched the basketball and hockey playoff games when one of the patrons recognized Hilbun from photographs shown on television and called police.

“I was involved in a conversation . . . when a guy who is a regular came up and was real agitated, real upset,” said Frank McNaughton, a co-owner of the Centerfield Sports Bar. “He repeated over and over, ‘The postal killer is here!’ ”

The customer pointed to one of two pool tables in a back corner where Hilbun was standing. In contrast to the picture of the suspect issued by police, McNaughton said, Hilbun “was clean-shaven, no beard, and his hair was a lot shorter and looked 10 to 15 pounds lighter.”

But Demy Mourani, 26, the customer who saw Hilbun, said the suspect “had a distinguished nose. . . . It was like the picture on TV.”

Hilbun, who turns 39 today, was said to be calm and unemotional at his arrest--the same description witnesses attributed to the gunman who strolled casually away from the post office murder scene Thursday. “Cool as a cucumber,” one bar patron said.

When police arrived, Hilbun was seated on a bar stool drinking a mix of vodka and 7-Up and wearing white cotton pants, a Hawaiian shirt and beach sandals. Three Huntington Beach police officers stepped up to him about 12:30 a.m., tapped him on the shoulder and asked him to step outside.

The capture at the bar on Beach Boulevard, about 20 miles up the coast from Dana Point, went smoothly. Officers did not draw their weapons.

“At first, the suspect gave an alias and said his name was Plant,” said Huntington Beach Police Lt. Charles Poe. “The officers said, ‘Well, tell us your real name.’ And he quickly admitted who he was.

“After he gave his name he just hung his head,” Poe said.

Officers searched Hilbun and found a “non-firearm type of weapon,” but Poe declined to identify it.

Even though he continued to circulate in public just miles from his alleged crime scenes, Hilbun managed to frustrate an intense police dragnet for more than 38 hours. Police said, however, he took some steps to prevent his capture.

For instance, he switched the license plates on his truck, replacing them with ones from Idaho, and he removed a camper shell, which was found Saturday in a vacant lot in Newport Beach. He also cut his shaggy silver hair, and he was no longer wearing a T-shirt with the word psycho printed across the front, which had shocked witnesses at the post office shooting.

Instead, Hilbun was wearing a maroon and blue Hawaiian-style shirt that one officer called a “here-I-am kind of shirt.”

The massive hunt for Hilbun involved 23 police agencies. Sheriff’s Capt. Andy Romero said police “think he is a cunning person that has his wits about him. . . . He did things to elude attention.”

Newport Beach Police Lt. Paul Henisey said his department received 50 calls before 6 p.m. Friday from the public reporting various information and sightings of Hilbun. Newport Beach devoted its entire force, including 23 detectives, to the search.

A $25,000 reward was issued by the U.S. Postal Service on Friday for Hilbun’s arrest. Prosecutors also charged the suspect with five felony counts--two counts of first-degree murder and three counts of attempted murder. He could face the death penalty if convicted. Prosecutors said additional charges were expected to be filed for the Fountain Valley shootings.

Hilbun was taken to the Sheriff’s Department about 4:30 a.m. Saturday and interviewed for several hours by homicide detectives from various police agencies. Investigators declined to discuss the findings. However, they said he was “friendly and cooperative.”

Hilbun was being held late Saturday without bail at the Orange County Jail in Santa Ana. His attorney, David C. Biggs, declined to comment.

Police obtained warrants to search a room at a Garden Grove motel where Hilbun is believed to have checked in after 3 p.m. Friday.

Saturday morning’s armed robbery was the fifth crime attributed to Hilbun in less than two days, three in daylight.

According to police, Hilbun stabbed his mother, Frances, and her cocker spaniel, Golden, to death at her home in Corona del Mar, then drove to the Dana Point post office, where he killed letter carrier Charles T. Barbagallo with a single shot between the eyes. Another postal worker was wounded.

Police believe the Dana Point shooting--which came just hours after another postal employee in Dearborn, Mich., killed a co-worker--was connected to Hilbun’s stalking of a female postal employee in Dana Point. Just a week ago, Hilbun had sent the woman a note saying: “I love you. I’m going to kill us both and take us both to hell.”

Minutes after the post office shooting, Hilbun allegedly wounded a man in the arm during an apparent botched robbery.

A few hours later--about 3 p.m.--police believe Hilbun shot and wounded a female motorist in Newport Beach because she was following him. The woman, who remained in critical but stable condition at Hoag Hospital, apparently wanted to talk to him because she thought he had stolen some magnetic car signs from her shop.

The injuries in the Fountain Valley robbery were described as minor.

The rampage terrified residents of several communities.

“It’s nice to be able to stop all the running around,” Poe of the Huntington Beach Police Department said. “He was terrorizing the whole beach community.”

Children at several schools were kept on campus Thursday and Friday in a “lock down” while volunteers were posted to watch for anything suspicious.

Residents also said they carefully locked doors and windows, and businesses reported losing the tourists usually attracted to the relaxed beach community with spectacular ocean views.

Kathy Gates, the wife of a postal worker who was wounded by Hilbun in the shooting Thursday morning, said: “We felt relieved.”

She said she and her husband, Peter, had worried that Hilbun might return. “You never know with him,” she said. “That was a thought.”

With the arrest of Hilbun, mail delivery resumed as usual Saturday in Dana Point for the first time since Thursday’s shootings, said Arthur O. Martinez, Postal Service district manager in Santa Ana.

Of the 70 or so employees who came to work, about 25 had volunteered to help out from other offices, from Newport Beach to San Clemente. The volunteers from other offices will receive compensation for their work, Martinez said.

Crisis intervention teams and psychologists are still available for employees in Dana Point, as well as any local office, Martinez said. He said security guards will remain until employees feel comfortable.

“I’m so glad to see everybody back alive,” said Si Grim, a Dana Point resident who came by the post office to pick up her mail. “You just feel in limbo. Now all of a sudden you’re relieved.”

Kim Springer, who was stalked by Hilbun, was in protective custody Saturday when postal officials told her of the arrest. “Kim Springer now has a great sense of relief,” Postal Inspector Pamela Prince said.

Springer’s boyfriend, Steve Eberhardt, said he also talked with Springer by phone Saturday.

“All she said was, ‘He’s caught,’ ” Eberhardt said. “I said, ‘Great.’ We said, ‘I love you,’ and that’s it. Just, ‘They caught him . . . Huntington Beach . . . love you. Bye, see you soon.’

“We’re both happy, that’s all,” Eberhardt said.

The rest of Springer’s family remained in Riverside County on Saturday, where they had fled for safety.

Hoping to address fears and concerns about the events, U.S. Postal Service officials met early Saturday morning with employees at the Dana Point post office.

Chief Postal Inspector Ken Hunter said the employees’ concerns focused on what could have been done to prevent the shooting.

“Some are frustrated that she (Springer) didn’t get enough help from the Postal Service,” Hunter said.

U.S. Postmaster Gen. Marvin Runyon told reporters that the incident will be thoroughly reviewed, but he defended the department’s actions in the Dana Point case.

“The suspect, Mr. Hilbun . . . had been fired,” Runyon said. “We recognized he did not belong in our work force and he was removed.”

But Runyon said reforms will not necessarily prevent violence in the future.

“Company after company has learned that locked doors, security systems and counseling professionals have not eliminated the senseless violence we saw this week,” he said. “There is too much violence in our society.

Contributing to this report were Times staff writers Nancy Wride, Leslie Berkman, David Reyes, Matt Lait, Greg Hernandez, Eric Lichtblau, Lily Dizon, Thuan Le and correspondents Willson Cummer and Anna Cekola.

Rampage in Orange County

1) Hilbun’s mother stagged to death

2) Rampage at post office

3) Resident shot

4) Abandoned kayak found

5) Motorist shot

6) Hilbun checks into hotel

7) Two shot at ATM

8) Hilbun arrested at bar