Tulsi Gabbard's Brother Accused Of Offering Children Money And Gum To Follow Him Into His Waikīkī Hotel Room

The elder brother of former US intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard spent Friday night in a Honolulu police cellblock after being charged over what investigators described as a 'stranger danger' incident at a Waikīkī hotel pool.

Batarti Gabbard, 55, was arrested and charged with second-degree custodial interference on 17 July after Honolulu police alleged he approached several children at the pool five days earlier, offering them gum and money to come to his hotel room and recording their names in a notebook.

The children refused, and he walked away, according to police, and no child was harmed. The allegations have unfolded alongside a family crisis, laid out in a protective-order petition filed by his wife and a written statement from his parents, who say their son suffered a mental health breakdown in the days before the incident.

A Poolside Approach Reported By A Bystander

The Honolulu Police Department said it opened an investigation after receiving a report of a 'stranger danger' incident at about 2 pm on Sunday, 12 July, at the pool of a Waikīkī hotel, which it has not named.

According to police statements, Gabbard allegedly approached multiple children, including a 9-year-old boy, asked their names, wrote them down, and offered gum and money if they would accompany him to his room.

The children turned him down, and he left the area, police said. A 42-year-old woman reported the encounter, and detectives identified Gabbard as the suspect on Friday, arresting and charging him the same day. The charge, custodial interference in the second degree, is a misdemeanour under Hawaii law; he faces no luring, kidnapping or sexual offence count, and the allegations have not been tested in court, where he is presumed innocent.

The arrest was not his only brush with police last week. Gabbard was separately arrested on 16 July on theft charges and pleaded not guilty.

A Protective-Order Petition Filed The Day Of His Arrest

Court papers reveal a family in distress before the pool incident. Kimberly Gabbard, his wife of nearly ten years, filed a petition for a protective order on Friday, writing that on 11 July, the day before the Waikīkī encounter, she feared for her safety because her husband was 'gravely disabled' and experiencing a psychotic break.

In the petition, she wrote that he may be mentally ill and using illegal drugs, that he had previously been diagnosed with bipolar disorder with psychotic features, and that relatives had 'repeatedly encouraged him to seek psychiatric treatment' as his judgment deteriorated. She said police instructed her to file the request. Family Court Judge Jessi Hall denied the petition the same day.

His parents, Hawaii state Senator Mike Gabbard and his wife Carol, said in a written statement on Friday that their eldest son had experienced mental health issues in the past but 'has been doing well for the last 10 years', and that he began acting erratically several days earlier. The family says he is now receiving psychiatric treatment.

The accounts present different perspectives on the same week of events. Police describe Gabbard as a criminal suspect, while his wife and parents portray a man experiencing a serious mental health crisis. None of those claims has yet been tested in court.

A Political Family Thrust Into An Unwelcome Spotlight

The case lands on one of Hawaii's most prominent political households. Batarti, the eldest of five siblings, is the brother of Tulsi Gabbard, the former Hawaii congresswoman who served as President Donald Trump's Director of National Intelligence before resigning last month, citing her husband's deteriorating health. Their father has represented West Oahu communities in the state Senate for nearly two decades.

Tulsi Gabbard's own arc has kept the family name in national headlines for a generation. She entered the Hawaii House of Representatives in 2002 at 21, served four terms in Congress from 2013, ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020, left the party in 2022, joined the Republicans in 2024, and was confirmed as the country's eighth Director of National Intelligence last year. Her brother, by contrast, has lived almost entirely outside public view until this week.

Neither Tulsi Gabbard nor her office has commented publicly on her brother's arrest. The family's statement did not address the specifics of the police allegations, focusing instead on his mental state and treatment.

Prosecutors have not indicated when Gabbard will appear in court on the custodial interference charge, and police have not said whether further charges are contemplated. Under Hawaii law, the misdemeanour count he faces carries a maximum penalty of up to a year in jail, a fraction of the exposure that would attach to the luring or enticement offences the incident initially evoked in headlines.

The custodial interference case remains pending, while Gabbard is also due to appear in court in connection with the separate theft case.