A 2005 mugshot of Junior Larry Hillbroom. In November 2005, Hillbroom pleaded guilty to one count of possession of methamphetamine as a third-degree felony in the Superior Court of Guam.(Photo: PDN file)
An heir to a co-founder of
global courier business DHL has been locked up in a jail cell in the island nation of Palau as he faces charges related to an “ice” trafficking case and a subsequent escape charge.
Junior Larry Hillbroom, 31, is detained 23 hours a day in a dark cell and “only allowed to come out for one hour each day for sunlight and fresh air,” Palau’s Ministry of Justice stated.
“If he comes out of his cell to talk to his lawyer, he will be in handcuffs and leg irons,” the Justice Ministry stated Feb. 20.
Hillbroom escaped Feb. 18 and was recaptured two days later at a beach in Meyuns, a hamlet in Palau’s state of Koror, where he tried to run toward mangrove trees, Justice Ministry officials said.
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At the time of his recapture, Hillbroom had two beer cans with him and remarked to authorities he “just wanted to party” before he went back to jail, said Justice Ministry spokeswoman Jennifer Anson.
Hillbroom, a part-time Guam resident, first landed in national and international news when he was 11 years old.
At that age, while living in poverty in Palau, his fate changed after he was identified — and later confirmed through DNA tests — as one of four out-of-wedlock children of the late DHL co-founder Larry Hillblom.
His share of the fortune from the “H” in DHL was supposed to be about $90 million before taxes, documents in the federal court in Saipan state.
A civil case in the federal court in Saipan remained pending as of late 2015, on the issue of whether legal fees for multiple attorneys in Guam, Saipan and California who were involved in various stages of the battle for Hillbroom’s inheritance should have been capped at 30 percent instead of about 56 percent, court documents show.
Hillblom perished at sea in the 1995 crash of his seaplane off Saipan, triggering a global battle for his estate, which court documents state was valued at $550 million.
The crash changed the life of the then-young boy, whose birth documents in Palau were spelled “Hillbroom” instead of Hillblom, “from living in poverty with his mother … with little education, speaking only Palauan and having never left his island nation,” according to court documents.
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Recent drug case[/h]In 2005, when Hillbroom was 21, he was arrested on alleged drug charges and for attempting to bribe a police officer in Guam. A court later sent Hillbroom to a substance recovery center for the Guam case.
In his most recent drug case in Palau, Hillbroom faces drug trafficking charges, the Justice Ministry spokeswoman confirmed.
Two women who arrived in Palau on a flight from the Philippines in mid-February were caught with crystal methamphetamine, or “ice,” worth $160,000 at street value, according to the Justice Ministry.
“Further investigation indicated that the supplier of the methamphetamine was Junior Larry Imeong Hillbroom,” who had traveled to Manila, according to the Justice Ministry.
“Law enforcement officials obtained an arrest warrant and met Mr. Hillbroom as he arrived from Manila” on Feb. 17, according to the Justice Ministry.
A surety bond of $500,000, or cash bond of $250,000 was set for Hillbroom’s initial drug-trafficking case.
His hearing on the escape case was expected to occur sometime this week.
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