Kauai police captured a prison escapee who is believed to have carjacked a county paratransit bus and other vehicles, and robbed a bank and a pharmacy.

About 30 officers and the police department helicopter searched for Walter Mills, 43, who escaped from the Kauai Community Correctional Center last night.

Police finally caught up with him near Kokee Lodge shortly after 4 p.m.

Police said bystanders reported seeing a man matching Mills’ description sitting in a parked vehicle.

Police believe Mills robbed the First Hawaiian Bank branch on Rice Street at about 8:30 a.m., beginning a crime spree involving carjackings and the robbery of a pharmacy.

Police said Mills could be armed and warned motorists and the public to keep their doors locked and not to approach Mills, if he is seen.

Police said a man matching Mills description brandished a weapon and stole his pickup truck from the Kmart parking lot in the Kukui Grove Shopping Center at about 9:50 a.m. The suspect left the pickup near Sudz Car Wash on Pahee Street in Lihue and entered a county paratransit bus, brandished a weapon and instructed the driver to take him to Koloa Road. There were no passengers on the bus at the time.

A suspect matching Mills’ description then robbed the Lifeway Pharmacy in Koloa at about 10:20 a.m.

Police believe Mills carjacked two other vehicles and was dropped off at Kalawai Park in Kalaheo, where he fled on foot shortly after 11 a.m.

Several schools in the Lihue and Kalaheo area went into lockdown as police searched the area for Mills.

Koloa Elementary School, Kalaheo Elementary School, Eleele Elementary School, Kekaha Elementary School, Waimea High School and Waimea Canyon Middle School — were on lockdown.

Kauai Community College also went into lockdown.

Wilcox Elementary School, Chiefess Kamakahelei Middle School and Island School in Lihue were also on lockdown immediately after the robbery, but the lockdown was lifted at 11:05 a.m.

A First Hawaiian bank surveillance camera image showed a man inside the bank with brown hair, balding on the top of his head and wearing a black shirt.

The Public Safety Department said Mills was last seen wearing a black shirt and blue jeans. He is described as six feet tall, 185 pounds with brown hair, balding on the top of his head, and blue eyes.

Mills was reported missing from a headcount at 8 p.m. Thursday.

Mills was convicted of second-degree theft for stealing a laptop from a Walmart on Aug. 9. He was also convicted for robbing a Kapaa Pharmacy last year with a BB gun.

Mills started serving his theft sentence on Sept. 14. Judge Kathleen Watanabe sentenced him to five years in prison to be served concurrently with a federal prison sentence for the pharmacy robbery.

Wearing a mask, Mills pointed a BB gun at employees and stole nearly 2,000 pills of OxyContin, oxycodone, hydrocodone, morphine and methadone. Mills plead guilty to the robbery and was sentenced to six years in prison.

At his July 26 sentencing in federal court in Honolulu, his attorney said that Mills had severe drug addiction and mental health issues.

He has a criminal record of 14 convictions that include theft, fraudulent use of a credit card, criminal contempt of court, abuse of a family/household member and driving under the influence of alcohol.

Anyone who has information on the whereabouts of Mills is asked to call 911 or the State Sheriffs’s Office at 586-1352.