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Keoni Tapaoan was running when a gunshot stopped him in his tracks, the sound echoing through the campsite. Pal tried to give
witness the gun
but ‘I said, Hell no’By Debra Barayuga
Star-BulletinHe ducked and looked back. "I seen the guy that got shot ... I seen him fall down on the deck of the porch," he said, sniffing back tears.
And he saw his friend Roberto Miguel standing by a tree near the cabin, facing the porch and cradling a gun in his hands.
When he saw Miguel turn and run, Tapaoan ran, too.
Tapaoan was the first government witness to take the stand yesterday to testify that he and four others went to the cabins at the Waianae Recreation Center in the early hours of June 3, 1998, with the intention of robbing someone.
Before the night was over, John Latchum, 33, who was vacationing with his wife and two children at the beachside cabin, was dead of a gunshot wound to the chest.
On trial for first-degree murder, punishable by life without parole, are Roberto "Erto" Miguel, Bryson Jose and Keala Leong.
Tapaoan said the group, which included Don Calarruda, did not stop running until they reached the Sunflower Apartments.
As they ran, Jose apparently had ended up with the gun and tried to pass it on to Tapaoan.
"Here Keoni, take the gun. Handoff. Handoff," Jose allegedly said.
"I said, 'Hell no!' " said Tapaoan, who was 17 at that time and is now 20.
At the apartments, Tapaoan sat on a curb and put his head on his lap because he felt sick.
When asked why he felt sick, Tapaoan replied, "Cause when we was running, could hear the lady screaming, screaming and screaming almost all the way down the road ... echoing through all the cabins and buildings and stuff."
Those were the screams of Wendy Latchum, 32, who saw her husband fatally shot in front of her, just moments after the youths had apparently tried to break into the Latchums' cabin.
In the courtroom yesterday, Latchum sat composed, listening to Tapaoan's testimony. But during his description of the events after her husband was shot, she walked out of the courtroom, choking back tears.
During Tapaoan's testimony, Miguel showed no visible reaction except to whisper to his attorneys or look down.
Tapaoan said he heard Miguel and Jose first broach the idea of beating up, robbing or shooting someone at the Waianae Recreation Center, or Rest Camp as they called it, as the group walked to the campsite.
The group was "buzzed" from drinking beer and smoking marijuana at the apartments and at a Waianae teacher's house earlier, and had just beaten up an unnamed male before they headed to the cabins, he said.
Tapaoan said he believed Miguel carried the gun because he had last handled the gun before joining in the beating earlier.
When they arrived at the recreation center, Tapaoan said Miguel and Jose ended up on the porch of a cabin, which was lit from the inside by a TV that was still on.
Miguel brought out the gun and held it with one hand while he jiggled the front door with his other hand, Tapaoan said. Jose was trying to open the sliding glass door beside the front door.
Tapaoan, who had stepped onto the porch, said he moved away when Miguel brought out the gun. He and Calarruda watched from a distance. He didn't know where Leong was.
After the gunshot rang out, they all fled back the way they had come.
Tapaoan said that after the shooting, he, Miguel and Calarruda caught a ride to Calarruda's house at Makaha Plantations, where they stayed the night. They talked about what had happened, and Miguel confessed that he had shot the man.
"I was like, 'Naw man, you couldn't shoot him,' " Tapaoan said. The next morning when he awoke, Miguel and Calarruda were gone.
Tapaoan said he watched the news and learned that the man at the cabins had died. He said he felt "sad, scared, nervous, sick," and went home.
The next time he saw the other two again was at school and Miguel again told him he had shot the man at the cabin.
Tapaoan said that, according to Miguel, "(Miguel) started to run, stopped, turned around, aimed the gun at (Latchum's) chest and shot."
Tapaoan has not been charged in this murder case.
Against the advice of his attorney, he decided to go ahead and testify knowing he could face criminal charges that could put him in prison for a long time.