Drifter plans to plead not guilty to shooting
The man accused of shooting another man execution style before pushing him off the cliffs near Yokohama Bay two weeks ago will plead not guilty to a charge of second-degree murder, his attorney said yesterday.
Patrick Deguair Jr., 30, living in the Ko Olina area, appeared yesterday before Judge Russel Nagata in Honolulu District Court.
Deguair faces a preliminary hearing tomorrow morning. His bail remains at $1 million. Deguair is also charged with several firearm violations, including possession of a silencer, and kidnapping.
Defense attorney Michael Green said he is unsure of the relationship between Deguair and the man he is accused of killing, Jermaine Duckworth, a 24-year-old former convict.
Green portrayed Duckworth as a violent man who had 11 misdemeanor convictions including assaults in 2003 and 2004. Most recently, Duckworth was arrested in November in a Maili home invasion, where he and three other men allegedly identified themselves as U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency agents.
"It's a tragedy when someone loses their life," Green said. "I really don't know what the relationship was between the two of them. The victim (did) home invasions and terrorizes them."
Police arrested Deguair Thursday night in a Pagoda Hotel room, where police allegedly found drugs, after acting on information from at least one person who said Deguair had used a gun equipped with a silencer to shoot Duckworth.
"This kid doesn't do drugs," Green said. "Until someone tells me there was a silencer recovered and it's tied to him, then that's a different story. I have a problem with unnamed sources accusing someone of a crime unless they were actually there."
According to court documents, at least one person told police Deguair had restrained Duckworth at a home before driving him to Yokohama Bay in the early morning hours of March 27. A tourist found Duckworth's body on the rocks at about 11:30 later that morning.
Deguair was dressed in all black yesterday morning in an untucked long-sleeve, button-down shirt, pants and shiny black shoes. A 1996 Pearl City High School graduate, he works as a duty manager at Hale Koa Hotel, according to the hotel.
Deguair also faces drug charges from his arrest at the Pagoda Hotel. He has four previous misdemeanor convictions: reckless driving, refusing to stop, driving without a license and criminal property damage.