The state Intermediate Court of Appeals has upheld the 2007 conviction and prison sentence of Henry Calucag Jr. for stealing the identity and land of a Kauai businessman who was found slain in the Philippines.

A state judge sentenced Calucag, 60, to 30 years in prison for forging a warranty deed to steal title to land belonging to John Elwin and for using Elwin's credit cards to purchase polo equipment weeks after Elwin's death.

Elwin's girlfriend reported him missing in May 2006 after he traveled to the Philippines to meet Calucag. Philippine authorities later found Elwin's body with gunshot wounds in the back and back of the head. It had been dumped in a driveway in a province outside Manila.

Calucag and his longtime girlfriend, Debra Anagaran, are awaiting trial in federal court for defrauding Elwin and two Honolulu men who disappeared after traveling to the Philippines to meet Calucag. Arthur Young disappeared in 1990 and Douglas Ho vanished in 2004. Both men signed promissory notes to Calucag or Anagaran backed by real estate before they disappeared.