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Killer of two men to
serve at least 20 years

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By Debra Barayuga
Star-Bulletin

Convicted murderer Samuel Cooper Jr. faces a mandatory life term with the possibility of parole after pleading guilty yesterday to murdering Honolulu Symphony volunteer Fred Cramer.

State Judge Karen Ahn also ordered that Cooper serve a mandatory minimum of 20 years as a repeat offender.

The sentence will run concurrent with a 20-year mandatory minimum he received from the court in August for the death of video store clerk Keith Miyashiro.

Cooper, 35, decided to plead guilty under a plea agreement with the state because if convicted, he could have been facing life without the possibility of parole, said his attorney, deputy public defender Ronette Kawakami. "The state would have moved for extended sentencing and he very well may have gotten it."

The state, as part of the plea agreement, agreed not to seek enhanced sentencing based on the victim's age, or extended sentencing.

Cramer, 81, was found bound, gagged and dead in his Waikiki apartment in May 1999 from a "gruesome strangling," said Deputy Prosecutor Eric Sacks. Cramer was well-respected and liked in the community.

Sacks said he will ask the parole board that Cooper serve at least 100 years or until he dies in prison for the two murders.

It will be up to the Hawaii Paroling Authority to decide the minimum terms Cooper must serve before he can seek parole.

Sacks said the state went with the plea agreement to spare Cramer's family, friends and supporters from the "gruesome" details of how he was killed being replayed before the public.

That Cooper killed two people within months of being released from parole on two other assault convictions shows "Mr. Cooper has no regard at all for human life," Sacks said.

Cooper had just been released from prison in March 1999 when he was arrested on suspicion of killing Miyashiro on Aug. 20, 1999. He was later implicated in Cramer's killing, which occurred three months earlier.

Miyashiro died of a shattered skull after being bludgeoned with a 7-pound roll of plastic wrap during a robbery at the video store where he worked.

Cooper will be sentenced Jan. 9 before Judge Ahn.