New trial for isle man
convicted of murder
The state Supreme Court has ordered a new trial for a Ko Olina man who was convicted last year of murdering his wife.
The high court vacated Kenneth Wakisaka's conviction on a second-degree murder charge yesterday and remanded the case back to the state Circuit Court for a new trial.
In a 32-page ruling, the justices said Wakisaka's conviction was influenced by ineffective counsel and the exclusion of key testimony from the doctor of his wife, Shirlene.
Prosecutors also improperly commented on Wakisaka's failure to take the stand in his own defense, the justices said. A defendant has the constitutional right to remain silent to avoid incriminating himself, and prosecutors are barred from making comments about a defendant's decision not to testify.
"As a rule, the prosecution cannot comment on the defendant's failure to testify because this infringes on the defendant's right not to be a witness against her- or himself," the high court wrote.
Circuit Judge Marie Milks sentenced Wakisaka to life in prison last year after a jury found him guilty of strangling his wife.
Medical examiners testified at trial that Shirlene Wakisaka died of brain damage caused by strangulation, and several witnesses said that Wakisaka made unsolicited comments before his wife's cause of death was determined that he did not choke her.
Wakisaka contends that his wife had a history of mental illness and committed suicide by overdosing on pills and alcohol.
In yesterday's ruling the Supreme Court said that Milks improperly excluded Shirlene Wakisaka's doctor Sharon Lawler from testifying at trial. Milks reasoned that Lawler was not a psychiatrist or a psychologist, but the high court said that Lawler "was intimately familiar with Shirlene's emotional problems."
The justices faulted Wakisaka's former attorney Mal Gillin for eliciting an improper opinion from Honolulu police Detective Wayne Cambra, who testified that he believed Wakisaka murdered his wife by strangulation.
The high court also criticized Gillin for failing to object to remarks by prosecutors about Wakisaka's failure to take the stand.
