LIHU‘E — Dozens of potential jurors called to the Lihu‘e state courthouse for the Vicente Hilario murder trial were sent home early Monday, as a motion from the defendant delayed the trial’s start date once again.
Hilario faces an array of charges, including murder in the first degree for the 2010 killing of Aureo Moore, a witness who was set to testify against him in a drug robbery case. Hilario has been serving as his own lawyer since late last year after several previous attorneys dropped his case. After years of delays, the trial was set to begin Monday.
Hilario appeared before Circuit Court Chief Judge Randal Valenciano at around 9:30 a.m. in a suit jacket instead of the Kaua‘i Community Correctional Center jumpsuit he has worn to recent hearings. Defendants in jury trials do not wear jail uniforms to keep from prejudicing the jury against them.
Shortly before the prospective jury members were set to be called into the courtroom, Hilario introduced a new oral motion to dismiss the case due to unreasonable delays.
County Deputy Prosecutor Matthew Arakawa said his office would require additional time to address the issues raised in the motion, to which Valenciano agreed.
Realizing that his motion would delay the trial, Hilario changed course.
“If I have to choose between my opportunity (to submit the motion) and right to a speedy trial, I would like the jury to be brought in today,” said Hilario. “Because I feel the veiled insinuation that my trial will be delayed, I’m going to withdraw my motion.”
But Valenciano, tiptoeing around potential issues that could be raised in an appeal, decided it was too late to withdraw.
“The allegations raised by Mr. Hilario are substantive,” said Valenciano. “The concern is if we just withdraw them there will be an allegation that he has been coerced.”
Hilario, who has consistently pushed for a quick trial, was frustrated at the delay.
Arakawa told Valenciano that he would need about two weeks to address the motion — at which point Hilario stood and announced: “This is insane!”
At Valenciano’s request, the bailiff dismissed the crowd of prospective jurors that had been waiting to enter the courtroom since early Monday morning.
In 2013, Hilario was convicted of murder in the first degree, retaliating against a witness, intimidating a witness, and bribery of a witness for the Moore killing, for which he was later sentenced to life in prison.
Prosecutors alleged Hilario bribed a woman with pills to arrange a meeting with Moore at Anahola Beach Park in 2010, where he then shot him six times. Hilario has maintained his innocence, claiming that a friend, David Manaku, shot Moore without his knowledge or consent.
Moore was set to testify against Hilario and another man, Kyle Akau, in a stick-up drug robbery that took place in the parking lot of Safeway supermarket in Waipouli earlier in 2010.
In 2017, the case was remanded to a new trial when the Intermediate Court of Appeals ruled Hilario’s right to meaningfully participate in his defense had been impeded.
Hilario submitted a witness list to the court Monday calling more than 40 individuals to testify, including Manaku, Akau, and several police officers and lawyers affiliated with the case.
He will next appear in court this Thursday on additional drug and gun charges stemming from the Safeway robbery.
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Guthrie Scrimgeour, reporter, can be reached at 808-647-0329 or gscrimgeour@thegardenisland.com.
