Man convicted of murdering horse trader on Big Island

By Hugh Clark
Advertiser Big Island Bureau

HILO, Hawai'i — A Big Island jury yesterday took two hours to convict Jason K. Santos of second-degree murder and robbery for the 1994 slaying of a Kaua'i man in what prosecutors called a cocaine drug deal that turned into a killing.

The victim's father, Vernon Souza Sr., said "the people should sleep better tonight." Souza wept when he described two years of nightmares he endured after identifying the badly burned body of his 30-year-old son, Vernon Jr., at the Hilo Medical Center morgue the day after the slaying.

Prosecutors presented a half-dozen witnesses to support their case that Santos was the leader in the planned robbery and killing that took place in a car on the Saddle Road on Sept. 30, 1994.

Santos, 29, was a resident of Waimea at the time of the killing but later moved to Henderson, Nev. He was extradited last year after the grand jury indicted him and Oliver White, 28, of North Dakota, also a former Big Island resident.

Souza, a noted rodeo performer and horse trader, had just arrived at the Hilo airport when he was killed. Prosecutors said Santos slit Souza's throat while he was still in the car and stabbed him. Souza also was beaten in the head with a horseshoe hammer. The car was doused with gasoline and set on fire.

White suffered permanent brain damage in an auto crash that occured since the Souza killing. Both prosecutor Jack Ma-

tsukawa and defense attorney Harry Eliason suggested that White tried to kill himself in the auto wreck.

White will not face trial because Judge Riki May Amano ruled in February that he was incompetent.

On Wednesday Santos took the stand in his own defense and blamed White for the killing, saying he was only along for the ride. Eliason argued that White was the murderer and accused prosecutors of influencing the witnesses to alter their testimony to focus on Santos.

Prosecutor Matsukawa said that the defense was shifting the blame and that Santos planned the killing and distributed the loot after the slaying.

Judge Amano will sentence Santos on Aug. 23.

The elder Souza said he was glad his ordeal is over but regrets his wife was not alive to see justice done for their only son. She died two years after their son was killed.

Souza said, "You can never, never imagine anything like this in your life."