Man testifies he saw victim strangled

By David Waite
Advertiser Courts Writer

A man who says he watched as a Kapahulu woman was strangled in a remote area above Makakilo testified yesterday that he thought she was just going to be taught a lesson for ripping off her drug dealer.

Ryan Onuma said he realized Tracey Tominaga was in grave danger on Jan. 21, 2002, when Jason Perry, the man from whom the drugs were supposedly taken, handed her something and said, "Enjoy your last cigarette."

Onuma said Delaneo "Kawika" Puha then slapped Tominaga to the ground. She began to weep and apologize to Perry for having had a male friend shove a shotgun into Perry's face at her house three days earlier and forcing him to apologize for making sexual advances to her.

Onuma, 32, testified for the prosecution against Puha, who was charged with conspiracy to commit kidnapping, attempted first-degree assault and first-degree hindering prosecution. Prosecutors said Onuma was one of seven men in the house when she was killed.

Perry has pleaded not guilty to Tominaga's murder and to the murder of Edward Fuller, who prosecutors said was killed to keep him from telling what he knew about her slaying.

Onuma said it was clear to him that Tominaga, 37, would not leave the site alive when another man at the scene, Andrey Lake, picked up a log about 5 inches in diameter and 3 to 4 feet long and bashed her over the head.

City Deputy Prosecutor Chris Van Marter asked Onuma what he thought when he saw Lake hit Tominaga.

" ... once Andrey cracked her on the head like that, I thought, 'How are they gonna let this girl walk away now?' " Onuma said.

The beating lasted 10 to 15 minutes and near the end, Onuma said, he wrapped duct tape around Tominaga's mouth and eventually her entire head, then hit her in the stomach with the back of a shovel "to knock the wind out of her" as Perry strangled her.

He said Perry squeezed his hands around Tominaga's throat "for a good three or four" minutes and checked for a pulse after she went limp. Onuma said he was afraid and never considered trying to stop the beating or calling police for help. "I was afraid I might be the next to go," Onuma said.

He said he called police April 2 and confessed to his part in Tominaga's death because "I wanted to come clean and felt bad for her family."

Onuma also testified that he was with Perry on the night of Jan. 26, when the two of them took Edward Fuller to Jack Lane in Nu'uanu, where Perry shot Fuller to death to keep him from telling police about Tominaga's murder.

Onuma denied the assertion of Puha's lawyer Reginald Minn that he went to police out of fear that Puha might "beat you to the punch" and confess first in order to work out a deal with prosecutors.