The "cold case" murder trial of Darnell Griffin opened this morning in Circuit Court, with a prosecutor telling jurors, "The man who raped and murdered Evelyn Luka (in 1999) remained a mystery until 2007."

That's when DNA evidence recovered from Luka was matched to a DNA sample taken in 2004 from Griffin, now 50 years old, Deputy Prosecutor Kevin Takata said in his opening statement.

"For almost eight years, Evelyn's rape and murder remained unsolved," Takata said.

Griffin's lawyer, Deputy Public Defender E. Edward Aquino, told jurors that Griffin and Luka "had consensual sex" two days before she was attacked and that Griffin was at home with his family the night of the assault.

Luka's murder "is a mystery today that does not get solved with Darnell Griffin as the answer," Aquino said.

Luka was found unconscious and in convulsions the morning of Sept. 6, 1999, lying on a median beside H-2 Freeway near Ka Uka Boulevard.

She had been raped and strangled and died the next month.

The night of the attack, witnesses said she was seen leaving a Kapiolani boulevard night club with a man who matched Griffin's physical description in a car like the one Griffin owned at the time, according to Takata and court records.

What jurors won't be told during the trial is that Griffin gave a DNA sample in 2004 because he was on parole for the 1980 murder of another young woman, Lynn Gheradi.

That information is being withheld as evidence in the Luka murder case because it has been ruled too prejudicial to Griffin's rights to a fair trial.

Griffin, a computer technician, was paroled in 1996.

The DNA collected from him in 2004 wasn't matched with evidence collected in the Luka case until 2007. He was then indicted on second-degree murder and first-degree sex assault charges.