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Defense rests case in trial over Maui woman’s 2014 slaying

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COURTESY MAUI POLICE DEPARTMENT

Carly “Charli” Scott

WAILUKU » Attorneys for a Maui man on trial for murder in the death of his pregnant ex-girlfriend have rested their case after the suspect decided not to testify.

Steven Capobianco’s defense team concluded its case Tuesday, allowing prosecutors to call a witness to testify, The Maui News reported.

Capobianco, 27, has pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder for the death of Carly “Charli” Scott and an arson charge related to her vehicle. Capobianco has said he saw Scott on the evening of Feb. 9, 2014, when her family says she went missing, but that he had nothing to do with her disappearance.

Forensic anthropologist Nicholas Passalacqua testified about the 27-year-old victim’s body parts, which were found by police in Nuaailua Bay on east Maui after searchers found some of Scott’s clothes there.

Passalacqua said the marks on Scott’s lower right jawbone were cut marks, with one mark indicative of someone “using a knife in a sawing motion.”

His testimony served as a rebuttal to remarks by defense witness Dr. Michael Laufer, who was called to the stand on Nov. 10. Laufer said marks on the jawbone were caused by the teeth of an animal, possibly a wild boar weighing 150 to 200 pounds.

Passalacqua said, however, that he didn’t “observe any evidence of carnivore damage to this mandible.”

During trial Tuesday, Circuit Judge Joseph Cardoza denied a prosecution request to introduce the results of DNA testing on a pair of blue jeans found over a guardrail along Hana Highway. DNA from blood stains on the jeans was matched to Scott and a black hair found in a pocket of the jeans was matched to Capobianco.

Cardoza ruled the evidence, which the prosecution worked for more than two and a half years to obtain, couldn’t be presented based on the timing.

3 responses to “Defense rests case in trial over Maui woman’s 2014 slaying”

  1. Keonigohan says:

    GUILTY! MAXIMUM sentence possible!
    Hopefully Big House BUBBA will shorten his sentence.

  2. bluebowl says:

    Send him to New Mexico after the guilty verdict. Calling on your ex girlfriend to help you with “car trouble “. And to have you say you have so many friends on Maui. WHY didn’t you call a man to help you? POS

    • Carang_da_buggahz says:

      He probably didn’t want to get saddled with child support payments for the next 18 years. Instead, the taxpayers get to pay his “room and board” for the next 60 years….okay, okay. I know this is da Aina. 2 years maybe?

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