State Circuit Judge Michael Wilson sentenced Less Schnabel Jr. on Tuesday to 10 years in prison — the maximum allowed for first-degree assault — for killing a prospective University of Hawaii law student in 2007 with one punch.
When he pleaded guilty in January, Schnabel, 27, agreed to the sentence in a deal with the prosecutor and to spend at least eight years of it behind bars before he is eligible for parole.
In 2008, Schnabel was sentenced to 20 years in prison after a state jury found him guilty of manslaughter. The parole board told him he would have to serve 18 years behind bars before he would be eligible for parole. The Hawaii Supreme Court overturned the manslaughter conviction last year because of improper statements the prosecutor made to the jurors in the trial’s closing arguments and because the trial judge allowed the prosecutor to present evidence from Schnabel’s juvenile criminal record.
On Tuesday, Wilson read into the record portions of letters from people who submitted statements about Schnabel’s victim, 34-year-old North Carolina native Christopher Reuther. One of the letters was from Reuther’s sister Heather Litton.
In her letter, Litton said her brother had decided to attend law school on scholarship at Tulane University but went to Hawaii at her insistence to check out UH’s William S. Richardson School of Law, which had also offered him a scholarship.
Reuther arrived in Hawaii on April 22, 2007, for an orientation at UH the following day. That night he went to Zablan Beach Park in Nanakuli, where he planned to camp.
A man who was camping there with friends said in trial testimony that Reuther looked out of place as soon as he pulled into the parking lot in his rental car, a red Ford Mustang convertible. The man said he and his friends advised Reuther to stay close to their tent because they regarded parts of the beach park dangerous.
Reuther went back to the parking lot where he encountered Schnabel, who, after striking a threatening pose for Reuther’s camera, told him to leave. Reuther was packing his belongings in his car when Schnabel punched him on the side of the head. Reuther died two days later.
