The parents of Peter Kema Jr., aka “Peter Boy,” are in police custody and have been charged with his murder.
Peter Kema Sr., 45, was arrested at 5:31 p.m. Thursday and charged with second-degree murder for the 1997 death of his 6-year-old son, according to Lt. Greg Esteban of the Hawaii Police Department’s Criminal Investigations Section. Kema was already in custody at the police cellblock, having been arrested earlier in the afternoon on a charge of driving without a license.
Kema’s 46-year-old wife, Jaylin Kema, had been taken into custody 17 minutes earlier on Silva Street near the Port of Hilo and also charged with second-degree murder.
A grand jury met Wednesday and indicted the couple. The jury’s work was completed too late in the day for a court to issue arrest warrants, so Hilo Circuit Judge Greg Nakamura set bail and issued the warrants Thursday afternoon.
During the hearing, Deputy Prosecutor Rick Damerville asked the judge to order Kema held without bail “or in the alternative, $500,000.”
“He has a prior record of burglary in the second degree in 1992, criminal trespass first in 2007, criminal contempt of court in 2007. He’s had multiple driving without a license charges and was, I believe, arrested this afternoon for a driving without a license charge,” Damerville told the judge.
Nakamura set bail at $500,000 and ordered Kema to have no contact with Jaylin Kema or with Peter Boy’s siblings, Allan Acol, Chauntelle (Acol) Woods and Lina Acol. Bail was set without prejudice, meaning prosecutors are free to file a motion requesting Kema be held without bail.
Damerville asked the judge for $150,000 bail for Jaylin Kema, and noted she has multiple convictions for shoplifting, contempt of court and failure to appear. He added that she’s facing a felony theft charge in a welfare fraud case, but is not a convicted felon.
“When we served the warrant on the house on the welfare fraud charges, we did find a firearm and drugs,” Damerville said. “In the state’s view, that’s an aggravating circumstance. … Her liability is primarily one as an accomplice. There is evidence that she has been, herself, a subject of abuse. That’s why her bail (request) is reduced.”
Nakamura granted the $150,000 bail and ordered that Jaylin Kema not have any contact with her children, who are all witnesses in the case.
The “Peter Boy” case is the most notorious missing child-turned-murder investigation in Hawaii history.
The abused Big Island boy went missing sometime in late spring or early summer 1997, and his mother didn’t officially report his disappearance until January 1998 after prompting by a social worker and police.
Peter Kema Sr. told authorities in August 1997 he left Peter Boy with a longtime family friend, “Aunty Rose Makuakane,” at Aala Park in downtown Honolulu.
Authorities couldn’t find any evidence the woman exists, didn’t believe Kema’s story, and found no plane tickets to corroborate his account.
When the boy’s disappearance became public, outrage about the story was palpable, and in the early 2000s, bumper stickers with the child’s face and the question “So where’s Peter?” were seen statewide.
In 2005, then-state Department of Human Services Director Lillian Koller released more than 2,000 pages of heavily redacted documents, with details of abuse allegedly suffered by Peter Boy and his siblings at the hands of Kema Sr.
The youngest, Lina Acol, who’s now an adult, told a psychologist in 1998, when she was 5, that she saw Peter Boy dead in a box, but also told the psychologist her brother was alive in Honolulu.
The psychologist noted the girl’s understanding of death was consistent with her age and could lead her to believe a person could become alive again after death.
The girl also told the psychologist Kema Sr. gave Peter Boy and her mother “dirty lickins,” which she described as punching, hitting and slapping, and that Peter Boy was tied up with chains and ropes.
When he was only 3 months old, Peter Boy was admitted to Hilo Hospital with multiple fractures, both new and healing, to his shoulder, elbow, ribs and knees. The older children were placed with their maternal grandparents, where they thrived. Peter Boy spent time between foster care and Jaylin Kema’s parents.
On July 25, 1994, Peter Boy was returned to his parents, despite warnings from several quarters that the Kemas were unfit, and almost 11 months later, the other children also were returned to the Kemas. The case was closed in October 1995.
In 1997, child welfare officials opened another investigation after a cousin said Peter Boy might have suffered a broken arm and was forced to eat dog feces.
That was about the same time the boy’s siblings said they last saw him alive.
County Prosecutor Mitch Roth noted Peter Boy would have turned 25 on Sunday.
He said the charges are the product of his promise that police and his office’s deputies and investigators would look at cold cases “with fresh eyes.”
“This is something we’ve said we planned on doing all along, and we’ve been doing that,” Roth said. Unopposed so far for re-election this year, he made the Peter Boy case and other cold cases a centerpiece of his 2012 campaign.
“We’ve had a couple of these cases (solved) already — (Daniel) DeJarnette, (Alexander) Gambsky. And we have some other … cases … getting ready to be set for grand jury as well,” he said.
DeJarnette, a retired Los Angeles Police Department homicide detective who lived in Ocean View, and Gambsky, an Orchidland Estates man, were convicted of manslaughter for the slayings of their wives, Yu DeJarnette and Dawn Mancilla Gambsky.
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
