A former Waikoloa hotel worker who shot and killed his wife's longtime lover was found guilty Wednesday of second-degree murder in a Big Island courtroom.

A jury also found Lito Mateo guilty of using a firearm in the commission of a separate felony. The 56-year-old Mateo shot 38-year-old Tito Rafol 18 times with a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol in the parking lot of the Waikoloa Beach Marriott Resort & Spa on March 8, 2007.

Mateo will face a mandatory life sentence on the murder charge and could receive an additional 20 years imprisonment on the firearms charge. He's to be sentenced at 8 a.m. Feb. 4 by Hilo Circuit Judge Glenn Hara.


The jury, which was instructed to return Monday morning and to not talk to anyone about the case, will decide if the murder was committed in an especially "heinous, atrocious or cruel" manner, as prosecutors allege. If the panel finds that to be the case, Mateo could receive a life sentence without the possibility of parole.

Mateo sat in what appeared to be stunned disbelief after the verdict was announced.

Numerous people witnessed the shooting, which occurred during the shift change at around 4 p.m. Those witnesses included Mateo's wife, Cornelia, and Rafol's sister, Adoracion Acidera.

Mateo's attorney, Deputy Public Defender Michael Ebesugawa, argued that Mateo was under extreme mental or emotional disturbance, called "EMED," at the time of the shooting. He asked Hara to set aside the murder verdict, which the judge denied. Ebesugawa contended that the facts did not support a murder verdict and that a lesser conviction of manslaughter would have proper. Ebesugawa declined comment afterwards.

Deputy Prosecutor Darien Ching Nagata said the jury "applied the facts of the case to the law and came up with the correct verdict."

Mateo's sister, Tess Bruno of Waimea, said by phone that she was "shocked" by the verdict.

"He's a good man," Bruno said of her brother. "He cares for the family so much."

Mateo, a Filipino immigrant and a naturalized U.S. citizen, worked two full-time jobs. He was a landscaper by day at the Fairmont Orchid resort, and a steward in the Marriott's kitchen at night. Rafol and Mateo's wife both worked in the Marriott's housekeeping department.

Cornelia Mateo testified that she and Rafol had an affair that started in 1999. Testimony in the trial established that the Mateos' daughter, Dina, 26, had heard gossip about the affair since she was a student at Honokaa High School. The couple's oldest son, Henry, 28, a cook at the Marriott, had heard about it for at least two years.

Cornelia Mateo had repeatedly denied the affair to her husband, and also to Rafol's wife, Lee-Ann, who had confronted both her and Lito Mateo, separately.

Two psychologists and a psychiatrist testified that Mateo was distressed not only by his wife's infidelity and indiscretion, but also by Rafol's insistence in calling him "pukol," a derogatory Ilocano word meaning "cripple." Mateo was born with deformed hands.

Mateo also told the mental health professionals that he had received at least two notes about the affair in his locker at the Marriott, including one saying Cornelia Mateo and Rafol had been seen together at the Kona Seaside Hotel. He reportedly gave one of the notes to hotel security, one of whom said that he, in turn, passed it along to the Marriott's human resources department in January 2007. Mateo said he never heard anything about the note after that.

Hilo attorney Martin Berger has filed a wrongful death civil lawsuit on behalf of Lee-Ann Rafol and children Kaylee and Kyle, against Lito Mateo, Cornelia Mateo, Henry Mateo, the Marriott and others.

That suit, which is being heard by Kona Circuit Judge Elizabeth Strance, seeks unspecified damages and accuses Lito Mateo of "outrageous, wrongful, wanton, reckless, intentional, negligent, and grossly negligent actions."