Accused Mills Killer Pleads Not Guilty

Laungatasi Samana Ahio, 21, charged with stabbing Jared Afu to death at Mills High School, plead not guilty on Wednesday to murder and knife charges, according to the Daily Journal of San Mateo.

Ahio's trial is scheduled for March 12, 2012. He is eligible for the death penalty or life in prison without parole.

Ahio and Afu confronted each other over personal matters at the Mills High tennis courts on the night of Aug. 4, 2010. Ahio is accused of stabbing Afu repeatedly in the face. He then allegedly fled the scene.

The police report summary alleges that a blood trail led to a church where a backpack with a bloody knife and the accused's identification was found.

Ahio surrendered himself the next day, Aug. 5, to the South San Francisco police Department. "The parents convinced him that he had to turn himself in, and they came in with him," said San Mateo District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe

At a pre-trial hearing on June 8, a friend of the victim, Brittney Bugarski, 21, testified that “the one who stabbed him,” meaning who stabbed Afu, sat on the same bench with his back turned to Afu and his friends for several minutes before he got up and appeared to punch Afu in the face.

She didn’t identify Ahio as the attacker, but she did say that Afu attempted to run and that he was pursued by his attacker and apparently punched several more times while his attacker said, “you shouldn’t have (messed) with my wife.”

- Alex Farr contributed to this report