A lawyer who represented Juan Baron when he pleaded guilty to the 2022 murder, theft and ID theft of 73-year-old Hawaii Loa Ridge resident Gary Ruby took the stand Friday at a hearing on Baron’s motion to withdraw his plea.

Baron alleged that because of his lack of fluency in English, he did not understand what his attorneys meant when they said he would die in prison if he did not take the plea deal.

Kyle Dowd, formerly an associate with the law firm of Myles S. Breiner, said he had a Spanish-language interpreter with him who read the change-of-plea form and attached documents at the Oahu Community Correctional Center, but did not have one when he and Breiner met to discuss the plea deal March 7.

Baron, a 25-year-old Colombian native who had been living in Texas prior to coming to Hawaii in 2022, testified in October he thought they meant he would be sent to the electric chair after a number of years in prison.

He said his prior attorneys did not tell him Hawaii had neither the death penalty nor the electric chair.

The plea agreement meant Baron would admit to the crimes in exchange for the state not asking the court for extended sentencing. An extended sentence would have meant life without the possibility of parole.

Dowd said he explained to Baron that 1) “he would never get out of custody for the rest of his life, and 2) he would never be able to return to his original country of birth, nor see his mother outside of custody.”

Dowd testified he did not say Hawaii had the death penalty or the electric chair.

Dowd also testified that he and Breiner discussed with Baron that Ruby’s brother and niece wanted the death penalty and that they might show up to the Hawaii Paroling Authority hearing or at least write in to ask for the highest minimum available.

“You had discussions with Mr. Baron about that desire by the decedent’s family?” asked Randall Hironaka, Baron’s court-appointed attorney who replaced Dowd and Breiner.

“Correct,” Dowd replied.

Dowd said Baron’s mother retained Breiner’s firm in April 2022 for a fixed retainer fee.

The scope of the representation of services was “to engage in plea negotiations with the government and also to investigate, possibly file and litigate a motion to suppress statements he made to law enforcement in Los Angeles,” Dowd said.

Baron had fled to California and was caught hiding on a bus in Anaheim. He confessed to Los Angeles Police Department detectives regarding the crimes he committed, even detailing strangling Ruby, placing him in a bathtub in Ruby’s house and adding bags of cement to cover the body.

Dowd testified that after assessing the case, including the statements to Honolulu police and particularly to Los Angeles detectives in March 2022, they were concerned that the statements could be admissible at trial.

When asked why Dowd did not file a motion to suppress, he said he was of the opinion that Bell asked whether the firm of Myles S. Breiner was to take this case to trial.

“Not as originally contracted,” Dowd said. “I cannot recall that additional fees could be contracted later for trial. There was an explicit understanding that we were not to take this case to trial.”

Baron was indicted on the murder and theft charges April 13, 2022, and the Myles S. Breiner firm was substituted in for counsel in May 2022.

Dowd said he and Breiner spoke with the mother initially by phone from Texas, and she later came to their Honolulu office.

He said the firm never filed a motion to suppress the statements, but did file an opposing memorandum to the state’s motion of the voluntariness of Baron’s statements.

Upon learning of the actions of the original deputy prosecutor’s misconduct of sharing photographs of this case to members of the public, the Breiner firm chose to file a motion to dismiss the case or, in the alternative, disqualify the deputy prosecutor and the Department of the Prosecuting Attorney.

Dowd said that the action of the deputy prosecutor had the potential of influencing the right to a fair and impartial jury. They requested the deputy prosecutor be disqualified or have the entire department be disqualified, which would have meant the Department of the Attorney General would take over the case.

Dowd testified he told Baron it was unlikely the entire case would be dismissed but that it could result in extensive jury screening processes or in a rare change of venue to try the case in a different circuit.

Baron denied that his attorneys told him the motion was done to gain leverage in plea negotiations. He said the only time he was told it was unlikely the court would dismiss the entire case was when they showed him the plea deal.

Dowd testified that in the midst of litigating the motion to dismiss, the government made a counteroffer. Several months passed while the state considered the defense’s proposed plea offer from Oct. 17, 2023.

That offer was for essentially a maximum 20-year sentence.

That offer was rejected because Deputy Prosecutor Ayla Weiss wanted to first litigate the motion to dismiss.

No counteroffer was extended until Weiss sent Breiner a letter March 4, and Breiner and Dowd went to Baron in person to discuss it and presented him with their March 7 letter with footnotes that referenced documents to which Baron had access.

Dowd said they recommended he accept the government’s counter offer to give up the sentence of life without parole and a joint recommendation to the Hawaii Paroling Authority of a 20-year minimum sentence.

He said he did not use the March 15 deadline to accept the deal to pressure, threaten or coerce Baron to accept, because prosecutors’ deadlines for proposed plea offers or counteroffers “are somewhat soft.”