Eric Thompson, on trial for fatally shooting acupuncturist Jon Tokuhara on Jan. 12, 2022, six months after his wife confessed to an affair with the victim, offered testimony last week in an attempt to refute prosecution claims that he was a controlling man.
Thompson said it was his wife Joyce’s idea to grant him custody of their only child in the event of a divorce in an agreement she signed just 11 days before her ex-lover was slain. Tokuhara was found by his mother Jan. 13, 2022, on the floor of his Waipahu clinic with four gunshot wounds to his face from a .22-caliber firearm.
“It was a huge relief,” Thompson said when asked by defense attorney Nelson Goo how he felt about the post-nuptial agreement. “It made me a lot more secure, made me less worried about our futures … . There wouldn’t be so much anxiousness. I think Joyce wanted to show me she was just as committed as I was to working on the relationship.”
Thompson said that in August 2021, a month after his wife admitted to the affair, the couple went to a legal service to have the document drawn up, but it was not ready until December 2021. He denied being angry about the situation.
Deputy Prosecutor Benjamin Rose said in his opening statement that Thompson forced his wife to confess the affair to her parents, prevented his wife’s siblings from seeing their niece, and carefully planned and nearly executed the perfect murder.
Rose pointed out inconsistencies in Thompson’s current testimony from his testimony in his 2023 murder trial, which ended in a mistrial when jurors failed to reach a unanimous verdict.
In last week’s testimony, Thompson repeatedly said that during their 15-year relationship, which included five years of marriage, they had their ups and downs, including multiple miscarriages. In his previous testimony, he said there had been only one miscarriage, in 2018.
At the recommendation of Kathy Tanita Ohama, a friend and the couple’s high school Spanish teacher, Joyce Thompson sought treatment for infertility from Tokuhara, an acupuncturist who offered a “happy baby treatment,” Eric Thompson testified.
He said he went once in 2017 to Tokuhara for carpal tunnel syndrome but doesn’t remember how to get there or park since his wife drove, nor did he recall the office layout.
“All I remember is I didn’t go back,” he said.
Joyce Thompson got pregnant following the treatments, but her husband said he was disappointed when she was not as enthusiastic as he was after the birth of their daughter, Emma, in June 2020. He said his wife “wasn’t herself for awhile” and that he should have paid more attention to her.
He became suspicious in July 2021 when Joyce asked him more than once to watch their daughter while she went to dinner with family friends. Thompson said he “kept pushing” his wife for an answer after reviewing home video surveillance of her walking out toward the highway in the middle of the night while he was on a work trip.
He said he was “in complete shock” when he learned of the affair.
“I was sad at first … I was pissed. … . What did I do to deserve this? … I was angry at Joyce and Mr. Tokuhara. He knew the story of all the miscarriages. Why would you try to help us just to blow it up later?”
Thompson said he never called Tokuhara, even if he wanted to tell him off. “That doesn’t do anything,” he said.
“In retrospect, I wasn’t there for her” before and after their baby was born, he said, calling himself a workaholic.
He denied trying to regain control over his wife by making her sign the agreement to give up custody of their daughter and their East Honolulu house if they divorced. He also said he had his wife tell her parents about the affair because they must have been wondering about her frequent visits and stays at their home.
He said he didn’t trust Danny and Kelly Yeh, his wife’s siblings, because he thought they knew about the affair, but he didn’t admit to preventing them from seeing his daughter until Rose pressed him.
Rose asked again, “You told Joyce you didn’t want Emma to be around Kelly?”
“Yes, I told her,” Thompson said.
The prosecutor also questioned him about his prior testimony that the couple was “inseparable” and “did pretty much everything together” during and after high school, and felt their “identities became one,” “like they were married from Day 1.”
“I might have said that,” he said.
Thompson testified this time around that they had separate interests and did separate things.
The defendant was also questioned about his Chevy Silverado pickup truck and the timing of a trip on the day of the shooting that he said he took to dump a load of bricks at the Waimanalo Convenience Center.
The prosecution earlier showed surveillance video of a Chevy Silverado similar to Thompson’s near Tokuhara’s clinic, claiming the defendant had removed a metal toolbox from the truck bed to disguise the vehicle.
Thompson used a photo of himself the day before the shooting, Jan. 11, 2022, to show him cleaning spilled resin out of his toolbox, which he said he removed from the bed. He testified that on the day of the shooting, he left his house at 5:23 p.m. to head to Waimanalo, but the state contends that’s when he left for Tokuhara’s clinic.
Thompson said he arrived at the convenience center just before the 6 p.m. closing, making the trip in about 30 minutes. He said it wasn’t busy, he got the nod to proceed, and returned home at 6:48 p.m.
He said that after dinner and a shower, he played with his daughter outside, lighting propane tiki torches that initially sputtered from nonuse.
The state’s fire expert said the fluctuating glow appeared to be from a burning fire, not from tiki torches. Police recovered a pot inside a wheelbarrow at the home that had obvious signs of burning at high heat, which the state contends was used to destroy evidence, possibly clothes worn by Thompson as a disguise.
Earlier in the trial, the prosecution presented the surveillance video that showed a Silverado truck near Tokuhara’s clinic and also an unidentified man wearing a white Quiksilver bucket hat, gray windbreaker, sunglasses, a face covering, dark pants and shirt, holding a paper bag, walking around toward the rear entry of the business.
Thompson said he put the toolbox back that night in preparation for a job at his brother’s house the next day, Jan. 13, 2022.
His brother, Michael, testified Feb. 7 that Thompson talked to him a week prior about installing a door, purchased months before. Thompson called that morning, asking if he was going to be home and installed it. His brother said he saw nothing unusual about Thompson’s demeanor.
The defendant denied killing Tokuhara.
When Goo asked, “How do you feel being accused of this murder?” Thompson replied, “I’ve had to relive this so many times, so many ways. It’s way worse than an affair.”
