Dale Derrick Rodriguez Jr. on Thursday told jurors in his murder trial that he hit the victim with a curved metal pipe to protect himself and his family.

Rodriguez, 42, is on trial in the Dec. 9 bludgeoning death of a state parolee who was on the ground when the blows were delivered. Jesse Waikiki, 33, died from blunt force injuries of the face.

Rodriguez testified he was protecting himself, his fiance and his fiance’s teenage daughter when he used the pipe to hit Waikiki twice in the mouth.

Rodriguez told jurors he and Waikiki had never met before. Waikiki, he said, had knocked out his fiance, Nisa Harada, outside their home on Salt Lake Boulevard.

"It was loud; it was like a loud whack, like if you drop something heavy. Just a real loud bang, pop," Rodriguez said, describing the blow he said Waikiki delivered.

After Harada was knocked unconscious, Rodriguez said, Waikiki jumped up and down with his fists in the air. "Who else, who else?" Rodriguez said Waikiki stated, challenging those around him.

Rodriguez said he picked up a curved pipe that was part of some exercise equipment and held it up to ward Waikiki away from him, Harada and Harada’s 15-year-old daughter.

He said Waikiki backed away but told him, "If you miss, then I’m going to knock you out."

Rodriguez said the next thing he remembers is seeing Waikiki on the ground.

He said he was in shock and did not see that his neighbor had knocked Waikiki unconscious, putting him on his back.

"But I see (Waikiki) shaking his head to get back up, and I’m afraid he’s going to come back after us," Rodriguez said.

That’s when Rodriguez said he hit Waikiki in the lower jaw twice, "just to keep him down. I didn’t want him to come back towards us," he said.

Rodriguez said he did not intend to kill Waikiki and even hit him with the padded handle of the pipe.

At that point, Rodriguez said, he did not know who Waikiki was. It was only after he was arrested and charged with murder that he learned that Harada had been romantically involved with Waikiki.

Waikiki had been paroled five days earlier but before that was on work furlough release at Oahu Community Correctional Center. He had been serving a 15-year prison term for burglary, car break-in and car theft convictions.

It was while on furlough that Waikiki met Harada, whose job as a labor specialist is to help soon-to-be released state felons transition into the community and find them jobs, defense lawyer Michael Green had told the jury last month in the trial’s opening statements.