This story comes to its own sad conclusion
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/682293.html
MURDERER WHO WAS GRANTIED LENIENCY DIES
Less than seven months ago, Osaiasi Saafi was in court on a murder charge, looking at 25 years. Then, a twist: The family of the young man he shot and killed asked the judge for leniency. They didn't want to see two young lives wasted. He got the minimum for second-degree murder: 10 years.
Now Saafi, age 31, is dead too.
The prison inmate died Friday at Alaska Regional Hospital after surgery earlier in the week for a neurological problem, said Richard Schmitz, a spokesman for the state Department of Corrections. He had family with him.
A childhood friend, Ma'o Tosi, said Saafi's parents had questions about how such a young man went so quickly. They didn't yet want to talk publicly about it, he said. They didn't even know anything was wrong until Thursday, he said.
"They're still having a hard time with everything," said Tosi, who was with the family at the hospital.
Saafi's lawyer, Rex Butler, was out of town on Friday when he heard the news. He was upset.
"What? Are you kidding me?" Butler said. "That doesn't make any sense to me." He said he was aware that Saafi had a neurological problem but thought it was under control. He said he would try to find out more.
Saafi was serving his sentence at Spring Creek Correctional Center in Seward but was transferred to a mental health unit at Cook Inlet Correctional Center in November for observation and testing, Schmitz said. He had been exhibiting behavioral problems.
A brain scan in January found an abnormality, a mass of some sort, Schmitz said. Saafi had surgery on Tuesday and came out of it, but then rapidly deteriorated, he said.
Schmitz said he didn't know when Saafi's family was notified of his condition but said generally, the prison system lets inmates decide when to contact family about illness, even a serious one.
Before Aug. 28, 2005, Saafi had no history of violence, no criminal record, not even a speeding ticket. He stepped in that day to protect his cousin from her husband, Josh Kagel, as they fought on Airport Heights Drive.
Kagel was high and threatened Saafi. Saafi came out of the house with a gun, fired into Kagel seven times. At the trial, Butler argued that it was self defense. A jury called it second degree murder.
At the sentencing, Kagel's father and sister saw something in Saafi. They asked the judge to show him mercy, give him the lightest sentence possible.
"The feeling that my dad and I had when we left the courtroom that day was unexplainable and empowering," Shayna Kagel said Friday. She thought that Saafi had a chance to make something of himself one day, maybe work with troubled teens like his friend Tosi.
She's upset about his death. She feels for his family. She's glad she forgave him.
Saafi was supposed to get out in 2012.