Prosecutors said Ueta Muasika was targeted because of his cousin’s deadly arson even though Muasika had no known role in it.
SAN MATEO, Calif. — A chain of retaliatory violence that began with a deadly 2019 house fire culminated in life-without-parole sentences for two men who prosecutors said sought revenge by killing a relative of the arsonist, a man authorities said had no involvement in the earlier crime.
The men, John Talia Paasi, 33, and Isileli Mahe, 34, were convicted in March of murdering Ueta Savelio Muasika Jr. outside his San Mateo home on Oct. 30, 2020. Muasika’s 2-year-old son was also struck by gunfire and survived. San Mateo County Superior Court Judge Michael K. Wendler later imposed life without the possibility of parole after the jury found that the defendants had lain in wait before the shooting. The sentences brought the two separate violent episodes — the arson and the later ambush — into their final trial-court context.
The first crime occurred in February 2019, when a fire was deliberately set at a San Mateo residence. Susana Tonga, Paasi’s elderly grandmother, died in the blaze. Authorities identified Fifita Tau, a cousin of Muasika, as the man responsible. Prosecutors said Tau had intended to target people he associated with a rival group but instead set fire to Tonga’s home. Tau was prosecuted and convicted. Paasi was among the people who survived the fire, according to later reporting on the retaliation case.
Police would eventually conclude that Tonga’s death supplied the motive for a separate act of violence more than a year later. Muasika was not accused of taking part in the fire, helping Tau or planning the arson. Investigators instead said the connection was familial: Tau was Muasika’s cousin. That distinction made the 2020 shooting a retaliation case in which prosecutors said responsibility for one person’s crime was effectively transferred to another member of the family. Police emphasized after the arrests that the attack on Muasika was both deliberate and personal.
On the morning of Oct. 30, 2020, Muasika was outside his home on the 1600 block of Eleanor Drive with his 2-year-old son. Authorities said he was preparing to take the child out and was near the family vehicle when the attack began. Prosecutors said Paasi and Mahe had waited for him before the gunfire. Fourteen shots were fired. Muasika was hit repeatedly and died in the driveway. His son was struck once in the face and was rushed to a trauma center. Police later reported that the child recovered.
The attack left investigators with two victims but no immediate arrests. San Mateo police spent about 18 months building the case, following evidence well beyond the city where the shooting occurred. By April 2022, detectives had identified Paasi and Mahe as suspects. Teams working with other law enforcement agencies arrested Paasi at a residence in Charlotte, North Carolina, and Mahe in Honolulu, Hawaii. Both arrests were made without incident, police said, and extradition proceedings brought the men back to California to face prosecution.
When authorities publicly announced the suspected motive, they drew a clear line between the earlier arson and Muasika’s conduct. Then-Police Chief Ed Barberini said the shooting appeared connected to Tonga’s death but described Muasika as the target of a personal, planned attack. Other investigators said they could not explain precisely why the defendants believed Muasika should answer for what Tau had done. The available evidence established the family relationship, not Muasika’s participation in the fire. That point remained important as prosecutors later presented retaliation as the motive at trial.
Years passed between the arrests and the jury verdict. At trial, the prosecution did not claim it could identify which man had physically fired the gun. Instead, prosecutors argued that both defendants joined in the plan and could be held responsible under California law even if jurors could not determine which one pulled the trigger. The jury agreed. After a 24-day trial, Paasi and Mahe were convicted of first-degree murder. Jurors also found the lying-in-wait special circumstance true and convicted the men of offenses related to the shooting of Muasika’s child.
The defense challenged both the evidence and the prosecution’s theory. Mahe’s attorney, Brandon Douglass, said before the verdict that his client had little connection to San Mateo County and no reason to want Muasika dead. He argued that Mahe was innocent and asked jurors to keep an open mind about the evidence. Paasi also denied responsibility and entered a not-guilty plea. Those positions remained part of the record even after the guilty verdicts, and Douglass has since said that he plans to pursue an appeal for Mahe.
At sentencing, Wendler denied motions seeking a new trial and imposed the punishment required by the convictions and special findings. Mahe was sentenced to life without parole plus six years. Paasi received life without parole plus 12 years, with his prior felony strike affecting his additional punishment. The court heard statements from five members of Muasika’s family, according to reporting on the hearing. Among them was Muasika’s son, who had been 2 when the attack happened and survived the gunshot wound.
The sentencing underscored the long reach of the original arson without changing who was legally responsible for each crime. Tau’s prosecution concerned the fire that killed Tonga. Paasi and Mahe’s prosecution concerned Muasika’s death and his son’s injuries. Prosecutors used the earlier case as evidence of motive, not as proof that Muasika shared responsibility for his cousin’s conduct. The distinction is central because authorities consistently said they found no evidence tying Muasika himself to the arson that set the later events in motion.
Muasika was 30 when he died and was also known locally by the rap name Juice Boi. His killing therefore became both a homicide investigation and a loss felt in his family and music community. Yet the most lasting public record of the attack may be the circumstance in which it occurred: a father beside his small child, targeted over an earlier crime committed by somebody else. His son’s survival placed that child at the center of the case from the first police response through the sentencing hearing years later.
The trial court case has now reached sentencing, but further legal proceedings are possible. Douglass has said Mahe will appeal. No later appellate decision has been reported. Unless a conviction or sentence is changed through that process, both men will remain imprisoned for life without the possibility of parole.
Author note: Last updated August 28, 2026.