Closing Arguments In Futi Trial Start Monday

Soon it will up to a jury to decide whether Fremont resident Abraham Hade stabbed Osana Futi to death last April as part of a feud between a street gang and members of the Newark Memorial High School football team.

Newark parent and athletics supporter Stacy Kelly told Patch she has attended all 11 days of the trial in Oakland Superior Court and that she will be on hand Monday when the wrapup begins.

That's when prosecutor Elgin Lowe will summarize his case that Hade stabbed Futi on Hyde Park Drive in Fremont after a party on the night of April 28.

Defense attorney Tom Knutsen will argue that it was not Hade who stabbed Futi but a friend of the accused who was only 14 at the time of the murder.

During the trial Lowe argued that the teen was willing to risk taking the rap because, as a juvenile, he would face a lesser sentence in juvenile court than Hade faces as an adult.

Lowe alleged that Hade and the juvenile both belong to a branch of the Norteno gang called Fremont Mexican Territory.

Knutsen said Hade doesn't belong to the gang but allowed that he may know some gang members.

Although they differed on who wielded the blade, Lowe and Knutsen agreed that Futi's death stemmed from a feud between Newark Memorial football players and Norteno gang members.

That feud started when Futi's close friend and football teammate,  near the intersection of Cedar Boulevard and Birch Street in Newark at about 3:30 p.m. on Dec. 15, 2010.

That crime was still unsolved when Futi was stabbed.

Starting Monday the Futi case will be wrapped up and handed to jurors.

"You never know what a jury is thinking," Kelly said.