After deliberating for more than four hours last week, a SeaTac Municipal Court jury found Vili Fualaau guilty of driving under the influence of alcohol.

A sentencing date will be set following a presentence investigation.

Fualaau, whose name has made international headlines since 1997, was arrested on Dec. 22, 2006, around 12:20 a.m. while driving on Des Moines Memorial Drive.

He was pulled over for speeding after a SeaTac police officer observed him going 55 miles per hour in a 35 mph zone, then was arrested after the officer smelled alcohol and noticed poor coordination by Fualaau.

“The way he (Fualaau) was looking at me, talking to me, just didn’t have the coordination,” the police officer who arrested him testified during the trial before Judge Elizabeth Bejarano.

Although a breath test was taken at the time of his arrest, it was dismissed as evidence earlier because the state Supreme Court has ruled it is unconstitutional to use breath tests as evidence in court.

Fualaau declined to take a field sobriety test at the officer’s request.

Fualaau’s trial began with jury selection on April 26, and concluded with the verdict on April 28.

The only evidence introduced by City Prosecutor Jeffery Brown was testimony by the police officer and a state toxicologist.

Fualaau, who did not testify in his defense, garnered international notoriety when his former sixth-grade-teacher Mary Kay Letourneau was convicted of raping him and served seven years in prison.

Letourneau and Fualaau have two children. They married last year after she was released from prison. They live in Normandy Park.

Letourneau did not appear in the courtroom and was not asked to testify.

Fualaau, the police officer testified, admitted to drinking that night, starting at 6:30 p.m. and having his last drink at 11:30 p.m. He consumed four shots of hard liquor and two beers during that time.

He was driving north on Des Moines Memorial Drive to take his brother home when he was pulled over.

The officer testified that Fualaau first handed him a bank card with his picture on it when asked for his driver’s license and registration, and gave the officer the title for the car instead of the registration.

Fualaau told the officer there was no alcohol in the car, but after an officer’s search three bottles of beer -- two of them opened -- were found under the passenger seat.

The officer also testified that Fualaau’s eyes were bloodshot and bulgy, which he told the jury is an indicative sign that someone has been drinking.

His eyes were not the same the day of the trial as the night he was pulled over, said the officer.

“Speeding is not indicative of someone under the influence,” argued defense attorney Scott Stewart. “People who are under the influence usually slow down.”

The officer followed Fualaau for half a mile and he never crossed the fog line or the center line, said Stewart. He pulled over the way he was supposed to on the right side of the road.

Stewart also noted that he was speeding in a warehouse district, a popular place for young people to race.

“You can have more impaired judgment because you’re 22 (years of age) and in a warehouse district that if you’re under the influence of alcohol,” Stewart said.

He claimed a lack of evidence by the city was a reason not to find Fualaau guilty.

But, countered Brown, “Even if it feels uncomfortable to find someone guilty ... you have to do it, you are under oath to do it.”

The trial again attracted national attention, with reporters and a photographer from People magazine in the courtroom.

In addition to a report on Fualaau’s trial in its May 5 issue, People also will feature an interview with the couple to mark their first wedding anniversary.