HONOLULU — Crimes committed by state employees, accidents on public property and a couple Second Amendment challenges are contributing to settlements, judgments and other legal claims this year to cost Hawai‘i taxpayers $18.1 million.
The state Legislature on Wednesday approved payment of 41 claims against the state by passing House Bill 2340.
This year’s total compares with $25.7 million for 35 claims last year.
The total expense this year was going to be higher, but the state Department of the Attorney General recently withdrew an earlier request to fund a settlement of a wrongful conviction claim filed by Albert “Ian” Schweitzer, who in 2000 was convicted for the 1991 kidnapping, sexual assault and murder of Dana Ireland on Hawai‘i Island.
Schweitzer’s conviction was vacated in state court in 2023 after new forensic evidence was presented and a witness recanted prior testimony. In March, he filed a motion seeking to prove that he was innocent and had been wrongfully convicted. Under state law, someone imprisoned under a wrongful conviction can be awarded $50,000 for each year of confinement, making Schweitzer eligible for $1.15 million for the 23 years he spent incarcerated under a 130-year sentence.
The Attorney General’s Office indicated to lawmakers in testimony on April 3 that the case was settled for $800,000, then more recently said the case is no longer being settled at this time.
Of all the settled claims this year, the largest one is $3.9 million that stems from the death of 21-year-old motorist Joshua Banks after he crashed into the end of a guardrail on the H-3 Freeway four years ago.
According to the account of the case by the Attorney General’s Office, there was no crash-worthy end piece on the guardrail because it had been destroyed in a nonfatal crash 18 months earlier and replaced with a temporary “glove” not suitable for the speed of the site.
The account also said the state Department of Transportation did not seek to install a new end piece on the guardrail meeting Federal Highway Administration safety standards before the Banks accident.
“The DOT’s temporary repair and ‘glove’ remained on the subject guardrail when Mr. Banks’ accident occurred,” the Attorney General’s Office said in its account submitted to the Legislature. “His vehicle was speared by the ‘glove’ and the guardrail.”
The second-highest approved claim was $2.95 million to settle litigation over a bicycle accident in Kula, Maui, where David Lawrence hit a bump and crack in the road caused by tree roots and suffered a traumatic brain injury and fractures. The lawsuit alleged that the state had been notified of the hazardous condition and did not address it.
Abuse or negligence that harms Hawai‘i prison and jail inmates has been a perennial issue resulting in settlement payouts, and this year was no exception.
Lawmakers approved a $2 million settlement of a federal civil rights lawsuit filed by nine current or former female inmates at the Women’s Community Correctional Center on Oahu who alleged that they were sexually assaulted by four corrections officers. The state prosecuted the officers on sexual assault charges, and two of them pleaded guilty or no contest to the charges.
Tommy Johnson, director of the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said in written testimony on HB 2340, “DCR is committed to improving its operations to minimize cases that burden the State and to work with the attorney general in closing cases that are currently active.”
In another case involving criminal wrongdoing by a state employee, a $1.25 million settlement was approved to resolve a lawsuit filed by the victim of a sexual assault by former Department of Land and Natural Resources conservation and resources enforcement officer Ethan Ferguson.
Ferguson was sentenced to 10 years in prison for assaulting a 16-year-old girl at a Hawaii island beach park in 2016. The victim claimed that DLNR should not have hired Ferguson, given that he had been fired by the Honolulu Police Department in 2012 over misconduct. HPD recommended to the state Department of Human Resources Development, which does hiring work for state agencies, that Ferguson not be hired.
Two settled claims this year involved the Second Amendment. In one of these cases, two plaintiffs claimed in a 2022 federal lawsuit that Hawai‘i’s ban on carrying billy clubs violated the provision in the U.S. Constitution regarding a well regulated militia, security of a free State and the right of people to keep and bear arms.
The plaintiffs, Todd Yukutake and Justin Solomon, entered into a stipulated judgment with the Attorney General’s Office that included $50,000 for attorneys’ fees.
The other Second Amendment case also stemmed from a 2022 federal lawsuit. It was brought by Rodney Pagba, who claimed that he was wrongfully denied a firearm permit because of a misdemeanor third-degree assault conviction.
After the Legislature passed a bill in 2023 that changed a state law so that a misdemeanor violent crime conviction resulted in a 20-year firearms possession disqualification instead of indefinite disqualification, the Pagba lawsuit was settled for $5,707.
The smallest claim this year was for $27, and was among 16 miscellaneous claims to reissue outdated lost or misplaced checks totaling $895,296. The largest check amount was $360,000 claimed by the Hawai‘i County Fire Department.
