Michael J. Buntenbah was ordered released from federal detention on Friday, October 9, after filing a secured mortgage for $500,000 with the clerk of the Federal District Court in Honolulu. Buntenbah was one of the 11 men named in a June 2020 indictment charging them with taking part in a variety of crimes under the direction of Honolulu businessman Michael Miske.

Although federal court documents refer to him as Michael Joseph Buntenbah, public records filed in the Bureau of Conveyances show he legally changed his name in March 2019 to Micheal Joseph Buntenbah Malone.

In the Miske case, Buntenbah/Malone is charged with “conspiracy to commit assault in aid of racketeering,” conspiracy to distribute and possession with intent to distribute cocaine, and a similar charge involving methamphetamine and oxycodone.

Buntenbah/Malone was initially ordered held without bail, but that order was overturned on appeal.

“The government acknowledged that Mr. Buntenbah, whom the Superseding Indictment does not name or charge in the main Miske Enterprise racketeering conspiracy of Count One, ‘is the least culpable’ among the 11 co-defendants and that he is ‘a minor player,'” his attorney successfully argued.

The court set bail at $500,000 and allowed a secured mortgage to be accepted in lieu of a cash bond. The court imposed a number of additional conditions, including GPS tracking. The mortgage provides that if he fails to comply with the conditions of bail, may foreclose and, in addition, will have an immediate right of receivership pending foreclosure.

He is the third of the defendants to be allowed release on bail pending trial.

The mortgage on Buntenbah’s family home at 45-170 Popoki Street in Kaneohe was filed with the court on Thursday afternoon, October 8, and he was ordered released the following day.

Real property records show the 4,149 home has eight bedrooms and 5-1/2 baths, with an assessed value for tax purposes of $1,358,400. However, it is encumbered by at least two existing mortgages. In June 2014, Buntenbah obtained a $395,000 mortgage loan from Honolulu Homeloans Inc., later assigned to First Hawaiian Bank, records show. He later took out a $225,000 line of credit from the Hawaii Central Federal Credit Union, which was reduced to a $100,000 credit limit in July 2019.

Real estate records show Buntenbah/Malone owns several other properties, including a one-acre agricultural lot in Hawaii’s Eden Roc Estates, and a 70% interest in 12-acres of agricultural land in Pepeekeo that includes a 3-bedroom 3-bath home.

Buntenbah/Malone still faces two felony assault charges stemming from a January 2016 assault in Miske’s M Nightclub. The case had been repeatedly postponed due to the federal investigation, and is now scheduled to go to trial in April 2021.