Prosecutors and defense attorneys squared off during a hearing in federal court on the morning of Tuesday, August 11, 2020 to determine whether Michael John Miske, Jr., owner of Kamaaina Termite and other local businesses, would be released on bond or held in Honolulu’s Federal Detention Center until the trial on charges that he controlled and directed a sprawling and violent racketeering organization over much of the past 20 years.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Inciong left no doubt about where he stood.

…in my 16 years as an AUSA here in this district, there is no defendant, in my opinion, that has posed a greater danger to this community than Mr. Miske.

And nor do I believe that there’s ever been a case brought in this district such as the RICO conspiracy that is the subject of this superseding indictment. And what separates it — there have been other RICO cases, I know, in the past, but what separates this case is the scope and breadth of the crimes that were committed in furtherance of the enterprise.

Tom Otake, co-counsel heading Miske’s defense team, reacted sharply.

They can come in here and say what they want. Those are just statements from a U.S. Attorney. And by the way, improper statements by U.S. Attorneys to talk about his personal opinion about how in 15 years this is the most dangerous person he’s ever dealt with. If we want to talk about personal opinions as attorneys, you know, I can do that too, but that’s not how we’re supposed to do it.

Inciong, given an opportunity to fire back, said his comments weren’t just pulled out of thin air, but were based on a federal grand jury’s finding of “probable cause” when they returned indictments in this case.

Inciong’s view was eventually backed by Magistrate Judge Kenneth Mansfield, who ruled “that there is insufficient evidence to overcome the presumption of detention” triggered by two drug charges and one weapons charge which each carry a mandatory minimum 10-year sentence if convicted.

A transcript of the 70-minute hearing was publicly released last week. Although it doesn’t contain any dramatic new revelations, it does provide additional details of both the government’s case and Miske’s expected defense.

Inciong noted that Miske had been on pretrial release during most of the period from May 2013 until his arrest in July 2020, while he was awaiting trial on a state felony assault charge stemming from a physical attack on a rival promoter outside the M Nightclub in December 2012. Miske had been quickly released after posting a $350,000 bond one day after charges were filed.

The case was dismissed “without prejudice” in May 2016 by then-Circuit Court Judge Rom Trader after prosecutors missed the “speedy trial” deadline, but the charges were refiled within weeks, and Miske was again released pending trial after reposting the $350,000 bond.

This meant that Miske was out on bail pending trial during the period in in which prosecutors allege he directed a murder-for-hire plot that resulted in the death of Jonathan Fraser, as well as alleged murder conspiracies that targeted a Waimanalo man suspected of providing information to law enforcement, and Lindsey Kinney, who has publicly said had declined an offer to Kill Fraser which he understood had been relayed to him from Miske.

This is important, the government said in their motion to keep Miske behind bars, because “whether, at the time of the current offense or arrest, the person was on probation, on parole, or on other release pending trial,” is a factor the court is required to consider when deciding whether continued detention is appropriate.

Inciong went on to say prosecutors have identified “over two dozen victims” of assaults by Miske or by others at his direction, or threatened by Miske. These cases are documented in police reports, Inciong said.

“You have to ask, I mean, how many were not reported,” Inciong then said.

And, according to the transcript, Inciong said “there is evidence that he was contacting and making very thinly veiled threats if not outright threats to witnesses as late as the fall of 2018,” although by that time Miske had clear evidence he was the target of a major federal investigation.

Inciong then turned to the government’s view of Miske’s financial resources. Following his arrest, Miske has been barred from accessing his personal or business bank accounts. However, “the Government does not believe that is has seized all of Mr. Miske’s assets, by any stretch.”

He pointed to Miske’s statement in two loan applications that he had invested approximately $11.5 million into his oceanfront home in Portlock which had been purchased for $2.35 million in 2010. Two banks turned down the loan applications “because the lenders came up with the same exact conclusion that the IRS investigators in this case did, and that the $11.5 million that Miske stated he had used from his business, income specifically, was his statement, that could not reconciled with the tax returns that he had filed.”

Finally, Inciong turned to prosecutor’s allegation that Miske attempted to hide his continued ownership of Kamaaina Termite and other businesses by changing their business registrations filed with the State of Hawaii and replacing his name with others as a way of shielding his continued ownership and control of the companies.

Miske’s attorneys have challenged that notion, saying Miske was not trying to hide his ownership, and had simply “employed qualified individuals as corporate officers.”

Inciong seized on the appointment of Delia Fabro-Miske as the sole officer and director of Kamaaina Termite and Pest Control in late 2016 as an example of the switch in corporate officers. She was a 2012 high school graduate who had been married to Miske’s son and only child, Caleb Miske, who died in March 2016 as a result of injuries received in a high-speed crash months earlier.

Well, if they’re referring to Delia Fabro-Miske, I would say that that couldn’t be further from the truth. On October 31 of 2016, which is right around the same time where this text message of Mr. Miske saying he was going to go dark to his accountant took place, Ms. Fabro-Miske, who is his daughter-in-law, submitted documents to the State of Hawaii, Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs that removed Mr. Miske from the State records affiliated with Kamaaina Termite and Pest Control, and stated that Fabro-Miske was then, from that point forward, the only board member of KTPC acting in the capacity of president, vice-president, secretary, treasurer and director.

She was approximately 21 years old at the time and was being paid $14 an hour, and there are text messages between Ms. Fabro-Miske and the accountant, at the time, where Ms. Fabro-Miske wanted to make sure that she was not going to be making more than $14 an hour. In fact, she asked that her salary or her wage be lowered to be $10 an hour, so that she could still get Social Security survivor benefits.

Inciong said Fabro-Miske would not be someone considered qualified to be a corporate officer, much less the business’ sole officer and director.

I can say, based on personal experience, that Miske was indeed attempting to hide his continued ownership of Kamaaina Termite and other businesses.

Back in March 2018, I wrote a column that appeared in Civil Beat, in which I described Miske as the owner of Kamaaina Termite.

I later described what happened next in a blog post (“Alleged gang leader tried to hide ownership of legitimate businesses to hamper federal probe“).

On the morning the column appeared on the Civil Beat website, an email from Adrian Kamalii, a public relations consultant representing Miske, denied the businessman had any ownership interest in Kamaaina Termite. Kamalii had previously appeared before the Hawaii Kai Neighborhood Board to publicly defend the tree lighting proposal.

“This is a request to edit your article or retract the company name from your blog post in Civil Beat today,” Kamalii wrote. “Mike Miske is not the owner of KTPC as explicated in their DCCA filings. Would appreciate the accuracy and having the named removed, if possible. KTPC has nothing to do with this story.”

Kamalii repeated his demand in a series of emails.

Pressure from Kamalii finally pushed Civil Beat to remove the reference to Miske’s ownership of the company, as it was not essential to the main point of the story. In retrospect, though, Kamalii’s actions, as Miske’s representative, make clear the intent to cover up his continued ownership of the businesses, even as federal reviews of his and the businesses tax returns continued to show he was their sole owner.

Miske’s attorneys, Thomas Otake and Lynn Panagakos, did their best to deflect prosecutors’ arguments, describing Miske as a good citizen who supported charitable causes, ran a reputable pest control company that received good customer reviews, and whose only criminal record was from years far in the past.

Otake pointed out that although Miske knew that he was under investigation for acts that included the murder of Jonathan Fraser, he did not use his substantial financial resources to disappear. Instead, instead of fleeing in the face of investigation, Mr. Miske prepared, hired attorneys, hired forensic accountants, got letters of support…The letters of support say a lot, Your Honor. They tell you about his ties to the community, the person that he is.”

And so since in 2017, it was very clear that that’s what the Government was looking into. Mr. Miske knew what the penalties of that would be, and he didn’t flee in the face of that. What did he do? He stayed. He hired attorneys, myself and Ms. Panagakos. He hired Ken Hines to do a forensic accounting. You don’t do that if you’re guilty or you’ve been using your business to funnel illegal funds. You don’t ask a 25-year IRS agent to come in and do a deep dive into all of that. That would be crazy.

He didn’t flee. He hired attorneys. He prepared.

In the end, these arguments were not enough to sway Magistrate Judge Mansfield, who granted the state’s motion to keep Miske in detention until trial.

He and several co-defendants have now been in custody for about 28 months. Their trial is scheduled to proceed in April 2023.