An attorney representing the estate of the late Hawaiʻi crime boss Michael J. Miske Jr. is accusing federal prosecutors of trying to bilk Miske’s 9-year-old granddaughter out of her inheritance.
Federal prosecutors maintain that Miske purposefully overdosed on fentanyl he had smuggled into prison in late 2024 to prevent the government from seizing his assets. Because Miske died before he was sentenced, a judge was obligated to dismiss his case. But his suicide itself represents obstruction of justice, federal attorneys argue, and allows the government to take control of his $20 million estate.
In a filing on Monday, a lawyer for Miske’s trust called the government’s theory full of “fatal flaws” and that the time for asset forfeiture has long expired. If the government succeeds, the lawyer wrote, it would only harm an “innocent child who bears no responsibility for any of the conduct alleged.”
In July 2024, a jury found Miske guilty of 13 federal counts related to his operation of a vast criminal enterprise that engaged in drug trafficking, robberies and murder for hire. The same jury a week later decided to allow the government to take control of his properties, which included more than $20 million in houses, boats, cars, cash, artwork and other items prosecutors say were somehow connected to his crimes.
But when Miske was found dead in his cell of a drug overdose at Honolulu’s Federal Detention Center on Dec. 1, 2024 — about two months before he was scheduled to be sentenced — the government’s forfeiture process was halted.
In a court filing earlier this month, federal prosecutors for the first time accused Miske of conspiring with other inmates to have fentanyl smuggled into the facility. They said he started taking small amounts of the drug in the days leading up to his death to trick investigators into thinking he died of an accidental overdose and accused him of obstruction of justice and interfering with the forfeiture proceeding.
In an opposition brief filed Monday, the attorney for Miske’s trust, San Francisco-based lawyer Edward Burch, called the federal prosecutors’ assertion a “novel, unprecedented theory” made up to try to seize whatever assets they can.
“We are vigorously opposing the government’s attempt to advance a legal theory that no court in the country has ever recognized for good reason,” Burch said in a statement emailed to Civil Beat. “It goes against the letter and spirit of the law.”
An ‘Invented’ Theory, Lawyer Says
One reason federal prosecutors lobbed the new obstruction of justice accusation at Miske is to try to tie his properties to a more recent crime, Burch argued in his brief.
Civil forfeiture law says the government must file to seize assets within five years of discovering the crime to which the properties are supposedly tied. Federal investigators started investigating Miske for fraud as early as 2013, meaning more than 12 years had passed by the time prosecutors filed their forfeiture complaint in January 2025.
“The government missed its legal deadline to bring this case, and invented a new theory to work around it,” the brief says.
Burch also argues the government can only seize proceeds obtained as the result of obstruction of justice, per the Civil Forfeiture Reform Act. If Miske’s suicide is obstruction of justice in the government’s eyes, none of his properties were obtained as a result, the brief says. Nearly all of his assets were purchased between 2010 and 2020, years before his death in federal custody.
“The Trust did not receive these properties because Miske died; it continued to retain what it already held when the criminal forfeiture proceeding abated upon his death,” the brief says. “Retaining pre-existing property is not obtaining proceeds.”
What Burch called the government’s “doomed attempt” to take Miske’s property will only hurt one person — Miske’s 9-year-old granddaughter, who has been the beneficiary of his trust since 2016. She is the daughter of Miske’s late son, Caleb, and Caleb’s wife, Delia Fabro-Miske, who was charged with racketeering conspiracy for her role in the Miske enterprise and was sentenced in April 2025 to seven years in federal prison.
Taking away the assets would mean stripping the granddaughter of “the only long-term financial security she has,” Burch said in his filing.
Burch also questions the factual basis of federal prosecutors’ theory.
Prosecutors relied heavily on testimony from inmates incarcerated with Miske, who told investigators that Miske intended to kill himself to prevent the government from seizing his assets. The inmates told federal agents Miske conspired with a former inmate who was out on supervised release to get re-arrested and smuggle fentanyl into the facility.
Burch said the government relied on “dubious third-party statements” and pointed out that Miske isn’t alive to tell his side of the story or be cross-examined.
“The Trust is asked to litigate the most critical fact in the case — whether Miske’s death was intentional and motivated by a desire to obstruct forfeiture — with no ability to contest it through the person who would know,” the brief says.
U.S. Attorney Ken Sorenson declined to comment, citing the pending litigation.
Story originally published by Honolulu Civil Beat and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.
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