After Lāhainā fire ruled ‘accidental,’ survivors still want accountability, compensation

After losing their family home and the town where they all grew up, Shayne Nameaaea Hoshino and his family filed a lawsuit seeking compensation and accountability from big landowners, the government and utility companies for the August 2023 wildfire.

Now, more than a year after the fire, Hoshino and others say they are still waiting for justice for the alleged negligence by multiple parties.

But their hopes of getting someone to take the responsibility were dashed after an independent report by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which was released to the public on Wednesday by the Maui Fire Department, ruled the Lahaina fire as “accidental”.

“The people who were there, who saw the devastation, the families are not going to be alright with it,” Hoshino said of the report. “They’re going to have a lot of mixed emotions. Hearing the announcement to me was like yeah, I would’ve expected that. … These guys were never going to give us justice of whose fault it was.”

The ATF report pinpointed the cause of the fire as a downed Hawaiian Electric power line that sparked a fire in dry brush on the morning of Aug. 8, 2023. Maui County firefighters believed the blaze was extinguished, but unknown “smoldering material” in a gulch reignited it later that afternoon, burning down more than 2,200 structures and taking 102 lives, with two people still missing.

Personal injury attorney John Yamane, a partner with Honolulu firm Leavitt, Yamane and Soldner who represents more than 800 families affected by the Lāhainā and Kula fires, disagreed that the fire was accidental, saying that years of overgrown brush and inadequate steps taken beforehand made it “a tragedy waiting to happen.”

“That’s what the people that caused the problem say: ‘Oh, it was an accident’,” Yamane said. “It was not an accident. All the warning signs were there, and the responsible parties did not pay attention, and they were asleep at the wheel.”

Several parties already have agreed to pay portions of a proposed $4 billion settlement. While Hawaiian Electric is on the hook for about half of it, other contributors will be the State of Hawai‘i, Maui County, Kamehameha Schools, West Maui Land Co., Hawaiian Telcom and Spectrum/Charter Communications. But the settlement is tied up in court. 

Hawaiian Electric, which has previously confirmed its line sparked the morning fire but disputed its responsibility for the afternoon fire, expressed remorse on Wednesday. But HECO said all reports up to this point “make clear that the devastation in Lāhainā resulted from a combination of many factors and the actions of many parties.”

“We deeply regret that our operations contributed to the fire that ignited in the morning,” the company said in a statement. “Confronted by an extraordinary weather event and a chaotic situation, our employees brought their best efforts to their jobs, as they do every day.”

HECO also pointed to the more than $110 million it’s investing in strengthening its equipment against extreme weather, managing vegetation and deploying devices, including 78 artificial intelligence-enabled fire detection cameras and 52 weather stations.

Maui Fire Chief Brad Ventura told reporters on Wednesday the department is confident the firefighters did everything they could that day in the face of strong winds and other challenging conditions.

“They went above what they should have gone above and beyond in normal days to protect the community as best as they can, and at the end of the day, a fire captain or an officer has all of his senses to make a determination when to leave the scene, and he determined that the fire to be as safe as possible for the community,” Ventura said. “We stand behind them on their decision.”

Ventura also said the department had no indicators that the fire cause would have been “something negligent or anything of that nature.”

The ATF also backed the department’s actions.

“I believe that Maui Fire Department did everything possible to extinguish the morning phase of that fire,” said Jonathan Blais, special agent in charge of the ATF’s Seattle Field Division, which covers Hawai’i. “They deployed countless resources, spent an extensive amount of time on scene, and observed the scene after they believed it was extinguished.”

Previewing the report in an interview with KHON2 earlier this week, Hawaiʻi Gov. Josh Green cast a wide net: “I don’t think you’re going to find a single point of blame, per se. I think everyone has responsibility.” 

Yamane said it’s “hard to say” whether the evidence is enough to bring criminal charges. He pointed out that guilt in criminal cases needs to be proved “beyond a reasonable doubt,” while civil cases just need to show “that it is more likely than not.” 

“Now I know in California they did bring criminal charges, but this is Hawai’i, right?” Yamane said. “The governor’s probably not going to let the public utility face criminal charges. He’s trying to do what he can to save the company and also find fair compensation for the victims.”

Lance Collins, a longtime Maui attorney who also is representing fire survivors with Malama Law Group, said even if the fire was accidental, “it could still be your responsibility to have avoided the harm to other people.” Regardless, that won’t determine the allocation fire survivors get. He said that is based on the damages they each faced, from the loss of a home or business to a harrowing evacuation. 

Yamane, Collins and other attorneys are waiting for the Hawai’i Supreme Court to decide whether insurance companies should be paid out first. 

In the meantime, families are struggling to find the funds to rebuild and move on.

Kelcy Durbin’s family lost the Waine’e Street home they purchased in 1980. Her parents, sister and nephew lived in the main house and her niece and two daughters lived in the cottage. 

Durbin, a 1995 Lahainaluna graduate who now lives in Oregon, said her parents and nephew were home when the fire started. Spotting flames on the hillside, they grabbed what they could and hurried to safety. Durbin went to bed that night knowing the family’s home was likely gone after seeing pictures of Waiola Church ablaze just down the street. 

The family filed a lawsuit with Malama Law Group in October 2023. They’ve applied for any financial aid they can find, but with their rental assistance running out early next year, they’re hoping by some miracle the settlement money will come in time to help them rebuild.

Most of their insurance payout went to cover the mortgage on their burned-down property, and contractors have told them it would likely cost $300 to $400 per square foot, putting the total at about $1 million for one home. 

Durbin, who flies home every month to help her family through all the paperwork, said she hopes the settlement would come by the end of the year, “but if it takes longer than that, then we have to think of alternative ways to make things happen.”

She said her family sued because they felt the parties involved should have known about the need to prevent overgrown brush and fortify utility poles and lines after the 2018 blaze that burned 21 homes in Kaua’ula Valley just mauka of Lahaina town. Durbin also disagrees that the 2023 fire was accidental.

“I feel like they’re not trying to point fingers and I understand why, but at the same time … they were aware of what needed to be done and they failed,” said Durbin.

She didn’t blame the firefighters, “who could have lost their lives for our town,” but said there was “a breakdown on all levels” among utilities, government and landowners.

For Hoshino, the whole incident also felt like a repeat of the 2018 fire when there was no satisfactory explanation about what caused the fire and who should be held responsible.

Hoshino and his family, who have deep roots in Lahaina, filed their lawsuit with Malama Law Group in March. He said it was tough to put a price tag on the sentimental value of family heirlooms and his childhood home, where cousins would crowd the living room and learn to cook by watching his mom make meatloaf in a pot. His family kept customs alive like lā‘au lapa‘au (traditional Hawaiian medical practices) and the building of an imu to feed the family at baby parties and graduations. 

The Hoshinos also want to rebuild but aren’t sure if they can wait for the settlement. 

“Hopefully we can get one clear answer on when this allocation’s going to be done, because I think for myself, I miss Lahaina and I want to go back,” Hoshino said. “But financially, can I rebuild? Can I really do all the things that I can do but not fall into a slump after?”

While the wait is difficult for families, both Yamane and Collins said getting the settlement out would likely be faster than going to trial. After the deadly 2018 Camp Fire in California, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. was the primary target for billions in fines and damages and pleaded guilty to 84 counts of involuntary manslaughter.

But Collins said if the lawsuits against the many parties blamed for the Maui fires had to be litigated one by one, it would take decades for the thousands of plaintiffs to get any kind of relief. 

“The first people who get trials will likely get a payout … and then (HECO is) going to run out of cash, and then they’re going to declare bankruptcy,” Collins said. 

Malama Law Group has filed between 100 to 150 lawsuits over the fires, Collins estimated. He said many clients are trying to figure out how to move forward with their lives and “not base their decisions on what happens in court, because everything is basically up in the air.” 

“Hearing people’s evacuation stories, and their experiences of what happened … it’s still sad,” Collins said. “I wish that I could wave a magic wand and everybody would have their home rebuilt and everything would go back to how it was before the fire. But I can’t do that, and so I just sort of feel like the best I can do is insert myself in every part of the process I possibly can to help with the best outcome.”