Feds say Hawaii crime lord committed suicide to stop Uncle Sam from seizing $20 million fortune

Hawaii nightclub owner Michael Miske Jr. was found guilty of murder and a host of other charges, and a jury said he should forfeit more than $20 million to Uncle Sam as part of his punishment.

But Miske died of a fentanyl overdose before he could be sentenced, which usually would wipe out the case — except the government now says it has evidence that Miske intentionally overdosed. The feds said he cannot be allowed to use his own death to thwart the government from getting the money it believes it’s due.

Matthew Cavedon, head of the Cato Institute’s criminal justice project, said he’s been tracking forfeiture cases for years and has never seen something like Miske’s case.

“The dead may rest in peace but property often does not,” he said.

Prosecutors said Miske was responsible for a reign of terror in Hawaii that included paying to have a pesticide dumped on dancers at rival nightclubs and orchestrating the kidnapping and murder of a man he held responsible for a son’s death.

After a 99-day trial, a jury convicted him of more than a dozen charges in July 2024. The jury then ordered the forfeiture of property.

He was slated to be sentenced on Jan. 30, 2025, but he died of an overdose two months before that court date.

U.S. Attorney Ken Sorenson, who is pursuing the $20 million, said people like Miske cannot be allowed “to dictate the fate of their ill-gotten gains.”

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“Our criminal prosecution of Michael Miske demonstrated that he was a thug who used robbery, felony assaults, drug trafficking, fraud, chemical weapons attacks on his competitors, murder, and criminal obstruction to terrorize and intimidate Hawaii for many years,” he said.

Government lawyers said Miske arranged with a former inmate to smuggle fentanyl into the prison in exchange for a car. The man intentionally violated the conditions of his release and was remanded to the Federal Detention Center Honolulu.

Prosecutors said in court documents that investigators last year found “an individual” who detailed the plot, saying Miske took smaller amounts of fentanyl in the days leading up to his death to make it look like he was a regular drug user, which he felt would make his overdose more plausible as an accident.

Mr. Cavedon, though, said the prolonged fentanyl use could also cut the other way by suggesting Miske had become a user who unintentionally went too far.

In the criminal world, dying before conviction wipes out charges, and death before sentencing wipes out punishment. In Miske’s case, it erased the jury’s decision to forfeit the $20 million in cash and property.

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But the government last year responded with a civil forfeiture case, where the property itself acts as the defendant and there’s no presumption of innocence the government must overcome.

“Forfeiture-land is a place where the normal rules don’t work,” Mr. Cavedon said. “There’s something remarkable about the fact that this case is going forward and [Miske is] not here to defend himself.”

The government argues that the incentive to protect his money was so great that Miske was willing to take his own life.

But Mr. Cavedon said the government’s own incentives here are also suspect: “You have a government that’s so desperate to get its hands on this money that it’s willing to take this action after he died.”

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If Miske were still alive, he could rebut the intentionality accusations. But of course he’s dead, making the case even more complicated.

Edward Michael Burch, a lawyer representing the trust, said the Justice Department’s new intentional suicide theory is “novel and fundamentally flawed” as a legal matter.

He said Miske’s business empire generated a good deal of legal profits and the government is trying to “rob an innocent nine-year-old, who has lost her father, grandfather, and effectively her mother, of her means to live without financial hardship.”

“We look forward to preventing the government from holding a child responsible for the alleged sins of others,” the lawyer said in a statement.

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Among the property the feds want are several boats, artwork, a 2017 Ferrari F12 Berlinetta, four vintage Volkswagens, a 1970 Ford Bronco and bank accounts.

After his conviction but before his death, Miske transferred all of his property into an existing trust and removed others to make the sole beneficiary his granddaughter, the daughter of Miske’s son Caleb, who was killed in a 2016 car crash. That was the crash prosecutors said Miske was exacting revenge for in the murder-for-hire.

• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.