A 14-year-old boy paralyzed from the waist down after the car he was riding in crashed in Makaha — allegedly while being chased by police who then fled the scene — already has incurred more than $2 million in medical expenses and will require 24-hour care for the rest of his life, according to the attorney representing his family.
Eric Seitz said medical experts estimate Dayten Gouveia will need at least $7 million for medical care throughout the remainder of his life.
Seitz said city attorneys rejected a settlement offer he made in connection with a civil lawsuit he filed Sept. 21 on behalf of the teenager and his parents, Ualani and Dennis Gouveia. He would not disclose the amount of the offer.
“That adds up to a big chunk of money. We made a demand on them, but they are not interested in settling the case at this juncture,” said Seitz. “The value of the case, as far as we’re concerned, is quite substantial.”
The Sept. 12 incident, which injured five others, is the subject of an ongoing criminal investigation, an administrative probe by the Honolulu Police Department’s Professional Standards Office and an independent investigation by the city Department of the Prosecuting Attorney.
“The matter is still under review by the Department of the Prosecuting Attorney, and no charging decision has been made,” according to Matthew Dvonch, special counsel to Prosecuting Attorney Steve Alm.
The city Department of the Corporation Counsel did not immediately reply to a Honolulu Star-Advertiser request for comment on the settlement offer.
The trio of District 8 patrol officers accused in the case, Jake Bartolome, Erik Smith and Joshua Nahulu, remain on restricted duty and have had their police powers suspended, according to HPD, while the criminal and administrative investigations continue.
The city, HPD and the officers are the subject of at least two civil suits filed by Gouveia’s family; the driver of the white Honda sedan he was riding in at the time of the crash, Jonaven Perkins-Sinapati; and the other occupants injured in the crash, including several minors.
The Honolulu Police Commission last week elected to schedule a contested case hearing on a request by Bartolome and Smith to have the city pay for their legal costs. Nahulu is represented by Honolulu attorney Richard Sing.
Commissioners could not decide at their Wednesday meeting whether the officers were acting within the scope of their employment at the time of the crash, since body-worn camera footage and surveillance video from businesses in the area gathered from the evening of the incident show the officers in two vehicles with their lights off while pursuing the sedan.
Commissioner Ann Botticelli said during the meeting that news media reports cite witness accounts and surveillance video allegedly showing the officers did not employ sirens or lights while appearing to be chasing the white Honda.
Botticelli said that would suggest to a layperson that the officers were acting outside the scope of their duty to protect the public.
“I’m wondering what ‘scope of employment’ really means,” she said. “I would appreciate more information on what that exact clause means.”
Commissioner Richard Parry wondered what discretion commissioners have, if any, to determine whether officers requesting legal counsel from the city are doing so to defend actions required by their employment as long as they are “at work, in uniform and so on.”
The corporation counsel’s office recommended approving Bartolome and Smith’s requests for legal counsel.
Parry cited two past instances when the commission decided not to provide city-funded attorneys: when an officer was accused of forcing a homeless man to lick a urinal and in a separate incident in which an officer was accused of sexual assault while on duty.
“It seems to me we are sort of between a rock and a hard place. In one way you could interpret we don’t have any discretion, but on the other hand … the rules give us the ability to make a decision,” said Parry.
“A case like this, it really seems like you are in that gray area. … Are these guys really doing police work? But does that mean we are trying to make a decision, trying to be judge and jury? … I don’t know; it’s really difficult for us to make that decision.”
The contested case hearing has not been scheduled. Bartolome and Smith will have to prove to the commission why the city should pay for their legal counsel.
According to court documents and attorneys for the plaintiffs, Perkins-Sinapati and Nahulu allegedly had a long-standing beef, and the three police officers chased him without sirens or lights after they broke up a party he was attending at Maili Beach Park.
Two of the officers were driving marked police vehicles, and the third was driving a subsidized vehicle. The officers allegedly drove away after bumping the back of Perkins-Sinapati’s car, which carried Gouveia and five others, causing it to crash.
None of the officers ever “commanded Jonaven to stop during the entire time they pursued Jonaven’s vehicle,” according to an April 12 lawsuit filed against the officers and the city by attorneys Michael Green and Maria F. Penn, who are representing Perkins-Sinapati and other crash victims.
The three returned to the scene of the crash after Emergency Medical Services personnel arrived and allegedly acted as if they “had no knowledge of what had transpired,” according to the lawsuit, which accuses the officers of conspiring and falsifying official reports to make the incident appear like a “single car accident.”
Body-worn camera footage from a patrol officer who arrived at the crash scene after Honolulu firefighters and EMS personnel shows a witness telling the officer he saw the officers bump the back of the white Honda that Perkins-Sinapati was driving before it crashed.
The footage suggests the officer was unaware that Nahulu, Smith and Bartolome were involved in the crash. The April 12 lawsuit seeks undisclosed damages from the officers, HPD and the city.
The official police description of the incident allegedly created by Bartolome, Smith and Nahulu was posted on HPD’s website after the crash.
It described a “single-vehicle crash” at about 3:51 a.m. Sept. 12 and did not mention a high-speed pursuit of suspects for allegedly violating park closure rules and other laws by partying at a beach park.
“Unit 1, traveling westbound on Farrington Highway at a high rate of speed, attempted to make a right turn onto Orange Street. Unit 1 lost control, veered right of the roadway, strikes the concrete curb, and travels through an open lot. Unit 1 continued traveling through a fenced property, collided with trees, and continued over the concrete wall of the adjacent property where it came to rest,” read the police account.
“The five male occupants of Unit 1 were ejected from the vehicle. As a result of the collision, the Unit 1 operator and one of the rear passengers were transported to an area hospital in critical condition. The remaining three passengers were also transported to an area hospital, but in serious condition.”
The report said it was “unknown if drugs or alcohol were also contributing factors.”
It does not mention a sixth person in the Honda sedan who also was injured but fled before EMS arrived.
