Parents sue Hawaii County after police kill their son in shooting

The parents of a 31-year-old man, shot multiple times and killed by police inside a vacant Hilo house, sued the County of Hawaii Wednesday.

Mary and Martin Buckingham question why three police officers had to enter the home and shoot their son, Dan Buckingham.

Police said they announced themselves several times after entering the house and the 31-year-old swung a large knife, cutting an officer.

The parents’ attorney, Jim Bickerton, said the police department “has not told the family what happened or released any information beyond selectively edited body-worn camera footage and a public statement blaming their son for attacking them.”

Dan Buckingham was a kind and gentle soul, who lived a traveling life with minimal possessions, which helped him cope with social anxiety and other mental health struggles, Mary Buckingham said at a news conference Wednesday via Zoom.

“He was such a pacifist,” she said. When she arrived in Hawaii, the headline read: “Suspect attacks police with machete; fatally shot.” Later police said it was not a machete.

“They subsequently charged him with attempted murder, trying to paint this distorted narrative, that he was a bad actor. I think they thought they could get away with it. They thought no one cared for him.”

The 31-year-old had been living in Pahoa for about a year and a half, where he sometimes stayed with friends or at other times alone in a tent in the jungle, the parents said.

“He was very gentle, very kind, humorous and loving,” Mary Buckingham said of her son. “His mantra was air, water, food and love,” adding he spent most of his time in meditation and helping others.

On the morning of June 18, he was staying at an unoccupied home in Hilo, where he didn’t know anyone, in anticipation of seeing his mother, due to arrive in Hilo later that day from Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Martin Buckingham, a medical doctor, got the call from local police in Michigan that his son had been fatally shot by Hawaii police and realized his wife was about to arrive in Hilo shortly.

The Buckinghams said their son was shot 13 times, a fact they learned from reading their local newspaper in Michigan. The parents said they did not receive many details from Hawaii County police.

Police did not specify in media releases how many times he was shot. They said he died of multiple gunshot wounds to his upper body, with several shots being fatal.

Police did not answer questions Wednesday from the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. A spokeswoman for the department said the department does not typically comment on ongoing litigation cases.

Police said earlier in media releases they responded to a home alarm system on June 18 and arrived at 11:42 a.m. at a house on Kilauea Avenue where they found a broken rear window.

The officers entered the home to investigate and “announced their presence several times,” police said.

As they cleared the home, they found a locked bedroom door. They left the house to make more checks around the perimeter of the property, then reentered the house and “breached the bedroom door” at about 12:02 p.m.

Police said Buckingham, was armed with a pocket knife and a large knife, which he swung and struck the first officer, cutting his arm. He received a large cut, was taken to the hospital in stable condition where he was treated and released, police said.

Bickerton said there was no pressing need or urgency to enter the room where he was secluded that required this approach.

The complaint alleges police officers failed to use reasonable care when they entered the room to ensure no risk of harm was created, instead “negligently entered the room in a manner that substantially increased the risk of harm to persons and was in fact a proximate cause of harm.”

Bickerton said “the limited footage of body-worn camera footage clearly shows police forced their way in with weapons drawn, a recipe for tragedy.”

Police allege Buckingham cut one of them on the arm, but the video shows only three seconds lapsed from the time the door was forced open to shots being fired, Bickerton said.

“To the extent any officer feels threatened once they saw a claimed knife, it was a situation the police had created by their negligent conduct of surprising someone in a confined space, and deadly force was simply unnecessary to protect against any further injury given the alternatives available to the police, which included retreating.”

The lawsuit also alleges Dan Buckingham was in fear of his life and suffered extreme emotional distress.

Martin Buckingham said his son was never diagnosed, but the couple suspects he suffered from some sort of mental illness.

Mary Buckingham, a psychiatrist, said her son had problems in his early 20s with substance abuse, but his traveling supported his sobriety.

She said she learned he had been in jail for breaking and entering a house earlier that week, and took some food and shoes. He spent the night in jail, and was released.

Bickerton said Dan Buckingham has no prior criminal history or history of violence.