Lawyers for the family of an 11-year-old Boy Scout killed last August when an AK-47 semi-automatic rifle was accidentally discharged at a shooting range wrangled in court Friday with lawyers for the Boy Scouts of America and its Aloha Council.
The hearing over the production of documents regarding the death and answers to questions posed by the family to the organizations is part of a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the family of Manuel “Manny” Carvalho, who was shot to death Aug. 28, 2022, at Camp Honokaia near Honokaa.
The Carvalhos’ attorneys filed a motion requesting Hilo Circuit Judge Henry Nakamoto to order BSA and the Aloha Council to produce documents pertaining to the boy’s death, while BSA’s attorney, Andrew Chianese, filed a motion in opposition.
“We’re still in the process of gathering those documents and reviewing and seeing what’s privileged,” Chianese told the judge. “There’s approximately 10,000 pages of documents. We’re thinking of breaking them up, Your Honor, so we can get our first batch out sooner. So, to answer your question, specifically, I still think we can get the first batch out by the end of (this) week, and if not by the end of (this) week, soon thereafter. And then, within another week or two weeks, we’d be able to do that second batch.”
Arguing for the plaintiffs, attorney Thomas Biscup expressed frustration over the lack of information turned over thus far by BSA and Aloha Council, as well as what he considered nonresponsive replies on legal questionnaires known as interrogatories.
Biscup said the Carvalhos haven’t received documents regarding an investigation into the shooting by the Boy Scouts.
“It seems impossible to me that an organization like this has a shooting death at one of its camps with an AK-47, and they’re not going to investigate it,” Biscup said. “They’re not going to find out information? It just doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. It just doesn’t pass the test of common sense and plain English.
“I think they should be ordered to give us straightforward answers — we know, or we don’t know.”
According to Biscup, the plaintiffs also received a nonresponsive reply about who was in charge of safety at Camp Honokaia on Aug. 28.
“Who was the range safety officer on the day Manny was killed?” Biscup asked. “And the answer we get is, ‘We don’t know what you mean by range safety officer.’
“This case is about the shooting. This case is about what Aloha Council did or didn’t do, what BSA did know, didn’t know, did or didn’t do about a shooting at a camp that’s governed by BSA documents. We laid it out in the complaint — what the shooting manual requires, what the outdoor manual requires, what the National Camp Accreditation Program requires. And the answer got? ‘Well, we didn’t understand what you meant by range safety officer at the camp.’
“That just doesn’t pass the smell test, Your Honor.”
Nakamoto ordered lawyers for BSA and the Aloha Council to complete document disclosure by May 12.
He set the next hearing in the case for May 19.
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.