Heiress’s former employees ask for hearing delay

Three longtime employees of Abigail Kawananakoa are attempting to step into the legal dispute involving the $215 million fortune of the Campbell Estate heiress in an effort to protect their interests as beneficiaries.

Kawananakoa’s former housekeeper, driver/gardener and ranch manager filed an emergency petition this week asking for a postponement of Thursday’s court hearing seeking to remove the trustee.

In a filing by Honolulu attorney Megan Kau, Thongbay Smart, Mark Smart and Wayne Shizuru argue that as beneficiaries of the trust, Hawaii law entitles them to notice of any petition that could affect their rights under the trust.

But so far they’ve been left out of the proceeding, the petition says, having received no notices of court petitions or copies of any pleadings as required by Hawaii probate rules.

The former employees argue in the filing that more time is needed to review more than 300 documents submitted in the case, including many that have been hidden under court seal contrary to procedures outlined by the law.

Kau said Friday she doesn’t understand why her clients — named among a handful of remainder beneficiaries in a 2001 amendment to Kawananakoa’s trust — were iced out of the case.

“They’re supposed to be given notice,” she said.

The court fight over Kawananakoa’s estate began after the heiress suffered a stroke one year ago and her then-attorney James Wright petitioned the court to become trustee in a move that was spelled out in a successorship plan previously set up by the heiress in case she became incapacitated.

However, Veronica Gail Worth, Kawananakoa’s life partner of more than 20 years and now wife, challenged the declaration, insisting that Kawananakoa, 92, is capable of handling her own affairs. Worth is seeking to return control of the trust to Kawananakoa.

A special master appointed by Circuit Judge R. Mark Browning to investigate the heiress’s mental health is recommending that Kawananakoa be allowed to change or revoke her trust and remove and replace the trustee, even though a psychiatrist determined she is unable to handle her own financial affairs.

James Kawachika, a Honolulu attorney, also is recommending that Wright be removed as trustee and be replaced by a trio of co-trustees, including Worth.

The filing by Kawananakoa’s former employees comes on the heels of an attempt by agents of the heiress to evict the Smarts’ grown daughters from the Pearl City home that Kawananakoa gave to the Smart family two years ago.

A hearing on the matter is scheduled for June 28 in 1st Circuit Court.

Kau said the fact that Kawananakoa is now attempting to take back the home she gave to the Smart family just a few years ago underscores the need to step into the trust battle to protect the Smarts’ and Shizuru’s interests in the trust.

Thongbay Smart worked 24 hours a day, seven days a week as a maid and cook for Kawananakoa for 32 years, while Mark Smart worked as her driver and gardener for 19 years. Shizuru, described as Kawananakoa’s hanai son, was ranch manager.

According to a court document, Kawananakoa told Thongbay Smart in 2015 that if she promised to stay in Hawaii and not move to the mainland, Kawananakoa would buy her and her family a home so that they could live here for the rest of their lives.

Relying on Kawananakoa’s promise, the family spent about $25,000 remodeling the home bought for them, the document said, and Kawananakoa even showed up in Pearl City with maile lei in hand to congratulate them on their new home.

“To their surprise, on May 7, 2018, an alleged managing agent filed herein a Complaint of Ejectment against (Smart daughters) Samantha (Michel) and Ashley (Thairathom). It does not seem like Kawananakoa herself authorized this complaint since she has been deemed by the probate court to be incompetent,” the document said.

Thongbay Smart and her daughters told Hawaii News Now two weeks ago that Kawananakoa and Worth were retaliating against them because they spoke candidly with a Probate Court-appointed psychiatrist and the special master in the trust fight.

Kau said fighting for her clients’ interests in the Kawananakoa trust is important, but there’s an even greater concern: protecting the $100 million or so that was set aside for the Abigail K.K. Kawananakoa Foundation, a charity that aims to underwrite Native Hawaiian causes following her death.

The foundation, as envisioned in its articles of corporation, will work to perpetuate Hawaiian culture, fund educational programs and scholarships, and provide financial support for medical treatment and health care, among other things.

“If a new trustee were to change the terms of the trust and delete the foundation, the state of Hawaii and Hawaiians will lose out,” she said.

Kau said she wants to see the dozens of public filings in the Kawananakoa trust case that have been put under seal by the court even though the Hawaii Supreme Court put restrictions on that practice in a case known as Oahu Publications Inc. v. Takase.

Honolulu media attorney Jeffrey Portnoy said he’s seen a number of examples of judges lately ignoring the guidelines set out in that ruling.

The guidelines, he said, include holding a hearing for each filing to determine what can be sealed, if anything — and that includes any redactions, which must be narrowly tailored to remove from public view only the personal information eligible for sealing.

The guidelines also call for giving the media notice for each hearing, Portnoy said.