The mistrial in one of Hawaii’s most high-profile court cases in recent years surprised few attorneys who had been following the case, mainly because jurors in the Christopher Deedy murder trial had to make an all-or-nothing decision.
What did shock was Judge Karen Ahn’s decision some two weeks earlier not to allow manslaughter as an option for those jurors, local lawyers said.
"Almost every defense attorney I talk to was surprised that manslaughter, the manslaughter instruction, was not given based on the (state) Supreme Court’s rulings on this issue," said David Hayakawa, who has practiced as a criminal defense lawyer in Hawaii for the past 25 years.
After jurors announced Monday they were hopelessly deadlocked on whether Deedy was guilty of second-degree murder, prompting Ahn to declare a mistrial, Hayakawa referred to a state high court decision that makes clear that jurors should be allowed to consider the lesser offense of manslaughter when there is a rational basis for that option.
"If Mr. Deedy had lost and the case was appealed, I would be very curious to see how the Supreme Court would rule" on Ahn’s excluding manslaughter, Hayakawa added. However, he deferred to Ahn’s judgment and the trial’s defense and prosecution teams.
"This is a very experienced judge and two very good attorneys," Hayakawa said. "The people who are in there with the judge are in the best place to make that decision. Clearly it worked well with the defense."
Another longtime local defense attorney, Todd Eddins, said he believed the Deedy case allowed for the jury to consider a manslaughter conviction.
"The factual circumstances supported consideration of reckless conduct … so the instruction should’ve been given," Eddins said Monday. "It clearly should have been part of the instructions under our Hawaii case law."
That doesn’t necessarily mean Deedy would have been found guilty of manslaughter, Eddins said. He called the prosecution’s decision not to pursue at least the option of manslaughter an "aggressive move but a tactical miscue."
"I would’ve thought the prosecution would’ve clearly been satisfied with a manslaughter verdict because it would’ve resulted in a 20-year jail term," he said.
The second-degree murder charge Deedy faced carries a mandatory life prison term with possibility of parole.
"It really is a victory for the defense. Mr. Deedy’s not behind bars and he’ll have another day in court," Eddins said.
But prosecutors will have an advantage when the case is retried because they have seen how Deedy would testify on the stand, he said.
Nonetheless, Deedy must also deal with the fact that at least one juror was immovably convinced that he was guilty of murder, said Michael Green, an attorney representing Kollin Elderts’ family in an upcoming civil suit. Deedy was charged with murdering Elderts, a 23-year-old Kailua resident, the early morning of Nov. 5, 2011, at the McDonald’s on Kuhio Avenue in Waikiki.
"It’s either murder or nothing," Green said of the case Monday. And some people weren’t about to let Deedy "get out with nothing."
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Star-Advertiser staff writer Ken Kobayashi contributed to this report.
