The ex-wife and a daughter of a 71-year-old Ocean View man fatally mauled by dogs 17 months ago said authorities aren’t doing enough to hold the owners of the dogs responsible for the attack.
Kalani Burgher, a 33-year-old man, and Keli Toyama, a 46-year-old woman, have been charged with negligent failure to control a dangerous dog under a Hawaii County ordinance that makes the offense a petty misdemeanor punishable by up to 30 days in jail.
Shannon Matson, the daughter of the victim, Bob Northrop, who died Aug. 1, 2023, after being attacked by four dogs on the roadway of Outrigger Drive in Ocean View, called the charge “completely insignificant and insufficient.”
“I mean, it’s a homicide. You can say whatever word you want to say, but they should’ve been charged with a felony,” Matson said Tuesday. “And that was the failure of the prosecuting attorney’s office.
“We provided them with contact (information) of somebody who says that they were attacked by the same dogs about six months prior. We felt that was enough to justify further charges, as well, but they felt differently.”
County Prosecutor Kelden Waltjen told the Tribune-Herald on Wednesday he wasn’t free to charge the pair under a state law passed last year making negligent failure to control a dangerous dog a Class C felony punishable by up to five years in prison, because the incident occurred before that law went into effect.
Matson told the Tribune-Herald in September 2023 that her father was walking to a friend’s house, hoping for a ride to Kailua-Kona, when the deadly attack occurred.
Burgher and Toyama, who missed their last court date on Dec. 16, have another appearance scheduled at 8:30 a.m. Monday before Kona District Judge Ann Datta.
A bench warrant was issued for the pair’s arrest for their failure to appear. The warrant was recalled, however, according to court records, after telephone contact was made with Burgher.
The pair was charged on July 31 via penal summons booking — a legal procedure in which charges are filed and pressed without an arrest and police booking prior to court hearings. Burgher is represented by the public defender, which can’t also defend Toyama. The judge was scheduled to appoint a lawyer for her on Dec. 16, according to court minutes.
“We have a shortage of criminal defense attorneys on the island, so they haven’t found one to take her case,” Waltjen said. “I hope they can appoint an attorney for her on (Monday).”
Police say the dogs’ owners relinquished all four animals plus a litter of 10 puppies to county Animal Control agents after the attack. Matson said she was told the dogs have been euthanized.
Stephanie Northrop, the victim’s ex-wife and Matson’s mother, wrote a recent letter to the editor of the Tribune-Herald, as yet unpublished, in which she cautioned anyone living near Burgher and Toyama “especially if they own dogs again to be very careful (and) guard your children and yourself.” She added that “the legal system has failed to … protect you from their irresponsibility and negligence in preventing the dogs they owned from killing the father of my children.”
“I’m sure she’s as frustrated if not more frustrated and upset than I am,” Matson noted.
“We know what happened, and there’s really no disputing that these dogs killed my father. That’s clear in the autopsy report,” she continued. “And that they are the dogs’ owners, at least that’s what they told the detective, as far as we’re aware. But I don’t know any of the other circumstances because we’ve not been able to receive any of the police reports or any of the Animal Control reports.
“Our family’s asked for them over and over again. And we were told that because it’s an active investigation, we can’t have access to them.”
Both Matson and Stephanie Northrop said they were told if the defendants remained at large, the two-year statute of limitations would expire and charges would be dropped.
Waltjen told the Tribune-Herald that once prosecution occurs for an offense, the statute of limitations is “tolled” — a legal term meaning it is put on hold.
Stephanie Northrop said in her letter that Burgher and Toyama “have expressed no remorse,” and she has nightmares about their dogs killing others.
“I want them to know although I hold them responsible, all I really want to know is that they never have an animal again,” she said.
Matson said she is “interested in restorative justice as a possible means of getting some closure and some healing around this and some sort of accountability.”
Restorative justice, a process in which the accused and the victim sit face-to-face with a staffer of the prosecutor’s office present, was used in the May 2023 case of a dog mauling in Ainaloa Estates subdivision in Puna that seriously injured Amber Clausen, then 32.
The procedure led to the dismissal of charges of negligent failure to control a dangerous dog, plus allowing a dog to stray that were filed against Clausen’s neighbors, Frederick and Kazzy Kassebeer.
“I am interested,” Matson reiterated. “And the county assured me that they’d be setting that up. And they never did. And then, they told me they couldn’t once it’s in court because they would need to speak to (the defendants’) lawyer, and they didn’t have a lawyer.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
