Honolulu’s Grand Finale Fireworks Productions advertised fireworks shows for weddings and events — something to “add a little spark to your special day.”
It appeared to be a reputable business, with a state license and federal and local permits to import fireworks and shoot them off. But behind the scenes, it was overseen by Mike Miske, who was later convicted of a host of felonies related to organized crime. And it made the vast majority of its money not by shooting glowing comets into the air on special occasions, but by selling fireworks on O‘ahu’s black market.
The scheme — using a front company to import large quantities of fireworks directly from China and selling them illegally — was high-risk but lucrative. “More volume, more money,” Alfredo Cabael Jr., who sold fireworks for Miske, said in an interview with Civil Beat. “And it was cheaper from China than from anyone in the U.S.”
From 2008 through 2010, Cabael said, he delivered those imported fireworks to customers, many of whom he believed were involved in drug trafficking and cockfighting. Eventually those fireworks and firecrackers made it into the hands of people who used them to celebrate holidays or pop them off in what has become a widespread, controversial practice throughout the years in the islands.
Details of how Miske bought and sold fireworks were revealed in a six-month trial last year in which federal prosecutors alleged he oversaw a criminal enterprise that engaged in robberies, kidnappings, fraud and other crimes for more than two decades. Miske was convicted of murder, racketeering conspiracy and other felonies — 22 counts in all. He died in December of a fentanyl overdose as he was awaiting a potential life sentence.
As prosecutors built their case, jurors heard about burner phones, cash wrapped in plastic, a mountainside bunker loaded with fireworks, fake break-ins to cover up paperwork discrepancies and mounting pressure as authorities grew suspicious.
The fireworks scheme didn’t get much public attention in that trial. But it has taken on new significance after a New Year’s Eve fireworks explosion in Salt Lake injured more than two dozen people and killed four, including a three-year-old boy. Though fireworks are illegal in Hawaiʻi, officials have struggled to enforce that ban and have said more needs to be done to prevent them from entering the islands.
Using a permitted business to import his products gave Miske a competitive advantage. It also brought regulatory scrutiny, which Cabael said ultimately led to the venture’s downfall. In 2010, the Honolulu Fire Department and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives started asking questions, and Miske’s team gave it up soon after.
That’s why retired Honolulu Police Deputy Chief John McCarthy believes the Miske operation was unusual. McCarthy said it’s much easier to smuggle fireworks onto the island by hiding them in shipping containers packed with other items. And most containers sent from the mainland can’t be inspected unless law enforcement has a reason.
Civil Beat found one other fireworks-related prosecution involving a licensed importer; it ended in an acquittal in 2012.
Grand Finale’s federal license gave it and its customers access to professional-grade fireworks that soared several hundred feet high, Cabael testified at the trial. Most people have no business handling those kinds of explosives, said Bruce Albrecht, the operations director for Hawaii Explosives and Pyrotechnics, the company behind Waikīkī’s weekly fireworks show.
“When we’re talking about aerial fireworks, these are products literally designed to throw fire 100 to 500 feet in every direction,” Albrecht said. “If you’re selling to a consumer that is untrained, does not know or understand the power behind them, that is a dangerous situation and you’re threatening their safety, their families’ safety.”
A Shipping Container Full Of Fireworks
Though Cabael, 52, told Civil Beat he once regarded Miske as family, he agreed to testify against him in exchange for not being prosecuted himself. He was the government’s key witness on the fireworks scheme.
The U.S. Attorney’s office in Honolulu declined to be interviewed for this story, but it gave Civil Beat access to evidence presented at trial. Civil Beat checked parts of Cabael’s account against those exhibits as well as testimony of one other witness.
The scheme started around 2008 with a trip to China, for which Miske brought a “large sum of money” to broker a deal, according to Cabael’s testimony. At one point, Miske was taken blindfolded to an undisclosed location in China, according to testimony by Cabael and another witness who accompanied Miske on the trip.
The fireworks were shipped to Island Weddings and Special Events LLC, which did business as Grand Finale. Business records listed Richard MacGuyer, who according to trial testimony was Miske’s cousin and business associate, as head of the company. Under federal law, MacGuyer would have had to pass a background check to obtain a license to import what are called “display fireworks.” MacGuyer, who was not charged with a crime and did not testify in the trial, could not be reached by email or phone to comment.
Because the company had a federal license to import display fireworks, the shipments would have cleared U.S. Customs and Border Protection. It’s unclear how many shipments the company received; Cabael testified about unloading one shipment and moving fireworks from a 53-foot shipping container into a 4,000 square-foot, World War II-era former military bunker built into a mountainside in Waipahu.
Most of the fireworks the company brought in were sold on the black market, Cabael testified. Among the products were so-called cakes that could shoot 100 displays at once; Miske’s associates sold each cake for between $200 and $400.
The company’s inventory list, presented as evidence at trial, included brocade fireworks, which make glittering explosions like spider webs; peonies, which display a round ball of stars; and palm tree aerials that rise and fall in the sky.
They also sold firecrackers, which can be sold legally to consumers if each sale is limited to 5,000 firecrackers. Cabael told Civil Beat that he and other associates disregarded the limit, falsifying county permit applications that are supposed to name the purchaser. Instead, Cabael told the jury, he and other associates chose names at random from the phone book.
Most buyers were probably dealers themselves based on how much they bought, Cabael testified. One customer bought enough to fill a box truck and paid with more than $100,000 in cash, sealed in plastic, he said.
Brisk Business Makes It Harder to Cover Tracks
Business picked up after Thanksgiving and peaked at New Year’s. Cabael made deliveries with a box truck or his own pickup. To evade detection, he had a fake ID under the name “James Kealoha,” used up to eight “burner” phones and covered the truck’s license plate with fraudulent, temporary paper plates.
Over two years, Cabael testified, he personally collected about $2 million for the business during his deliveries. He said he got paid about $25,000 in the first year.
But on paper, all those fireworks were still stored in the Waipahu bunker. With every sale, the organization had to conceal more missing fireworks from inspectors with the county fire department. Before inspectors came by, Cabael said in an interview, Miske’s team filled empty boxes with newspaper.
Over two years, Cabael said the company put on only a couple of legal fireworks shows. For one event, he testified, Miske’s team misled the Honolulu Fire Department, saying they’d set off more fireworks that evening than they really did.
Miske’s team thought that would give them cover for the illegal sales, Cabael said at trial. But retired Honolulu assistant fire chief Socrates Bratakos testified that officials noticed discrepancies between the inventory paperwork and the fireworks that were actually shot off at a Kualoa New Year’s Eve celebration in 2009.
Bratakos testified that he met with Miske and his associates in March 2010 to warn them about following the law. Bratakos was unavailable to comment for this story, according to a representative of his current employer, the State Fire Council.
In the months to come, the scheme started to unravel.
Authorities Begin To Catch On
At various points, Grand Finale had to deal with local, state and federal authorities.
The ATF requires detailed records to track fireworks bought by licensees from acquisition until they explode in the air. Every three years, as part of the fireworks license renewal process, the ATF audits each company’s records and inspects its inventory.
County fire departments inspect companies’ inventories annually and can show up unannounced as well. The county fire agencies also review firecracker permits.
And for each fireworks show, the county fire department requires a permit and a safety plan. The department can inspect the show before, during and after to ensure it matches inventory records, Albrecht said. Shows must be run by state-licensed pyrotechnicians.
Sometime in 2010, Bratakos got word that fireworks seized by authorities were similar to those in the inventory of Island Weddings and Events, according to his testimony. On more than one occasion, a fire department auditor told MacGuyer that his inventory didn’t match what was supposed to be there, and he needed to treat it as a high priority, according to emails shown in court.
Cabael testified that in response to the Fire Department’s questions, MacGuyer “staged a break-in” at his house and claimed paperwork had been stolen from his safe.
The Honolulu Fire Department scheduled an inspection of the bunker on Jan. 15, 2011. Two days before, MacGuyer reported a break-in there. The timing was suspicious, Bratakos testified.
“I had seen that before with some fireworks companies,” he said. “If there was pressure, then sometimes there would be — all of a sudden everything would go missing.”
Cabael testified that the break-in was staged at Miske’s behest. The team soon got out of the fireworks business. Cabael told Civil Beat that he never returned to the bunker.
No criminal charges materialized until years later, when federal prosecutors took aim at the entire Miske enterprise.
Cabael told Civil Beat he had a falling out with Miske and moved to Utah a decade ago to get away. He said he’s no longer plugged into the local fireworks business and doesn’t know how the explosives are entering the islands today.
When Civil Beat first asked him about his feelings on fireworks, he at first said he wished they were legal. Growing up in Kahuku, Cabael said, fireworks were part of the local culture — something he misses now that he lives on the mainland.
Back when he was selling illegal fireworks, he said, he didn’t give much thought to who ultimately shot them off. But in light of the deaths and injuries in Salt Lake on New Year’s Eve, he said he had mixed feelings.
Had the victims been his own family members, Cabael said, he’d want to see a crackdown. The risk to innocent bystanders is too great.
“They got to get a handle on it because people don’t deserve to be dying like this,” he said. “No money, nothing’s worth that.”
