Background
The Hawaii Supreme Court issued its substantive Opinion in this criminal appeal on July 2, 2026, arising from Case No. 1CPC-23-0000318 in the Circuit Court of the First Circuit. The case involves four defendants-appellants — Joshua Nahulu, Erik Smith, Jake Ryan Bartolome, and Robert Gus Lewis, III — appealing from the lower court proceedings.
Following issuance of the July 2 opinion, the court identified several clerical and typographical errors in the filed document, including a misspelling of a defendant’s name, an incorrect designation of the authoring justice’s title, and the omission of diacritical marks required by the Hawaiian language.
The Court’s Holding
Acting Chief Justice McKenna, on behalf of the court, issued this Order of Correction on July 14, 2026, directing that the July 2, 2026 Opinion be corrected in five specific respects. The corrections are non-substantive and ministerial in nature, addressing only typographical and formatting deficiencies in the original filing.
The court corrected defendant Bartolome’s surname (previously misspelled as “BARTHOLOME”), updated the byline and opinion title to reflect McKenna’s designation as Acting Chief Justice rather than simply “J.,” and restored proper Hawaiian diacritical marks — replacing “Makaha” with “Mākaha” and “Maili” with “Māʻili” in the relevant portions of the opinion.
Key Takeaways
- This filing is a procedural Order of Correction only; the substantive holding of the underlying opinion (filed July 2, 2026) is not reproduced in this document.
- The court corrected the misspelling of defendant Jake Ryan Bartolome’s surname and clarified Acting Chief Justice McKenna’s title throughout the opinion.
- The order also restores proper ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi orthography, correcting place names “Mākaha” and “Māʻili” to include their appropriate macrons and ʻokina.
Why It Matters
This order carries no independent legal significance beyond conforming the official record to the court’s intended text. Practitioners citing the July 2, 2026 opinion in State v. Nahulu should take note of the corrected spelling of defendant Bartolome’s name and the corrected authorship designation for Acting Chief Justice McKenna.
The restoration of Hawaiian diacritical marks reflects the Hawaii Supreme Court’s ongoing practice of ensuring accurate representation of Hawaiian place names in official court documents, consistent with the state’s recognition of Hawaiian as an official language.