How manslaughter fireworks charges filed in Orange County link to Esparto blast

Orange County prosecutors have filed involuntary manslaughter charges in the death of an 8-year-old girl killed by illegal fireworks at a Fourth of July party — a death Yolo County prosecutors had previously connected to the black-market explosives operation behind the deadly Esparto warehouse blast.

Earl Decastro, 47, of Buena Park, was charged Wednesday in the death of Jasmine Nguyen, who was killed July 4, 2025 — three days after seven workers died in the Esparto explosion — when an illegal, professional-grade firework malfunctioned and created a chain reaction of explosives beside the child, according to the Orange County District Attorney’s Office.

“There is nothing accidental about buying and lighting illegal fireworks,” Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer said in a news release. “An eight-year-old little girl is dead and the man who killed her is going to be held responsible. A few seconds of fun is not worth a lifetime of trauma and the loss of a beautiful little girl who never had the chance to grow up.”

Orange County prosecutors did not name what type of fireworks were behind the death or connect the case to Douglas Tollefsen, who is charged with second-degree murder in the Esparto case. Yolo County prosecutors have said he was connected to the bootleg fireworks that killed the girl.

Wendy Wilcox, a spokesperson for Yolo County DA Melinda Aiello, said Aiello could not comment because of a gag order in the Esparto case.

‘Death toll has been no deterrent’

In an April bail motion in the Esparto case, Yolo County prosecutors wrote that “one of Tollefsen’s products — a ‘For the Streets’ branded device with the label ‘Knuckles Punch’ — killed an eight-year-old girl in Buena Park, California.” Tollefsen, described in the motion as Devastating Pyrotechnics owner Kenneth Chee’s “longtime associate,” is charged with seven counts of second-degree murder in the Esparto deaths. Chee is also charged.

“The death toll has been no deterrent to Defendant Tollefsen,” prosecutors wrote, alleging he continued communicating with contacts in the illegal explosives business after the blast about “specific products to import,” conduct they said “shows his complete disregard for human life.”

Orange County District Attorney spokesperson Kimberly Edds said the DA’s office is “not able to confirm at this stage” that the fireworks cited by Yolo prosecutors caused the death of the girl. Edds also said the office could not “speculate” on whether Tollefsen could face charges in Orange County.

‘Bootleg black-market fireworks’

In November 2024, eight months before the Esparto explosion, dozens of photos posted on Tollefsen’s Facebook page show him on a business trip in Liuyang, China’s fireworks region, with two co-defendants — Chee and Jack Lee — and Neil Li, Devastating’s general manager, who was killed in the blast. The group poses in restaurants and factory showrooms, alongside pallets of cases stamped with 1.4G explosive placards and brand names such as “L.A. Heist.”

Fireworks expert Charley Weeth said the China photographs show the sophistication and extent of Devastating Pyrotechnics’ involvement in what he calls “bootleg black-market fireworks.”

Weeth said bootleggers purchase fireworks from manufacturers in China and who, for a fee, package the fireworks in colorful branding, which are more difficult to track and often lack proper warnings. Weeth said that overloaded fireworks are responsible for dozens of deaths across the U.S.

In the Facebook photos of Chee, Tollefsen and Lee, the group is seen visiting the Liuyang factory of T-Sky, the Chinese exporter whose fireworks were seized in San Jose after a 2023 fire and explosion that has since been linked to Devastating Pyrotechnics.

Particularly troubling, Weeth said, is Tollefsen’s photo captioned “my new desk job,” where he can be seen in a tongue-in-cheek photograph presiding over the reception desk of Raccoon Fireworks, a Liuyang manufacturer. It says it produces custom fireworks under more than 100 brands for over 50 companies worldwide. Tollefsen is wearing a Devastating Pyrotechnics company shirt in the photograph.

‘Knuckles Punch’

The underlying manufacturer of “Knuckles Punch” is unknown. In a YouTube video posted in June 2024 — a year before the Buena Park death — a masked man ignites the 205-shot device, which is lit with a single fuse and fires mortar shots high into the night sky for more than two minutes.

Orange County prosecutors said Decastro bought illegal fireworks for the gathering, including a $400 firework “cake” purchased from an unlicensed seller that contained professional-grade explosives.

After shooting fireworks in the street in front of his house for more than an hour, Decastro lit the $400 device as a grand finale, prosecutors said. Within seconds, it malfunctioned, firing aerial mortar shells into the driveway where partygoers had gathered to watch.

Weeth said he was familiar with the 205-shot “Knuckles Punch” and called it a dangerous firework masked as something appropriate for a backyard fireworks display.

“This tragedy in Buena Park involving a bootlegged overload and an 8-year-old girl is another senseless death,” he said.

Decastro faces one felony count of involuntary manslaughter, recklessly causing a fire with great bodily injury and illegal possession of more than 100 pounds of dangerous fireworks. The next hearing in the case is scheduled for Sept. 11.