A 21-year-old Huntington Beach man allegedly allowed a friend to “car surf” his pickup while driving more than 50 mph on Pacific Coast Highway until the friend fell and suffered fatal injuries, the Orange County District Attorney’s Office announced on Friday, July 17.
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Brandon Scott Soleau is facing a felony count of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence in connection with the death of 20-year-old Kolby Kekoa Aipa on Aug. 2, 2025.
Prosecutors say Soleau was driving with eight passengers in his 2015 Toyota Tacoma — including three in the bed of the pickup — around 10:30 p.m. after a movie premiere in Huntington Beach.
Aipa reportedly rode an e-bike alongside Soleau’s pickup while they were traveling on a service road parallel to Pacific Coast Highway. Aipa — who was not wearing a helmet — asked Soleau if he could “car surf” the pickup, prosecutors said. Soleau gave him permission, prosecutors added.
Aipa allegedly put his arm through an open front passenger window while still sitting on the e-bike, allowing the pickup to pull the e-bike along at faster speeds than it was meant to reach on its own.
Soleau merged onto southbound Pacific Coast Highway at 50 mph, prosecutors allege, while Aipa continued to hold onto the pickup through the truck window while sitting on the e-bike. A passenger in the pickup was filming Aipa, prosecutors said.
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After more than a mile on Pacific Coast Highway, as the pickup approached Seaport Avenue, Aipa apparently lost control and fell onto the roadway.
Aipa was taken to UCI Medical Center in critical condition. He died three days later of blunt head trauma, prosecutors said.
According to the DA’s office, it is illegal under the state vehicle code for anyone riding a motorized bicycle, like an e-bike, to “attach themselves” to a vehicle on the roadway.
“This tragedy cost the life of a young man with his entire future ahead of him and will forever impact a young man who will have to live the rest of his life knowing that he killed his friend,” Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer said in a written statement. “This is a stark reminder that every action and every decision have a consequence, and in this instance the price of those decisions was the life of a 20-year-old man and that is a price no one should ever have to pay.”
If convicted as charged, Soleau faces up to six years in state prison. He has not yet entered a plea. It wasn’t clear from court records if he has yet hired or been assigned an attorney.
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