The parents of a 23-year-old Kailua man shot and killed by a federal agent in a Waikiki McDonalds took the Honolulu Prosecutor’s Office to task today, saying they felt lied to and “abandoned.”

Jennell and Kendall Elderts told the Associated Press they were upset prosecutors didn’t pursue a lesser charge of manslaughter against U.S. State Department agent Christopher Deedy, who was standing trial for second degree murder for killing their son Kollin Elderts.

Deedy’s trial ended in a hung jury in large part because jurors were presented with an all or nothing choice — either convict Deedy of murder or let him walk.

Some in the legal community questioned the wisdom of not pushing harder to get a manslaughter option on the table, but Honolulu Prosecutor Keith Kaneshiro defended the decision to stick with second-degree murder decision by saying the evidence didn’t support the lesser charge.

Now Elderts’ family wants a new prosecutor to take over the case. Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Janice Futa was the lead in the trial, and Kaneshiro has indicated that she will remain in that role.

“I think we need a different prosecutor,” Jennell Elderts said on Friday. “We just need a more aggressive approach to prosecuting this guy.”

A second trial is scheduled for summer 2014.

You can read the full AP report here.

Photo: Federal special agent Christopher Deedy testified during his murder trial. (Screen shot from KITV)

—Nick Grube