R v Reid

[2022] NZHC 1990

IN THE HIGH COURT OF NEW ZEALAND TAURANGA REGISTRY

I TE KŌTI MATUA O AOTEAROA TAURANGA MOANA ROHE

CRI-2021-070-1899

[2022] NZHC 1990

THE QUEEN

v

WILLIAM REID

Hearing:	12 August 2022
Appearances:	S Teki-Clark for Crown R Adams for Defendant
Judgment:	12 August 2022

SENTENCING REMARKS OF LANG J

Solicitors:

Crown Solicitor, Tauranga

R v REID [2022] NZHC 1990 [12 August 2022]

[1]                 Mr Reid, you appear for sentence today having entered a guilty plea to a charge of aggravated burglary.1 That charge carries a maximum penalty of 14 years imprisonment.

Background

[2]                 You entered your guilty plea immediately after I gave you a sentence indication on 2 June 2022.2 This was shortly before your trial was to commence. I gave the sentence indication on the basis of an agreed summary of facts, and I need to reiterate some of the points made in that summary for sentencing purposes today. I do so even though the facts are set out in the notes of my sentence indication, which I will annex to these remarks. One of the victims of your offending is present today and she has not heard how I arrived at the indicated sentence. It is important that she understands how this was done.

[3]                 The summary of facts records that the offending had its origins in the fact that the male victim, to whom I shall refer as A, had allowed another person to store a caravan and bus on a rural property in the Bay of Plenty. A and his partner conducted a firewood business from that property. The summary records that the owner of the bus and caravan had been attempting to regain possession of his items, but difficulties had arisen. That person then contacted persons associated with the Rangitikei chapter of the Rebels Motorcycle Club. He asked those persons to assist him to recover his bus and caravan from A’s property. You were recruited to assist in this task.

[4]                 On 25 January 2021 you travelled with four others in a motor vehicle from Hunterville to the Bay of Plenty. At about 9 am you were captured on CCTV footage at a service station in Rotorua. Your vehicle then carried on to Tauranga, where you met with two females who had travelled from Auckland in another vehicle. Both vehicles were then captured on CCTV film footage travelling in convoy towards A’s property.

1      Crimes Act 1961, s 232(1)(a).

2      R v Reid [2022] NZHC 1292.

[5]                 The two vehicles got to the address at about 10.30 am. You and your associates entered the property by opening a gate. The two females then remained in the vicinity of the gate while you and your associates drove up to the accommodation block on the property. You and your associates then got out of your vehicle and approached A, who was splitting firewood with his nephew. One of the group was armed with a baseball bat. You and your group began saying “You owe us, you owe us”. A replied that he did not owe you anything, and told you and your associates to leave the property. The group then surrounded A and began punching him and hitting him in the head, face and chest. This caused A to fall to the ground, where the assaults continued. When A attempted to call out for help, the group of men began hitting him even harder.

[6]                 Two of the group then turned their attention to A’s nephew. They struck him with golf clubs, pans and other objects. He attempted to defend himself by grabbing an axe from the floor of a shed, but this was taken from him. Once he was on the ground the group kicked him and told him to stay down.

[7]                 Eventually A told you and your associates to take the bus. He was told to get into the bus and start the engine. When he refused to do so, the group began hitting him with a baseball bat and with his own golf clubs. At this point he was hit in the head about nine times with weapons. Orchard workers from a neighbouring property heard the commotion and came over to investigate, but were scared off by the antics of you and your associates.

[8]                 The two females then approached the scene and began assaulting A’s partner. They threatened to drag her behind their vehicle and to kidnap her. They then began punching her again and asking her for keys to motor vehicles that were parked at the property. One of the females began ripping CCTV cameras from the building, whilst the other went to try to start the vehicles. You removed a CCTV recording device from the accommodation block and smashed it to pieces in the shed with a golf club. At this stage A’s partner managed to escape to a toilet, where she telephoned the police using a cellphone. A’s nephew was also able to escape and raise the alarm.

[9]                 The incident ended when one of the females left the address in a Toyota Hi- Ace van that had been parked at the address. You and your associates then got into

your vehicle and returned to Hunterville. The other female returned to Auckland in her vehicle.

[10]              As a result of this incident A suffered very significant injuries. These include stab wounds, cuts, bruises and abrasions that were scattered throughout his body. He also suffered deep cuts to the scalp as a result of being struck by the golf club. He had multiple facial fractures about the nose and eyes, as well as fractures to two ribs and to his vertebrae. In addition, he suffered a puncture wound to the left trapezius, a muscle at the base of the neck. A’s partner also suffered significant injuries. These included swelling and bruising about the left side of her face, as well as a loose tooth, abrasions and bruising about her body. A’s nephew also suffered abrasions and bruising as a result of the incident.

[11]              The physical injuries tell but part of the story. This morning you have heard A’s partner read a measured, thoughtful and comprehensive statement setting out the effects that the offending by you and your group has had for her and her partner. In short, their lives have been destroyed. Not only did they suffer very significant physical injuries, but they also had the trauma of having a large group of armed men attack them in the sanctity of their own property. It is clear that the wounds and injuries suffered as a result of the incident will have lasting, if not lifelong, consequences for

A. It will undoubtedly have severe psychological effects for both of them for many years to come.

Starting point

[12]              Counsel were in broad agreement at the sentence indication hearing regarding the aggravating factors of your offending. These include the fact that it was premeditated, in that it involved careful planning over some time. It also involved taking at least one weapon to the scene. It involved the use of persons associated with a gang to carry out what amounted to vigilante action to enforce property rights. Those who went to the address knew before they got there that violence would be used against the occupants of the address. This is obvious from the fact that the group did not seek to obtain what they wanted by persuasion. Rather, they immediately resorted to physical violence in order to coerce the occupants of the address into providing

them with what they wanted. It involved the entry into private property where the occupants ought to have been able to feel safe. It involved the victims being confronted by a large group of persons, who then used weapons to strike both A and his nephew about the head. This sustained violence involved very significant injuries to A and moderate injuries to A’s partner and nephew.

[13]              After referring to some of the cases that counsel had provided me with, I selected a starting point of nine years imprisonment for your offending. I would have selected a starting point of at least nine years six months but for the fact that the Crown acknowledged it could not point to any evidence that you had inflicted any of the blows using weapons.

Aggravating and mitigating factors

[14]              You have no previous convictions of any moment so far as the present sentencing is concerned. For that reason I did not add an uplift to reflect previous convictions or any other aggravating factors personal to you.

[15]              The only discount for which I was prepared to give you credit at the sentence indication stage was that for guilty plea. I accepted a submission by both counsel that a discount of around 17.5 per cent was appropriate even though your guilty plea would be entered very close to trial. This resulted in a reduction of 19 months, or one year seven months, from the starting point I identified.

[16]              It is now necessary to ascertain whether, and if so to what extent, to reduce the starting point further to reflect mitigating factors personal to you other than the guilty plea.

[17]              I now have the benefit of both a pre-sentence report and a very comprehensive report tendered under s 27 of the Sentencing Act 2002. The report makes harrowing reading. It confirms you were raised in a domestic environment where physical violence, gang associations and drug and alcohol abuse were the norm. You were the victim of significant physical and emotional abuse at the hands of your father. This resulted not only in significant physical injuries to you but also emotional scarring that led to you becoming completely estranged from your father. Not surprisingly, this had

a significant effect on your educational opportunities. You went to a Te Reo school for some time and it is clear that the conditions there were extremely damaging for you. Physical violence was a feature of your time at that school.

[18]              You then moved to Feilding where you attended a school for several years in which you felt far more included. However, and not surprisingly given your domestic situation, you began consuming alcohol and more particularly marijuana at a reasonably young age. This developed into the use of methamphetamine on a regular basis. Ultimately, you tried to deal with this by removing yourself from the situation. You went to Australia, where you hoped you would be able to start a new life. For seven years you were able to hold down a steady job in Australia. However, you began using methamphetamine again whilst there, and this effectively took over your life. Ultimately, it led to you being arrested in Australia and later deported to New Zealand.

[19]              Upon your return you again became involved in methamphetamine use. At about this time also you became seriously involved in gang associations. This began when you turned to a gang for support whilst you were serving a sentence of imprisonment. This provided a family for you of a type you had not previously experienced.

[20]              The present offending is obviously also gang-related. However, I am satisfied that the disconnect that you have had from your family, whanau and culture in your early years coupled with the other factors that were a feature of your early life had a direct impact on the offending and your decision to become involved in it.

[21]              Thankfully, you still have members of your whanau who stand by you. You say you are determined to spend your time in prison productively. You want to gain qualifications as a plumber so you can become involved in meaningful employment upon your release.

[22]              I found interesting one comment in the cultural report where the report writer referred to the fact that you had said you never wanted to be like your father. It was then pointed out to you that your father went to prison and you are now in prison. He was a gang member, and you are now associated with gangs. He had beaten your

mother and you have now been involved in assaulting your partners. In short, Mr Reid, you have become your father.

[23]              The only person who can turn that round is you. If you don’t take advantage of the opportunities that are going to be offered to you in prison, then the sad reality is that you are going to be back before the courts facing increasingly longer sentences. It is up to you whether you are genuinely prepared to turn your life around at this stage.

[24]              Counsel for the Crown agrees that a discount is warranted for the mitigating factors identified in the s 27 report. Your counsel suggests a discount of 12 per cent, or 13 months. The Crown agrees this is within the available range. I therefore propose to apply a further discount of 12 per cent, or 13 months, to reflect both the deprivation you suffered in your formative years and the rehabilitative prospects that you now show. This is related to and connected with the expressions of remorse that you now make.

[25]              This means that the starting point of nine years imprisonment is reduced by 32 months, which leaves an end sentence of six years four months.

Sentence

[26]              On the charge of aggravated burglary, you are sentenced to six years four months imprisonment.

[27]Stand down.

Lang J

NOTE: PUBLICATION OF THE JUDGMENT AND OF THE REQUEST FOR A

SENTENCING INDICATION IN ANY NEWS MEDIA OR ON THE INTERNET OR OTHER PUBLICLY ACCESSIBLE DATABASE IS PROHIBITED BY SECTION 63 OF THE CRIMINAL PROCEDURE ACT 2011 UNTIL THE DEFENDANT HAS BEEN SENTENCED OR THE CHARGE DISMISSED. SEE

IN THE HIGH COURT OF NEW ZEALAND ROTORUA REGISTRY

I TE KŌTI MATUA O AOTEAROA

TE ROTORUA-NUI-A-KAHUMATAMOMOE ROHE

CRI-2021-070-1899

[2022] NZHC 1292

THE QUEEN

v

WILLIAM REID

Hearing:

2 June 2022

(Heard at Auckland)

Appearances:

D McWilliam for Crown R Adams for Defendant

Judgment:

2 June 2022

SENTENCE INDICATION OF LANG J

[1]                 Mr Reid and five other defendants are scheduled to stand trial in this Court on faces a charge of aggravated burglary.3 The maximum penalty for that offence is 14 years imprisonment. The trial is scheduled to commence on 7 June 2022.

[2]                 Mr Reid now seeks a sentence indication. This is an indication of the sentence he would receive if he enters a guilty plea to the charge at this point. If he does not accept the indication and is found guilty at trial, he will be sentenced on the facts as the trial Judge determines them to be.

Background

[3]                 The factual basis on which I am to provide a sentence indication is contained in an agreed summary of facts. This records that the genesis of the offending was the fact that the complainant, to whom I shall refer as “A”, had allowed another person to store a caravan and bus on his rural property. The owner of the bus and caravan had been attempting to regain possession of his items, but his attempts were unsuccessful. That person then contacted persons associated with the Rangitikei chapter of the Rebels Motorcycle Club. He asked them to assist him to recover his bus and caravan from A’s property.

[4]                 On 25 January 2021 two females travelled from Auckland to Tauranga in a silver Holden Commodore motor vehicle. They were tasked with assisting in the recovery of the bus and caravan. On the same date Mr Reid and four others travelled from Hunterville to the Tauranga area in a black BMW motor vehicle. At around 9 am on that date they were captured on CCTV footage at a service station in Rotorua. The vehicle then carried on to Tauranga, where the occupants met the two females who had travelled from Auckland in the silver Holden Commodore. Both vehicles were then captured on CCTV film footage travelling towards A’s property in convoy.

[5]                 The two vehicles arrived at A’s address at about 10.30 am. Mr Reid and his associates entered the property by opening a gate. The two females in the Holden Commodore then remained in the vicinity of the gate whilst Mr Reid and his associates drove up to the accommodation block on the property.

3      Crimes Act 1961, s 232(1)(a).

[6]                 Mr Reid and three of his associates got out of their vehicle and approached A, who was splitting firewood with his nephew. One of them was armed with a baseball bat. They began saying to A, “You owe us. You owe us”. He replied that he did not owe them anything and told them to leave the property. The group then surrounded A and began punching and hitting him in the face, head and chest. This caused A to fall to the ground, where the assaults continued. When A called out for help the group of men began hitting him even harder.

[7]                 Two of the group then turned their attention to A’s nephew. They struck him with golf clubs, pans and other objects. He attempted to defend himself by grabbing an axe from the floor of a shed, but this was taken from him. Once he was on the ground, the group kicked him and told him to stay down.

[8]                 Eventually A told his attackers to take the bus. They told him to get into the bus and start the engine. When he refused to do so, they began hitting him with a baseball bat and with his own golf clubs. At this point he was hit in the head about nine times with weapons. Orchard workers from a neighbouring property heard the commotion and came over to investigate but were scared off by the antics of Mr Reid and his group.

[9]                 The two females from the Holden Commodore motor vehicle then approached the scene and began assaulting A’s partner. They threatened to drag her behind their car or to kidnap her. They then began punching her again and asking for keys to motor vehicles parked on the property. One of the females began ripping CCTV cameras from the building whilst the other went to try to start the cars. Mr Reid removed a CCTV recording device from the accommodation block and smashed it to pieces in the shed with a golf club. At this stage A’s partner managed to escape to a toilet, where she telephoned the police using A’s cellphone.

[10]              The incident ended when one of the females left the address in a Toyota Hi- Ace van that had been parked there. Mr Reid and his associates then got into their BMW motor vehicle and returned to Hunterville. The other female returned to Auckland in the Holden Commodore.

[11]              As a result of this incident A suffered significant wounds, abrasions and contusions throughout the entire body. He also suffered deep lacerations to the scalp as a result of being struck by the golf club. He had multiple facial fractures about the nose and eyes, as well as fractures to two ribs and to his vertebrae. In addition, he suffered a puncture wound to the left trapezius, a muscle at the base of the neck.

[12]              A’s partner suffered significant swelling and bruising about the left side of her face, as well as a loose tooth, abrasions and bruising about her body. A’s nephew also suffered abrasions and bruising about his body.

Starting point

[13]              Counsel are broadly in agreement regarding the aggravating features of Mr Reid’s offending. These comprise:

(a)Premeditation in the form of careful planning and taking at least one weapon to the scene.

(b)The use of gang members in what amounted to vigilante action to enforce property rights.

(c)Prior knowledge that violence would be used against the occupants of the address.

(d)Entry onto private property.

(e)Confrontation of the complainants by a large group of persons.

(f)Use of weapons to strike the head.

(g)Sustained violence against three victims.

(h)Significant injuries to one victim (A) and moderate injuries to A’s partner and nephew.

(i)The theft of property from the address.

[14]              Counsel have referred me to several authorities in which broadly similar offending has attracted starting points of around nine to 11 years imprisonment.4 Both counsel suggest a starting point of around nine years imprisonment.

[15]              I have recently provided a sentence indication for Mr Timoti, one of Mr Reid’s co-defendants. He was not involved in the attack on A.5 I took a starting point in his case of nine years imprisonment.6

[16]              Mr Reid played a full role in events from the outset although the summary does not record that he used weapons to strike any of the complainants. He was at least a party to the concerted attack on A, who suffered the most significant injuries. However, the Crown accepts he cannot be identified as one of the persons who inflicted violence on A. Had that not been the case I would have adopted a starting point of not less than nine years six months imprisonment. As matters stand, however, I am prepared to accept that a starting point of nine years imprisonment is appropriate.

Aggravating factors

[17]              Mr Reid’s has previous convictions but none of these is relevant for present purposes. I apply no uplift to reflect this factor.

Mitigating factors

[18]              The only mitigating factor for which I give credit at this stage is that for guilty plea. Given the fact that the trial is scheduled to begin in less than a week the discount would normally be around ten per cent. However, the Crown suggests a discount of

17.5 per cent is warranted in Mr Reid’s case. This is in line with the discount I gave Mr Timoti.7 It also reflects the fact that Ms Adams has acted extremely quickly to propose resolution after being assigned very recently as Mr Reid’s counsel.

4      R v Mako [2000] 2 NZLR 170; Court-Clausen v R [2020] NZCA 488; Hemopo v R [2016] NZCA 242, R v Tregidga [2021] NZHC 3498, Kreegher v R [2021] NZCA 22, Bartlett v R [2021] NZCA 152, Royal v R [2009] NZCA 65; Manuel v R [2010] NZCA 285; Tiori v R [2011] NZCA 355.

5      R v Timoti [2022] NZHC 1092.

6 At [15].

7 At [17].

[19]              I therefore propose to apply a discount of 17.5 per cent as suggested by both counsel. This results in a reduction of 19 months, or one year seven months.

Indicated sentence

[20]              It follows that the indicated sentence is one of seven years five months imprisonment. This may be reduced further at sentencing depending on the information available at that time.

Postscript

[21]              After I had advised counsel of my indication Ms Adams advised me she has instructions that enable her to accept the indication even though Mr Reid is not yet aware of it.

[22]              Mr Reid will therefore be arraigned by AVL from Spring Hill Corrections Facility on Friday 3 June 2022 at 3 pm. The trial Judge, Moore J, will take the plea because I will not be available at that time. Counsel have leave to appear by VMR. The Registry is to advise counsel and the Judge of the details required to enable them to connect to the courtroom from which the arraignment is to be conducted.

Lang J