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Dean Noble remained defiant as he was sentenced for the raping and bashing the teen today.

Flanked by prison guards, he called out ‘I’m innocent!’ during the sentencing. He also had to be ordered to take off his hat.

The sentencing focussed on whether or not Noble should get New Zealand’s toughest penalty - preventative detention.

Crown Prosecutor Pip Currie called for it, saying Noble had more than 60 convictions and was already in jail for assault and kidnapping when he attacked his cellmate at Christchurch prison.

Currie said: “(The attacks) included violence and there were threats made during the rapes. Indeed, during one of them the victim was rendered unconscious.”

Noble claimed through his lawyer that the victim was a liar. The sentencing judge ignored that and said he had agonised over the appropriate sentence. Justice Chisholm told Noble to consider himself lucky for getting an 11 year sentence instead of preventative detention.

The raped teenager was himself in prison for assault, kidnapping, and sex with a minor, but prison activists say the pair should never have been in the same cell.

“We are totally opposed to any idea of putting a teenager in with a seasoned prisoner - that should never happen,” says Kathy Dunstall of the Howard League for Prison Reform.

The Corrections Department says cell pair-ups are considered carefully. They also said that inmates are checked every two hours and have an intercom and buzzer if they need help.

“In the case of the prisoner Noble and the complainant there was absolutely no knowledge that the doubling up would be inappropriate,” says Christchurch Prison Manager John Roper.

Noble will now be in jail until at least 2015, and this time he will be in a single cell.

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“They were being racist, calling me a terrorist. I totally ignored them.
Normally I would say something but I didn’t even say anything, just ‘yeah, yeah’.

“I was more concerned about getting the two girls I was with in the car and eating my doner kebab.

“One guy opened the door and another one punched me in the mouth while I had the kebab in it. It was a moving vehicle.�

The victim, who suffered a fat lip and loose tooth, says the others in the mob were “kicking the car in� when cabbie Peter Hough floored it.

“No one likes to be Trevor Mallard-ed,� the victim notes wryly.

Cabbie Hough says the attackers were “big boys� who were “real aggressive�.

“It was five onto one – that’s how they fight these days.�

His taxi suffered little damage despite them giving it a kicking as well.

“Even as I was driving they were hanging on and punching [my passenger].

I floored it a bit then stopped because they were still hanging on. At that stage I thought they really meant business and that’s when I really floored it.�

Hough says it was an “ugly night� in general.

The victim has lodged a complaint with police, who are yet to make any arrests.

Acting sergeant Steve Watt says inquiries continue.

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They would not impress a jury. They certainly didn’t impress Judge Rollo.

The unemployed man had been picked up for breaching his bail, and for two assaults in Dunedin.

All was going well and he was about to be released on bail again, until he heard that the judge was making it a bail condition that he not drink alcohol.

That wasn’t on. If he couldn’t drink, his girlfriend would also not drink. “She gets agitated when she can’t drink. I’m a happy drunk, not a violent drunk.”

He would not get into more trouble. His new girlfriend had threatened to leave if he got more charges.

“I just had a bad day,” he explained. “My (previous) girlfriend cheated on me with a gook and I saw a gook so I smacked him.” He explained to the judge that a gook was “an Asian guy”.

Judge Rollo said his record included four breaches of bail, two breaches of community work, two breaches of supervision, and breach of a trespass order. “You can’t be relied on to comply with bail conditions.”

Red-beard announced he would renounce all alcohol when he realised he was heading for the cells, for a remand in custody until November 15, but it was far too late.

He said he was only there because a judge “screwed up” his bail conditions a few days ago.

“You have screwed up now,” Judge Rollo told him.

The encounter ended without any violence in court.

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Corey William Mackle, 28, Peter Christopher Tait, 49, and Jason David Warren, 26, entered no pleas when they appeared before Judge Tony Zohrab. They were charged together with Aaron James Harvey, 34, accused last week of shooting Mr MacDonald, 39.

Mackle’s application for bail was denied by Judge Zohrab. The other three accused did not apply for bail. They will all reappear in court for a pre-depositions hearing on October 23.

The four men each face a second charge of unlawful assembly outside the Lone Legion Motorcycle Club gang house on Gasgcoine St, Riversdale, where Mr MacDonald was shot. Two others appearing in court yesterday charged with unlawful assembly, Gregory Ferguson Cleland, 36, and Charmaine Fay, 22, were granted bail until the pre-depositions hearing.

Yesterday Judge Zohrab outlined the alleged events leading up to Mr MacDonald’s murder.

About 9am on September 15 all six people before the court were seen outside the gang headquarters on Gasgcoine St.

When a car drove past, rocks were thrown at the vehicle. One smashed the car’s windscreen.

The damaged vehicle was taken to Elizabeth St and the driver returned to the gang headquarters on foot with two of his brothers. The defendants retreated into the confines of the motorcycle club property; verbal abuse was exchanged and then weapons were produced including a machete.

Harvey held a .22 calibre rifle and, allegedly encouraged by Tait to: “shoot the blacks”, “shoot the niggers”, he fired it. Mr MacDonald was hit in the stomach and he later died of his wound at Wairau Hospital.

In court yesterday defence counsel Philip Watson sought bail for Mackle, an apprentice builder. Mr Watson reminded the court that his client was innocent until proven guilty, but police prosecutor Sergeant Steve Frost said evidence against Mackle was quite strong.

Approving bail would also put both the community’s and Mackle’s personal safety at risk, Mr Frost said. Blenheim was a small, close-knit community, and the situation was still quite “volatile”, he said.

Mackle lived at the gang headquarters, was a member of the gang and was wearing his Lone Legion Motorcycle Club patch when arrested, Judge Zohrab said.

Ongoing disharmony between the gang and the victim’s associates meant independent witnesses could be easily intimidated if the key suspects were granted bail, he said.

Bail was not sought for Warren and Tait by their counsel, Michael Hardy-Jones.

Witnesses had identified Cleland as being inside the property when the altercation took place and it was said he even went outside before the shooting to tell the victim and his brothers to leave.

Cleland and Fay, described in court as Warren’s girlfriend, were granted bail; ordered to live at stated addresses and follow a 7pm to 7am curfew.

Neither may associate with any of the co-offenders or travel within 200m of the Gasgoine St residence.

Dr Yvette Tinsley, senior law lecturer at Victoria University, said it was not unusual for more than one person to be accused of murder.
The conditions are explained in the Crimes Act 1961, Section 66 Parties to Offences. A person who had offered some encouragement or help or had set off on a common purpose and could foresee that someone would be hurt as a result could be found liable for the same offence.

However, sometimes a court would drop the charge against associates to a manslaughter charge, she said.

In August 12 men were accused of the murder of Wanganui toddler Jhia Te Tua, although only one shot from a high powered rifle killed the girl.

The men were in three cars involved in the drive-by shooting at the home of Jhia’s Black Power father in Puriri St in Wanganui in May.

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The man and two friends, one Brazilian and one Chilean, appeared to have been followed along the lane between Bardeaux and Mini Bar by three New Zealand men, in their early to mid-twenties.

The New Zealanders said something to the three foreigners in English, which they did not understand.

“They said, sorry, we don’t speak English, and they were then pushed about and there was a verbal exchange before one member of the group disappeared around the corner and returned with about 15 other young men,” Mr Duffy said.

The large group all appeared to be New Zealanders and police believed all were probably living in Queenstown. Police were certain the group was not an organised gang.

The Brazilian was viciously attacked, while his two friends managed to run off.

Police were unsure what weapons if any had been used, but some broken glass was located nearby in front of BarUp.

The Brazilian man was discharged from Lakes District Hospital yesterday, still suffering from “fairly serious concussion”, feeling weak and dizzy with little recollection of the events.

Police were contacted by St John Ambulance who found the victim lying in a pool of his own blood from a serious head injury, Mr Duffy said.

The trio had been out for a few social drinks and were definitely not intoxicated, Mr Duffy said.

“I’d hate to think that the fairly average publicity the Brazilian community has had (lately) … that this is retribution for that.”

He was concerned that the reputation of many Brazilians have been unfairly represented and been “tainted” by other incidents.

A Queenstown-based Brazilian soccer player was charged with assault with intent to injure following a soccer brawl during a Queenstown game in May this year.

That charge was later dismissed but police are pursuing the matter in the Invercargill High Court.

Mr Duffy said police had also dealt with some other incidents this year in which Brazilians were offenders, but in this case they were “certainly the victims”.

“We’ve got a large number of Brazilians living and working and contributing in Queenstown – I think it appears that Queenstown could be getting the wrong end of the stick if they think a lot of Brazilians are responsible for crime,” Mr Duffy said.

The three young men were on a working holiday in Queenstown.

No arrests had been made yesterday and police were keen to hear from anyone who either witnessed the attack or had any information.

“It’s bad that in a short time Queenstown has gone from being a desirable place to live … and that perspective is changing, now we’re hitting the front page of the papers for all the wrong reasons,” Mr Duffy said.

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The Canadian, of native American ethnicity, had been in Wellington two days when he approached the heavily-tattooed Borland and invited him and his friends out for drinks.

While drinking, Mr Kawerninski told them stories about how he was a gangster in Canada and showing them scars he said were from bullet wounds.

He rode back to McPadden’s Lower Hutt flat with the men. They stopped enroute to buy bourbon and coke.

Arriving at the flat, they smoked cannabis, Mr Kawerninski passed out, and was woken by four or five men beating him up.

A pillowcase was put over his head, his legs were bound, his belongings were taken and he was dumped in a remote location.

Mr Kawerninski spent eight days in Lower Hutt Hospital with a fractured rib, collapsed lung and serious bruising after his ordeal.

Justice Jillian Mallon thanked Borland for a letter he wrote to her, telling him it was never too late to say he was sorry .

“Even if he was making a nuisance of himself he did not deserve what happened to him,” she said.

McPadden received the lighter sentence because he drove the car and acted as a lookout only to avoid “getting a kicking” from the men who had just beaten up the comatose tourist, Justice Mallon said.

Crown prosecutor Grant Burston said Borland was “the most culpable offender”.

“He is described by a probation officer as being a high risk of reoffending and of high risk to the community.”

Gregory was also a high risk reoffender, Mr Burston said.

“He had just finished a two-year sentence for aggravated robbery a month earlier. Then, in April, he has taken part in this robbery.”

McPadden was less culpable, and didn’t invite the men or the tourist around to his flat, and was a lower risk of reoffending, the Crown said.

- NZPA

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The frightened victim, who wanted to be known as Leilolala, said that as a Buddhist, he felt the attack was his “bad luck”.

“I think maybe I did something wrong. Maybe I killed an animal,” he said.

He and his girlfriend moved into the flat on Saturday and had already been broken into twice before yesterday’s assault.

He was in bed upstairs with his girlfriend when they heard a knock at the front door.

When he opened the door slightly, “they pushed it in really fast”.

They pushed him into the lounge and started to punch him.

“They swore a lot. There was lots I couldn’t understand. They said, ‘F… off, you yellow Asian boy, this is white people’s place’ – lots of stuff like this,” he said.

The men were acting “crazy” as they bashed him with beer bottles.

“They were crazy, like animals. I thought they were on drugs,” he said.

“I practised kung-fu for four or five years. I was thinking, ‘I can’t control the situation’. I was trying to fight back, but they didn’t feel any pain.”

He suffered facial injuries but was able to fend off some of the blows and injured one of his attacker’s arms before they fled after about 10 minutes.

“I think the other guys saw (their friend) could not move his arm, so they left,” he said.

Leilolala, who is studying cooking, said he had lived in New Zealand for nearly five years and had not experienced a racist attack before.

“They hate me maybe because they think we are rich because we drive nice cars. But it’s not because we are rich but because we think cars are quite cheap here. Maybe they think it’s unfair for them,” he said.

He said he still wanted to live in New Zealand despite the attack.

“My girlfriend is quite scared, but for me I am OK because I think these kind of people are very little in New Zealand.”

Detective Sergeant Scott Anderson, of the Hornby police, said the attack appeared racially motivated as “race hate” comments were made during the attack and the attackers left without taking any property.

They were described as being aged between 17 and 23.

The director of the Peeto Multicultural Learning Centre, Patrick O’Connor, said the attack was “absolutely shocking” and the community needed to challenge and confront such behaviour.

“All decent people have got to be cohesive in resisting the ugliness of racism, especially the arbitrary and anonymous face of racism where cowardly thugs disguise themselves and outnumber innocent people,” he said.

The Chinese community contributed a lot to Christchurch’s economy and diversity, he said.

The Chinese contributed $500 million to the international student market in 2003-04 – an industry that would be affected by race-hate crimes, he said.

“Thugs have an effect of ruining our export education industry because incidents like this get reported in Chinese newspapers and suddenly this little island gets the undeserved reputation of racist thugs and we are not at all,” he said.

Christchurch Chinese Students and Scholars’ Association president Jerry Dai said he was disgusted at the attack.

“I am worried not only for Chinese students, but for all international students in Christchurch,” he said.

“I will inform our members and other Chinese students to be aware of their safety. As a collective, we will not tolerate these kind of disgusting attacks.”

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