Allegations of Sexual
Abuse in NZ |
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The Dominion Post Three sons of a Murupara church
minister have been jailed for a "vigilante" attack on a man they
wrongly accused of raping their sister. Vincent, 29, Blaize, 27, and
Trinity Akuhata, 20, appeared in Rotorua District Court yesterday for
sentencing on charges of injuring with intent to cause grievous bodily harm
to Delmar Coates on June 10 last year. The three had pleaded guilty and
were each jailed for three years. They are sons of Murupara Elim Church
pastor Te Ta'ahe Akuhata. Outside the court, Pastor Akuhata
said the family were extremely sorry for the actions of his sons. Attempts had been made to meet Mr
Coates, a distant nephew, for a restorative justice meeting but he had
refused. "We have been hoping and
praying for reconciliation from the victim to meet us but he does not want
to." Pastor Akuhata said the family did
not support what had happened. "At the end of the day it is
the families of the men who will suffer." He said he would continue to pray
for his sons while they were in prison. The court was told the three men
had been to a party and the next morning were told by their sister that she
had been raped. They went back to the address of
the party and were told Mr Coates was the person involved. The three men forced their way
into Mr Coates' house in Murupara and beat him around the head and body with
a baseball bat, in front of his partner and 18-month-old son. Mr Coates' partner was hit on the
arm when she went to grab her son, who walked in on the beating. They later found out Mr Coates was
innocent of the claim. All three men took full
responsibility for the attack despite Trinity being the only one of the group
to hit Mr Coates with the bat. Mr Coates was in hospital for two
days with a broken nose, rib fractures and bruised kidney. Lawyers Mo Dorset, for Blaize
Akuhata, and Jonathon Briscoe, for Vincent and Trinity Akuhata, gave oral and
written submissions for home detention. The maximum sentence for the
offence is 10 years' imprisonment. In sentencing, Judge Jocelyn Munro
said the three men had realised their mistake soon after the attack and were
remorseful. They were all employed fulltime,
had families and had no previous convictions. However, Judge Munro said the men
were intoxicated and had "made a compulsive decision blinded by rage to
hurt Mr Coates". "It was a vigilante-type
attack where the men took the law into their own hands for revenge." The attack was premeditated, and
"completely and utterly unprovoked", she said, and those
aggravating factors meant home detention could not be considered. |