Murder convictions have been quashed and new trials ordered for two women sentenced in 2010 over the brutal street slaying of a man in Whanganui.
Castlecliff man Paul Kumeroa was killed on Septmeber 23, 2008.
Jamie Ngahuia Ahsin and Raeleen Matewai Noyle Rameka were sentenced to 10 years and six months in jail following the 2009 High Court murder trial. Clarke James McCallum and Daniel Craig Rippon were also convicted on the murder charge. McCallum was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum 15 years non parole, and Rippon was to serve 12 years non parole.
The trial was before Justice Robert Dobson, who said it was a "completely mindless and violent attack" on Mr Kumeroa.
Mr Kumeroa had been drinking, and was wearing a red hoodie that belonged to his partner when he had walked home alone along Cross St on the night of the attack.
Ahsin was driving a borrowed car when she and her associates drove past Mr Kumeroa, he said.
She reversed the car and Rippon and McCallum got out and attacked him.
McCallum felled Mr Kumeroa with a small axe with two blows to the side and back of his head. Justice Dobson described it as a callous, brutal and unprovoked attack.
He told Ahsin at the sentencing that two female voices had been heard yelling encouragement on the night of the attack.
The appeal for the two women was approved today in the Supreme Court, and new trials were ordered. It was found that there were "inadequacies" in the judge's summing up to the jury, appeal documents said.
Defence counsel for the women suggested the women had called to the men to get back into the car, indicating that whoever spoke was trying to stop matters going further.
That was the "evidential foundation on which the appellants rely for the appeal point", the documents said.
It was suggested the judge should have raised that point with the jury.
By Melissa Wishart of the Wanganui Chronicle
