Differing sentences given for aggravated robbery

Two men involved in a Dunedin street attack found themselves on the end of vastly differing sentences this week.

Ihaia Begley, 24, came before the Dunedin District Court after pleading guilty to being an accessory to the aggravated robbery.

With support from his employer and a previously clean criminal record, he was sentenced to six months’ community detention.

Tawhiri Tairi-Rouvi, however, failed to turn up for the hearing at the scheduled time and had to be hauled before the court after police executed a warrant for his arrest.

He had twice failed to attend interviews with Probation and, with no home-detention address available, Judge Michael Turner jailed him for 22 months.

On November 26 last year, the pair, along with 31-year-old Damian Bryce-Blewden and 19-year-old Jakane Cruden, set off to find a 17-year-old who owed a $100 cannabis debt.

Cruden had sent out a message to his contacts seeking the whereabouts of the teen and they found him sitting on a bench in High St.

Pay up or he would be killed, one of the defendants told him.

The threat prompted the victim to walk away but they caught up with him outside a hotel in Princes St.

Bryce-Blewden punched the teenager in the mouth and kicked him in the leg before a scuffle ensued.

Begley filmed the incident on his phone, later telling police it was so others could see what had happened.

Bryce-Blewden held him on the ground as Cruden inflicted at least six blows with a metal bar.

Tairi-Rouvi stood aside, ensuring no members of the public became involved in the fracas.

Judge Turner accepted Begley was not involved in the violence but capturing the footage on his phone was “a particularly aggravating factor”.

The presence of both he and Tairi-Rouvi increased “the overall level of intimidation,” he said.

The defendants took the teen’s phone, hoodie, cigarettes and a shopping bag containing a phone charger and anti-psychotic medication.

Begley drove Bryce-Blewden's car away from the scene but the vehicle ran out of fuel a short distance away.

Counsel for Tairi-Rouvi, Brian Kilkelly, said his client had shunned family gang connections but had made poor decisions in his choice of new friends.

“This offending, from his perspective, was spontaneous in that he wasn't fully aware of what was going to happen,” he said.

Tairi-Rouvi was 17 at the time of the crime and Judge Turner gave him leave to have his prison term converted to home detention, should a viable address become available.

In October, Bryce-Blewden was jailed for two years nine months, while Cruden got 11 and a-half months’ home detention.