Wednesday 28 August 2013

Anne Hunt speaks out for justice





Is this yet one more police stuff up? Can’t the police do anything right. Their treatment of the public has gone from bad to worse. And who do the police work for in Levin? Citizens or the Mayor and local rowing club members.

Horowhenua District Councillor and Mayoral candidate Anne Hunt has slammed the racial disparity in the way the police are dealing with incidents at Lake Horowhenua, in the wake of another attack on her credibility during this election campaign.

She says it is now more than five weeks since Horowhenua Rowing Club members attacked owner Phil Taueki, and still there have been no arrests, despite Sergeant Marty Bull advising her on the day that Mr Taueki did not need to identify the offenders because they had already admitted it.

As the police have not yet arrested the offenders, Mrs. Hunt says that the rowers are free to go down to the lake and taunt Mr Taueki because the police have allowed them to get away with beating Mr Taueki up.

On the Horowhenua Rowing Club's official web-site, members are now claiming his injuries were self-inflicted.
Having seen his bloodied face and injuries to the back of his head, she says this would be physically impossible.
Mr Taueki had been hit from behind, and then had his face smashed into the rocks on waahi tapu land where the rowers have no right of access.

Judge Atkins had warned members of the Horowhenua Rowing Club earlier this year not to cross the Domain boundary.

She says it was fortunate that a supporter managed to get down to the lake in time to record a police officer reading Mr Taueki his rights, as the usual procedure is for the police to arrest Mr Taueki on some trumped-up charge so that the rowers could continue their unlawful activities on this privately-owned lake uninterrupted.

Mr Taueki confided afterwards that the attack was so vicious that he feared for his life.
When he took a formal complaint to the police two days later, he asked Constable Derek Turvey if his complaint would be investigated. He was told: 'probably not'.

Area Commander Patrick Handcock had met with Mr Taueki and Professor Whata Winiata a few days later to discuss this latest incident, and although he had promised Mr Taueki that he would be in touch with him by 11 August, Mr Taueki has not heard back from him.

Meanwhile Judge Lynch has relaxed Mr Taueki's bail conditions so that he can protect himself from further assaults without risking arrest for breach of bail. He also directed the police to review the remaining charges against Mr Taueki. (see attached submission)
In the past few years, a total of nineteen charges have been dropped by the police or thrown out by the courts.
Mrs. Hunt says that if any of these remaining charges come before the court, she will be testifying that she had received two early morning phone calls threatening to kill Mr Taueki and her.

Initially the police had been reluctant to investigate these death threats, but eventually the calls were traced to a Levin landline. "I was able to recognise the caller, and it was a member of the Horowhenua Rowing Club".

If charges had not been dropped at the last minute on another case, Mr Taueki would have played an emergency call to the police from a Club member, who made a supposedly 'off the record' comment that the police would celebrate if her husband harmed Mr Taueki. This caller, a senior manager at WINZ, held Mr Taueki responsible for last year's vandalism to their boats.

Mrs. Hunt says that the police have not spoken to Mr Taueki about this incident so obviously there is no evidence linking him to this damage. Mr Taueki had been bailed to live elsewhere at the time and had an iron tight alibi.
However Mrs. Hunt says that on the other hand, the only people who knew Mr Taueki was being held in custody the night his car was trashed were the rowers and the police.

As Mr Taueki no longer has a vehicle, Mrs. Hunt says she is on stand-by to transport him to important meetings, such as the Whakawhiti Korero at Te Wanganga o Raukawa on the day the video footage featuring on You Tube was filmed. She says Mr Taueki was angry because he recognised the rowers who had viciously assaulted him down at the lake, and having been summoned by the rowers, two police cars were arriving as he was driving away.

Previous court cases have established that a police officer was responsible for organising an unlawful event at the lake the day before his mother's Tangi. And despite this police officer denying that he had said anything to upset Mr Taueki, video footage confirms that this police officer disputes Mr Taueki's ownership of the lake.

Meanwhile Mayor Duffy refused to allow a Court of Appeal decision to be tabled at this month's Lake Domain Board meeting establishing that the Board has no authority to allow the Rowing and Sailing Clubs to occupy the buildings on Maori Freehold land at the lake.

Mr Taueki is still awaiting a Supreme Court decision that is expected to clarify the right of owners to remove people acting unlawfully on their property.

For further information: please contact Anne Hunt 06 363 7750.
I have removed identifying details from the attached e-mail but I understand the link has appeared on a number of other web-sites, including the Horowhenua District Council and Rowing Club sites.



2 comments:

Anonymous said...
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Anonymous said...

This is typical of the racism against Maori inside the Police Force.
If the authorities and the judge had any guts at all this would've been over long ago. All those involved in this matter and against Mr Taueki should all stand trial. I thank Mrs Anne Hunt for showing tremendous courage. These thugs should be relocated back to where they originated from including the authorities involved.