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Turoa Hapi
.
Jailed for four years for violating two young sisters.
After he was paroled he raped and stabbed a 78 year-old Bridge Pa, Hastings woman in May 1994.
.
.
none known
Born 1968
prison
Sentenced to preventive detention with a minimum of 15 years in July 1994
Due for a parole hearing June 2009
Background
From NZ Herald story 16th July 1994
A Hawkes Bay man will serve a minimum of 15 years in jail for the rape and multiple stabbing of a 78 year old widow in her home near Hastings. The sentence was imposed yesterday by Justice McGechan in the High Court at Napier. The 15 years will be part of a preventive detention sentence imposed on Turoa Junior Hapi, aged 26. The minimum term is the first use of a change to the Criminal Justice Act since the alteration became effective last September. It came after the crown prosecutor, Mr Geoff Rea, had sought a 10 year minimum. Justice McGechan imposed the sentence on charges of rape and wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. Hapi was sentenced to concurrent terms of six years for the aggravated robbery of the woman, five years for burgling her home and two years for unlawfully taking her car. He had previously pleaded guilty to all the charges relating to the attack on May 24.
Justice McGechan noted that the attack came just four months after he was released from jail after serving two and a half years of a four year jail term imposed in 1991 for the sexually violation of two young girls. The court had heard that the woman was watching television when the lights in her home went out. She investigated and confronted Hapi, who leapt at her and during the attack stabbed the woman at least 20 times. He forced her to write two cheques, the second because the first was covered in blood, and plunged a knife into her head where he left it before breaking into her garage and fleeing with her car. The offence was detected when a police officer stopped Hapi, who was driving the car near Napier. He had blood on his hands and clothing and the police went to the woman’s home to investigate.
They found the woman in a pool a blood in the lounge of her home. Justice McGechan said it was doubtful she would have survived had she not been found at that stage. The attack Justice McGechan said, was "little short of demented." Hapi had been in jail each year since he was 17. Justice McGechan said: "An ironic and unusual feature is that prison is not a punishment [to Hapi], it is security. "The imposition of any long sentence would not have been a punishment in that light and, moving cautiously in a new legislative area, I am not inclined to be at all extravagant." It seemed the probable intention of the legislative change was to reflect and cater for the public concern to see very severe sentences imposed effectively for "particularly repugnant offences." Defence counsel, Donna Carroll, had argued the case was not an appropriate one for preventive detention.
Sunday Star Times article of August 13th 2000 - "Murder after 51 Days on Parole"
Article is reproduced here
