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Offender Databases Dean Noble

Dean Carleo Noble

Alias

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Offences

Assault, kidnapping and threatening to kill his former partner in September 2003
Also attempted to pervert the course of justice and bribe a witness
Earlier sentenced on weapons charges
Also sexual violation by anal rape and assault of his cellmate at Paparua prison in 2005
Also miscellaneous methamphetamine manufacturing charges etc etc

Victims

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Offender Affiliations

Paula Noble

Gang affiliations

Highway 61
Mongrel Mob

Age

Born 1968

Current Location

Prison

Parole/Release Dates

Sentenced to 6 years 10 months with a 3 year 8 month non parole period in March 2005
Sentenced to 11 years in September 2008
Unsuccessfully appealed sentence and conviction in October 2009
Eligible for parole after 7 years

Background
Full appeal judgment online here (PDF)
First parole eligibility date fell in May 2007 now he will not be considered for release until September 2015
NZ City story here
NOBLE SENTENCED: At the High Court in Christchurch, Dean Noble has been sentence to two years jail for illegal possession of a pistol after earlier being acquitted of being an accessory in the drive by shooting murder of black power member Max Shannon, but found guilty on the pistol charge

Noble was responsible for the suicide of Michael Maxwell. Michael Maxwell committed suicide in late 2009 because he had been raped by Noble in Christchurch Prison. Christchurch Press story here has further details regarding this

The Press, Christchurch, Jun 5, 2008
Two cellmates were deemed to be "compatible" by the Corrections Department before a teenage skinhead was raped by a 37-year-old Maori gang member. Highway 61 gang member Dean Noble, now 41, was found guilty last month on three charges of sexual violation, including two counts of rape, and assaulting his 19-year-old cellmate in 2005.

The Department of Corrections service support manager, Karen Urwin, said prison management used their "custodial knowledge and experience" to place "compatible prisoners" together. "However, prisoners who share cells together may not always get along. Prisoners sharing a cell spend a lot of time together in a closely confined space and, unfortunately, conflict can sometimes occur. In these cases, one or both prisoners will be moved."

Christchurch Prisons southern regional manager, Paul Rushton, said Noble and the victim were in a high-medium unit within a block that housed several gang factions. The inmates were placed together because they were not considered high risk to each other, he said.

"Noble, although his serious criminal offending has placed him in prison, has not exhibited behavioural problems in prison. His internal risk isn't high.There was nothing to indicate to us in our dealings with him, and he's spent a lot of time in prison, that he would beat, bully, extort or - as it's been proven in this court case - sexually assault another person." There were single cells within the unit for "the worst of the worst" inmates, but they were not deemed in that category, he said.

The unit manager would have removed the victim immediately if he had expressed fears for his safety or reported an assault. However, the unit manager,who gave evidence in court, said the victim had only said Noble was "strange" and did not mention an assault, Rushton said. "Any prisoner who believes they are at risk can ask to be placed on segregation. I would like to make it clear that the department would not ignore any report of assault, and had the prisoner complained he would have moved immediately. Sexual assault is not OK, it's not acceptable and when reported it is acted upon immediately."

Canterbury University criminologist Greg Newbold said it was "incomprehensible" for a teenage boy to be put with a hardened criminal and older Maori gang member. "There's no way that should ever happen. I'm surprised they have got teens even in the same cell block with hardened criminals, let alone the same cell." Offenders under 20 were normally kept separate from adults, and rapes were rare in New Zealand prisons, he said. "For an inmate to rape another inmate is considered - by inmates - to be completely unacceptable. They are totally scorned."

Further background from here
Story from December 2004
Highway 61 gang member Dean Noble has escaped a charge of conspiracy to murder but was found guilty by a jury last night on a charge of attempting to pervert the course of justice. A co-accused, nightclub operator James Alan Samson, 30, was found guilty on charges of attempting to dissuade a witness by bribery, and attempting to pervert the course of justice, and not guilty on a count of threatening to kill.

In the High Court in Christchurch, the pair were remanded in custody by Justice Fogarty pending sentence later this month. The Crown had alleged a woman, whose name is suppressed and who had been in an allegedly violent relationship with Noble, faced pressure to drop charges rising from a serious assault by Noble in September last year. The pressure allegedly culminated in an attempt to murder her in February by an overdose of morphine, for which Noble's sister, Paula Noble, has been jailed for nine years.

Noble was yesterday acquitted of a charge of conspiring with Paula Noble to murder. Noble had already admitted charges of injuring with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, kidnapping and threatening to kill related to the assault in September last year. Summing up the case for the jury yesterday, the judge said it was a case where the Crown relied to a degree on circumstantial evidence.

When a series of reliably established facts began connecting, that could be proof beyond reasonable doubt. He warned the jury to be objective and guard against any feelings of sympathy or prejudice. As far as the conspiracy to murder charge against Noble, it came down to whether Dean Noble agreed with his sister Paula Noble that she would give an overdose to the complainant, the judge said. Summing up the defence case for Samson, lawyer Raoul Neave said essentially he was caught in the middle of a friend's domestic dispute.

As for the events of February 15, the attempted murder, they had nothing whatsoever to do with Samson. It was important for the jury to remember they were not in a court of morals but a court of law, and someone could not be convicted simply on the way they behaved, thought or spoke. It came down to what they actually did, and whether it was done with criminal intent.

There was little evidence to back the complainant's allegations against Samson. Demands for money were driven by the complainant, not Samson, who was passing on money from Noble he was required to pay as a parent. As for the charge of threatening to kill a police officer, Samson was simply behaving like a clown at the time, but that did not make him a criminal, Neave said. Summing up the case for Noble, David Ruth warned the jury to be careful. They could not just say Noble was a violent and suspicious character so therefore they would have to find him guilty.

While the complainant had been in an abusive relationship with Noble, for some reason women in abusive relationships wanted to keep going back, which she had done. In the aftermath of an unjustifiable assault, she was simply seeking normality, he said. Regarding a false letter Noble wrote, purporting to be from her and asking to withdraw the charges, at the time it was written she was a full party to it, Ruth said.

The most serious charge Noble faced was the conspiracy to murder. There was no suggestion Noble was involved in supplying intravenous drugs, and there was no basis to think an attempt on the complainant's life was attributable to Dean Noble. It was not enough to reason he had a motive. The jury needed hard evidence to conclude Dean Noble had a serious agreement with Paula Noble to kill the complainant. No-one could say Dean Noble ever condoned killing the complainant, Ruth said

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Corrections and Additional Information
We endeavour to make this database as accurate as possible, but we are at the mercy of whatever information we can find in various online and offline archives. We rely on the public - that is, people like you - to fill in the gaps that we cannot. If you wish to submit additional information or a correction to this file CLICK HERE . Privacy: Trust policy is that all sources are treated as strictly confidential unless we are explicitly told otherwise. If you wish to see a file removed from this database certain conditions must be met by the offender set out HERE Note that this does NOT apply for those that are the primary offender in a murder, rape, or any sexual offending involving minors. We do not enter into correspondence regarding the guilt/innocence of offenders. Such correspondence is not responded to, especially if the offender concerned has a number of prior convictions

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