Police provide update on Bryndwyr shooting
Police in Christchurch have just given an update on Thursday morning's shooting in the suburb of Bryndwyr. Reporter Tim Brown spoke to Tuwhenuaroa Natanahira.
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RNZ News
4 minutes ago
- RNZ News
Transport agency disputes 'systemic failure' led to Johnathon Walters' death
A road worker was crushed on a Remuera street last year by a runaway truck so dodgy it had been banned from the road multiple times since 2017. Photo: 123RF Roadworkers who were on a crew with Johnathon Walters do not want to talk about his death 15 months ago - it is just too raw. Walters was crushed on a Remuera street last year by a runaway truck so dodgy it had been banned from the road multiple times since 2017. Operator and director of Ashik Transport, Ashik Ali, has pleaded guilty to manslaughter. Truckers are speaking up, angry about a road safety system they say is full of holes. Many others were flouting the rules, one said. "Systemic failure killed Johnathon Walters," a National Road Carriers Association post read . But NZTA has rejected that. Murray Robertson was in Auckland when it happened. He had to front up to the bereft crew. "It's particularly difficult when you know the individuals and you've gotta walk in the room and look in, look in their eyes and, you know, explain if you've done everything you possibly can to make sure this doesn't happen." Now managing director of Downer in New Zealand, he knew Walters from the "early days", the latter working on paving crews and him in road construction. "So I actually knew him personally. "The next day I went to our depot where we brought our crew together and they were extremely impacted and shaken up, to the point, you know, these are tough grown men and they were they were in tears." The team was like a family. "In fact, our supervisor and foreman are related and the team are very close to Jonno's family. So for them it's not just losing a colleague, it's almost like losing part of the part of the whānau, you know? "It's raw for them, you know, because they've had to get on and and get back to, you know, operating as a team." Downer New Zealand managing director Murray Robertson. Photo: Supplied / Downer NZ Sadness lingered, but other feelings, too. "Given the circumstances and how it happened, there was not just the sadness, there was a fair degree of anger as well [and] I guess disbelief that this could happen," Robertson told RNZ. The truck had a full load of chip seal on board when its brakes failed and it began rolling down Remuera's Victoria Avenue after 8pm on 8 May, 2024, zig-zagging for 400m, hitting Walters, two lamp posts and a wall, before stopping, according to the NZ Herald . "I tried to press the brake, speed or clutches," Ali told police when they spoke with him at Middlemore Hospital, where he fled to afterwards. "Nothing would work." He had gotten away with using a truck for years that had been banned by police and inspectors multiple times. The 55-year-old Aucklander ran the truck with bad brakes from the time he bought it in 2017, despite police checks, inspections and pink stickers meant to blacklist it. The stickers were pulled off. For the last three years or so the truck had no certificate of fitness (a COF, like a car WOF). To get around registering a truck without a COF, Ali appeared to have changed the plates. "The current system has no teeth," the New Zealand Trucking Association said . Carriers Association boss Justin Tighe-Umbers told RNZ, "They are outraged that this has resulted in a death that looks completely needless and they want to see these gaps plugged." NZTA rejected the claims of systemic failure. "NZTA had applied the regulatory levers available to identify the poor state of the vehicle and to address the immediate risk to public safety," it told RNZ. "Regardless, an individual (Mr Ali) subsequently made a decision to illegally drive this unregistered and unsafe vehicle after it had been ordered off the road, resulting in the death of another person." Though it never revoked Ashik Transport's transport service licence (TSL), given that Ali drove a pink-stickered vehicle when that was illegal, it was "highly unlikely" that revoking his TSL would have changed the tragic outcome, it said. His guilty plea spoke strongly "to the actions of the individual". A trucker, John Baillie, said the case was a cause for "despair". "I was at a function on Saturday night where the Herald article on Mr Ali was the hot topic of conversation with people getting quite vocal regarding the ongoing level of offending that seemed to go unchallenged over time despite multiple flags being raised," he told the Carriers Association in a 4 August email. "He is one of many others operating this way. "I certainly get the feeling that a lot of good operators are really starting to get frustrated with what they are seeing - reading and hearing about these dishonest operators that are just running rampant round the place with non-compliant equipment with next-to-no enforcement or agency involvement allowing them to take the piss out of the compliant operators." Tighe-Umbers said their efforts for three years to get truck licensing and other protections tightened up were bogged down. "It is glacial in how long it is taking to get recommendations through and action taken." Ali's whole fleet was inspected in 2020 after maintenance failings. He was put on a regime of extra maintenance and having to get certificates of fitness (a COF, the truck equivalent of a WOF) every three months, instead of the usual six, the reporting from court said. "NZTA had identified Ashik Transport as a poor operator, and had taken a range of measures to address the safety risks identified," the agency said. But the truck banned in 2018 was caught again, by police roadside, in 2021 with loads of safety defects. More stickers were put on it. Pamela Bonney of Auckland trucker L W Bonney and Sons said there was high frustration among good operators who spent a lot of time and resource making sure their trucks were safe to go to work every day. "What this case highlights is that there's a lack of power for the police and NZTA to actually take action when required," she said. "As a good operator, we want to see good operators prospering and those that do not have a desire to comply shut down." NZTA Waka Kotahi said the measures it took included an initial decision to revoke the transport service licence of Ashik Transport. Instead, after formal discussions, it issued a Notice of Improvement for the extra checks. Transport Minister Chris Bishop says he agrees rules reform is needed. Photo: RNZ / Mark Papalii Tighe-Umbers said change was urgent but not arriving. "We've been in discussions with the Ministry of Transport for many years about policy fixes needed in the system." Most recently, this had bogged down at a government working group set up by former Transport Minister Simeon Brown and continued by the current one, Chris Bishop, he said. Bishop told RNZ, "Rules reform is complex, but I agree this work needs to proceed at pace." In June he announced the country's land transport rules reform to, in the first place, "increase productivity and efficiency". A Beehive media release also said it would "improve safety". Among the seven reform tasks would be "simplifying heavy vehicle driver licencing, weight thresholds, and freight permitting to improve efficiency and productivity for the freight sector". Bishop, in a statement to RNZ, noted another task: Investigating whether to require heavy vehicles entering the fleet to be fitted with extra safety features. On the truck safety front, they were opening new commercial vehicle safety centres and ensuring police focused on the highest risk and harm, he said. Police inspected 11 percent more heavy vehicles last year, totalling 52,478, against a target of 50,000. They also added five jobs to the safety team, with more training, including online for all front line police. Bishop, like NZTA, extended their deepest sympathies to the family and friends of Walters, and everyone else affected by the tragedy. Tighe-Umbers said, in an article for transport media outlets, that it was "far too easy" to become a transport operator in New Zealand - and far too difficult to stop repeat offenders who continually ignored the rules. "Once you pass an open-book test, you're licensed to operate a transport business of any size, no business plan, no proof of sustainability, and no required experience or expertise." Pink stickers were "meaningless" to recidivists, court action was too slow or ineffective, and detection "nearly impossible in a large city without sufficient enforcement resources". Ali had little chance of being caught unless he had been stopped at a Commercial Vehicle Safety Centre or flagged by road police, Tighe-Umbers said. "This is not the fault of frontline NZTA or police staff." Some in the industry call such unregistered, often dangerous, vehicles "ghost trucks". Part of the problem, they say, is that in this country a transport service licence applied to a company, as opposed to an individual truck as it did in the UK, where it was easier to track a vehicle and impound it, they said. Some also questioned the willingness of NZTA Waka Kotahi to throw the book at rogue operators. But NZTA said that certificates of fitness were already linked to transport service licences. Ali's truck did not have a COF and had been ordered off the road, but he chose to drive it in spite of this, it said. Legislative change was not its function, but led by the ministry, it added. "NZTA supports and suggests amendments where they are necessary. "NZTA is continually reviewing our regulatory processes and decision making." It worked closely with police and the Crown Prosecutor to support the prosecution; it would not comment further prior to Ali's sentencing in November. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
3 hours ago
- RNZ News
Marlborough teen was eating, drinking and using his phone before fatal tractor crash
Queen Charlotte Drive. Photo: Screenshot / Google Maps A teenager who died after crashing a tractor was eating, drinking and using his phone before the vehicle left the road. Trenton Karl Jones, 18, died from severe head and neck injuries after the tractor he was driving crashed through a barrier and rolled down a steep bank on Queen Charlotte Drive near Cullen's Point in the Marlborough Sounds on 21 October 2021. In findings released on Tuesday, Coroner Rachael Schmidt-McCleave said the 18-year-old's death was entirely preventable. But she did recommend Marlborough District Council should install a metal barrier at the site to prevent similar deaths in future. "Had [Jones] been fully focussed on driving the tractor, and had he not been distracted by eating, drinking and messaging on his phone, he is likely to have been able to take evasive action to avoid crashing down the bank, or to safely negotiate the curve in the first place," the coroner said. Jones grew up in Tapawera, south of Nelson, and moved to Linkwater in 2020 to work for Leslie Bros Contracting. Paul Leslie, one of the owners, said Jones showed up to work early every day and was a "good little fella", who was "good on machinery" and "great with numbers". The morning of his death, Jones and Leslie had travelled to Canvastown where a paddock needed ploughing. The tractor was on site and Leslie watched Jones do pre-start checks on the tractor before leaving him to complete the work with the understanding he would drive the tractor back to the business' premises in Linkwater once it was done. Later that morning, Jones was driving the tractor back to Linkwater on a winding section of Queen Charlotte Drive in Havelock, when he failed to negotiate a right-hand bend, crashed through a wooden barrier and rolled down a steep bank on the left-hand side of the road. At the time of the accident, it was sunny and the road was dry, well-marked and in fair condition. The tractor did not have any mechanical faults. Coroner Rachael Schmidt-McCleave. Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon An investigation by the Tasman Police Serious Crash Unit found remnants of an ice cream, sausage roll and coffee inside the overturned tractor, while analysis of Jones' phone data showed he had been using Snapchat while driving, though he had placed his phone back into his chest pocket before the crash. Jones was likely distracted by eating, drinking and messaging on Snapchat as he negotiated the bend in the road, causing the tractor to crash through the barrier and down the bank, Schmidt-McCleave said. The senior constable who oversaw the crash investigation said Jones had not been wearing his seatbelt and, if he had, he "more than likely would have survived". Schmidt-McCleave said given the injuries described in the post-mortem, she did not have enough evidence to reach that conclusion. The crash investigator also said the wooden sightline barrier was not sufficient to prevent the tractor from crashing through and had there been a metal or wire barrier at the curve in the road, it might have kept the tractor on the road and prevented the crash. He recommended Marlborough Roads should consider installing one. Marlborough District Council and the district's roading office, Marlborough Roads, advised the coroner it managed a roading network approximately 1500 kilometres long, much of it rural and mountainous, with around 250 sight rails in the region to delineate the road next to steep drop-offs. The council said it would be challenging to install a metal barrier at the site of the crash due to the steep terrain, as the deep anchoring required for barrier posts would be difficult. It deemed its current approach to road safety was adequate, including the use of sight rails, signage, line marking and appropriate speed management. Schmidt-McCleave recommended Marlborough District Council further consider installing a metal or wire rope barrier at the crash site and on similar bends on Queen Charlotte Drive, in order to reduce the chances of further deaths occurring in similar circumstances. The coroner also endorsed the Transport Agency's recommendations on driver distraction, which included encouraging motorists to turn their phone off when driving or using 'do not disturb' mode, and taking regular breaks rather than eating, drinking or smoking while driving. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
11 hours ago
- RNZ News
Abel Wira on trial for manslaughter after dogs kill landlord Neville Thomson
By Shannon Pitman, Open Justice Journalist of Abel Wira is accused of the manslaughter of Neville Thomson who was mauled by dogs in Panguru. Photo: RNZ / Peter de Graaf A concerned woman listened over the phone as her partner shouted at a pack of growling dogs - then the line went silent. Shirley Orchard then sent Neville Thomson a message, desperate to know what was happening. "I hear a pack of mutts going off and you disappear, you have left me here wondering if you have been mauled, let me guess. Are you out of it just forgot me or bleeding to death?" she said in her text message. She never got a reply. Three hours later, it was confirmed Thomson had been mauled to death by 23 dogs belonging to his boarder. Abel Wira, 61, is now on trial at the High Court at Whangārei on charges of manslaughter and owning a dog that caused injury or death to the man he called a brother. Crown lawyer Danica Soich opened the case to the jury on Monday, outlining the details of what happened at Thomson's property in Panguru on August 4, 2022. Neville Thomson died from blood loss in August 2022. Photo: Supplied The court heard on Monday that Wira had been living in a caravan at Thomson's 2ha property with his dogs. Soich said Wira was known to often lock his dogs in a truck or barricade them in his caravan with a block of wood. A few weeks earlier, Wira had crashed his vehicle into a paddock. On the day Thomson died he organised for a neighbour to help pull the vehicle out. Wira left the property, leaving Thomson at home to look after his dogs. The court heard the dogs had a history of aggression, rushing at neighbours, attacking local cattle and even Wira had previously needed medical attention for dog bites. About 9.56am, Thomson was on the phone with his partner and told her the dogs had not been fed in two days. He said he had offered Wira his truck to go and get dog food but this had been declined. Over the phone, Orchard heard dogs growling and barking and Thomson saying "get out of here you f***ing dogs". Thomson reportedly moved away from the phone and for the next 10 minutes she listened to growling, barking, shouting and then silence. "Mr Thomson does not come back to the call," Soich told the jury. Orchard made several attempts to call back and texted her partner, confused by what had just happened. Meanwhile, Wira had travelled to Broadwood to pick up dog biscuits and other items and returned to the Panguru property around 11am. At 11.30am, the Crown said he sent a private Facebook message to his friend. "I need help bro please my dogs have attacked my bro and he's gone please bro." The court heard Wira was sighted leaving Panguru about 1pm and not long after he waved down police in Ahipara. "Wira told police Neville Thomson was dead and had been eaten by dogs," Soich told jurors. "He explained it had been two hours since he found Mr Thomson and he was driving to Kaitāia police station as he did not have a phone." Throughout this time, Orchard was texting neighbours to check on Thomson and requested a police welfare check at 1.33pm. "Sure enough, when they arrived they saw the defendant's dogs locked in a [Toyota] Hilux. The dogs were behaving aggressively and trying to get out," Soich said. "There were muddy drag marks leading from the front porch to the kitchen. "They found his body lying in the kitchen wrapped up in a blanket. Neville Thomson showed no signs of life." The dogs had blood on their fur and were reportedly locked in a truck, barking, attacking each other and almost breaking windows. Thomson died at the scene from blood loss. Six adults and 17 puppies were found at the property. Two had to be shot on site because of their aggressive behaviour. When Wira was interviewed he said it was normal practice to lock his dogs in a caravan using a white shoelace and a log of wood across the door. It is the Crown's case that regardless of whether Wira was present or not, his departure from providing a reasonable standard of care for the dogs led to Thomson's death. "Mr Wira's dogs were clearly dangerous," Soich said. "You'll be asked to bring your knowledge of human and canine behaviour. For everything he knew about these dogs - a log placed against a caravan door, was a major failure." Defence lawyer Connor Taylor acknowledged Thomson's death was horrific, but a terrible accident. "Can it be proven that it was culpable homicide?" Taylor put to the jury. "It's not the situation you would often read about. "What happened that day, how they got out, or why they got out, we will never know. "What we do know is this. It was tragic, it was unforeseeable but it does not make Mr Wira guilty of his murder." The trial is expected to last two weeks before Justice Andrew Becroft. * This story originally appeared in the New Zealand Herald .
