Victim awoke with hostel owner in bed
A man who was drugged and indecently assaulted by his ‘‘father figure’’ says the incident left him ‘‘sick, confused and freaked out’’.
Michael Harris, 58, pleaded guilty earlier this year to charges of indecent assault, stupefaction, attempted stupefaction and the making and possession of ‘‘intimate visual recordings’’.
The Kaitaia hostel owner drugged, assaulted and photographed more than a dozen men between 2005 and 2014.
He appeared in the High Court at Whangarei yesterday, where the victim, whose name is suppressed, told him the offending made him feel ‘‘dirty’’.
The charges relate mostly to offences committed between 2011 and 2014 against 14 men in their late teens and early 20s, who had been visiting New Zealand from countries including Germany, Austria, Britain and the United States.
Some charges, however, relate to similar offences dating back to 2005, against a New Zealand boy who was 15 when the offending started. Those offences were committed in a number of locations around New Zealand.
The names and many identifying details about victims were permanently suppressed by Justice John Fogarty to prevent further harm and embarrassment to them.
Sentencing by Justice Fogarty was scheduled for yesterday morning.
However, this was delayed at the 11th hour because of lastminute wrangles over the potential seizure and sale of the hostel by the Crown, which would affect sentencing calculations.
Justice Fogarty allowed the victim to read a victim impact statement as he had travelled to New Zealand especially for the sentencing and would not be able to attend any rescheduled appearances.
The man said he had lived at the hostel, painting and repairing in exchange for board in one of the spare rooms in Harris’ private house.
He had come to see Harris as a ‘‘father figure’’, and all had seemed ‘‘fine and innocent’’ until the night that Harris made him a mixed drink at one of the regular small gatherings in his sitting room.
After one drink the man felt like he was going to pass out, and headed up to bed.
In the middle of the night, however, he woke to find Harris was in bed with him with his arms around him. The man left the hostel a couple of days later, but was further distressed when Harris contacted him again before he left New Zealand.
He said he felt ‘‘dirty’’ knowing that somebody he had trusted had betrayed him.
The man returned to sit next to his girlfriend in the public seating, but a few minutes later Harris called out from the dock to ask Justice Fogarty if he was allowed to give a response.
The request was granted, and Harris addressed his victim directly.
‘‘I just wanted to say sorry,’’ he said before choking up so his words became inaudible.
He rubbed his face and removed his glasses.
‘‘I do sincerely apologise. I’m glad you came today. Thank you.’’
Outside court, the man said when he first met Harris he’d thought he was just a ‘‘nice, odd, friendly fellow’’, almost ‘‘overfriendly, but not in a sexual way’’.
He said he had mixed emotions about seeing Harris for the first time since the offending.
‘‘Part of me is a little sad for him, and part of me is a little mad. And a bit of disgust.’’
He hoped that Harris would fully understand the gravity of his offending after hearing his victim impact statement.
‘‘I hope it hits him hard. Hearing it from the victim will make him really understand it was wrong, more than any sentence can.’’
Harris was arrested in September 2014 after a lodge guest approached Kaitaia police to say he suspected something untoward had happened to him while at staying the lodge. A blood test showed the man had been drugged with the prescription sleeping drug temazepam.
In July 2016 Harris pleaded guilty to 14 charges but elected a jury trial on 28 other charges, but in September he pleaded guilty to the remaining charges as well.
Harris reportedly bought the Main Street Lodge in 2012 for $1.2 million and spent $200,000 refurbishing it. The property included a cottage, seven offices, eight dormitories and eight motelstyle units as well as communal kitchen, dining and sitting rooms, Before then Harris had worked as a travelling salesman for an Auckland carpet and rug company.
In August last year, it was reported that police had applied to stop the sale of the Main Street Lodge under the Proceeds of Crime Act, which allows for the seizure of property that has been used to facilitate crime. – Fairfax NZ