Mob and meth fuel mayhem, mental illness

Taking methamphetamine caused a mental illness that led to serious unprovoked assaults on prison officers and prisoners, a court has heard.

At the age of 14 Hemi Te Poono was sent to live at the Mongrel Mob headquarters in Turangi, a decision that now seemed incomprehensible, his lawyer Mike Antunovic said at the High Court in Wellington on Monday.

The placement was Cyfapproved and considered in his best interests at the time, but it had ‘‘very negative’’ consequences and set the scene for what followed, Antunovic said.

At 33, Te Poono has been sentenced to a total of eight years and six months’ jail, for all the prison attacks, and attempting to burgle the Palmerston North Manawatu Standard office and a neighbouring building, while armed with a shotgun in August 2015. He has to serve at least four years and nine months’ jail before being considered for parole.

After being arrested for the attempted burglaries Te Poono was charged with murder, and although acquitted in November 2016, he attacked six people – four prison officers and two prisoners – while in custody.

In Manawatu Prison he attacked a prisoner from behind with a sharpened pencil, stabbing him many times, fracturing his cheekbone and cutting him.

Three days later he used a sharpened piece of perspex to stab at three officers in Manawatu Prison in September 2015 while they were collecting meal trays, attacking their heads and bodies.

Shifted to Rimutaka Prison he attacked a prisoner walking past him, stabbing with a sharpened instrument, hitting him 23 times in the head, neck and body, and kicked him once when he was trying to get up.

By November 12 he had another sharpened pencil that he punctured the cheek, and stabbed at the head, of a prison officer who took him back to his cell.

Now Te Poono has been put in maximum security, locked in a cell 23 hours a day, Antunovic said. His exercise area is another sunless cell.

Crown lawyer Jo Mildenhall said the Rimutaka Prison officer was off work for six months after he was attacked.

The Crown had considered asking for Te Poono to be sent to jail indefinitely under a sentence of preventive detention, but in the end did not seek it.

Justice David Collins said he would not have imposed it anyway. The judge said Te Poono had reported psychotic symptoms since the death of Samuel Culling who, on Te Poono’s account, was executed while sitting beside Te Poono in his car.

Hemi Te Poono awaits his sentence at the High Court in Wellington.

A psychiatrist said the psychosis was methamphetamineinduced.

The symptoms have been controlled and Te Poono was now willing to have treatment to reduce violence and control his alcohol and drug use, the judge said.

In November 2016, a Wellington jury found Te Poono not guilty of murdering Samuel Culling, a man he had known just 24 hours.

The Crown alleged Te Poono shot Samuel Culling, also known as Samuel Badawi, in the back of

the head at close range with Culling’s own sawn-off 12-gauge shotgun on August 5, 2015.

Culling was shot while sitting in the front passenger’s seat of Te Poono’s Mercedes Benz and his blood was found in the car.

Te Poono dumped the body in central Palmerston North.

He said Culling was shot by someone who ran up to the car and pointed the gun through an open window. The pair had smoked methamphetamine, and were planning to stand over drug dealers to get more drugs.