Someone should have seen this coming
The life and death of Marie Harlick
Someone should have seen this coming: That the man Marie Harlick was once in love with would stomp and beat her so brutally she choked on her own blood, her body left limp in a bathtub with the tap running as life drained out of her.
Her 19-month-old daughter Vivienne, strapped into a stroller nearby, would be left traumatised from witnessing her mother’s murder at the hands of a jealous and controlling Mongrel Mob member, Robert Roupere Hohua.
Next door to the Opotiki house where she died, two teenage friends heard the yelling and beating, called 111 and wanted to intervene. But the mother of one of the boys stopped them from going next door, fearing they too would be hurt.
By the time the police arrived – 26 minutes later – Hohua had dragged Marie’s limp body, stripped off her wet clothes and laid her on a mattress, half-covered in a blanket.
Her face had been washed and her infant daughter was lying next to her. On the screen on Marie’s cellphone was her sister Vicki’s number, a call she never managed to make.
Marie Harlick was a 35-year-old mother of five – and two other dead children – when she died, the victim of unspeakable domestic violence.
“Was I the last person she tried to call? I don’t know,” says Vicki Harlick, through tears.
“I don’t think I did enough. I pretended everything was okay, when it wasn’t.”
Vicki is grief-stricken and guilty about not doing more to help Marie escape a life of escalating violence.
But the failure is more widespread – a dysfunctional family, various agencies that didn’t see the warning signs despite multiple incidents and, in the end, Hohua himself.
A Herald investigation found that many people had many chances to intervene in the sad life of Marie Harlick.
● Police recorded 33 family violence incidents involving Marie.
● Her baby daughter Vivienne was red-flagged with Child Youth & Family.
● Corrections changed Marie’s home-detention address. Hohua was not allowed to live with her, as part of her sentence conditions, but did.
● Hohua was twice freed on bail for assaulting Marie, despite strong police opposition, before killing her.
“The death of Marie was absolutely preventable,” says Jane Drumm, executive director of domestic abuse charity Shine.
“And there are so many other women suffering like her. It’s terrible on a human level. And it’s terrible because it’s costing this country billions of dollars.” M arie Rose Harlick was born on April 13, 1981, in Whangarei. She grew up in Tikipunga, near Whangarei Falls, where everyone called her Mush but no one can remember why.
She was no stranger to crime. The mischief started with stealing fruit from orchards and lollies from the local dairy. Later, she and Vicki stole cigarettes.
Marie, of Ngati Porou and Ngapuhi descent, had a distant relationship with her mother and was, she told her probation officer, “handed around the family”.
Her teenage years were marred by sexual abuse, Marie also disclosed.
Changing homes meant constantly changing schools, so by the age of 12 Marie had stopped going. By 13 she was drinking alcohol, which became a lifelong comfort and companion.
Against a backdrop of rejection and family dysfunction, both sisters wanted to find their absent biological father but, says Vicki, “he didn’t want anything to do with us”.
That rejection was a bitter blow to Marie. “It sort of broke Marie’s heart,” Vicki says. “To this day I think that was the missing piece in her life.”
In their teens, the sisters moved to Taupo Bay, near Mangonui in the Far North, where their stepfather grew up.
There, Marie met Eddie Tatai and, at 17, fell pregnant. The couple would go on to have five more children but
their years together were a time of turmoil and trouble.
They moved to Auckland, then New Plymouth and, in 2010, celebrated the birth of their sixth child, a daughter they named Frances. Three weeks later Frances was dead.
On the night of June 18, the couple invited friends over for drinks and put the children, including the baby, to sleep on a single mattress in the lounge. Late that night Marie joined her children in a “fairly intoxicated” state, Coroner Carla na Nagara found.
When Marie woke up, Frances was not breathing and cold. The coroner found the baby died of accidental asphyxiation.
“This case serves as another tragic reminder of the risks when safe sleeping advice for babies is not followed. I extend my heartfelt sympathy to Frances’ family for their loss,” said Coroner Carla na Nagara.
It was not the last time Marie would grieve for a child. There was more misery when Marie’s handsome boy Piripi, raised by his paternal grandmother in Taupo Bay, was found dead. Newspaper headlines reported an unnamed 10-year-old boy committed suicide as part of a cluster in Northland.
His death was ruled accidental by Coroner Brandt Shortland.
Piripi’s unexpected death on top of the loss of baby Frances plunged Marie into depression.
Evicted yet again from a state home in 2013 – she was behind in her rent – Marie left Eddie and New Plymouth behind, moving to Whakatane to be with her sister. V icki Harlick had been living in the eastern Bay of Plenty for 15 years and wanted to help Marie have a better life, settle down.
“There were a lot of things swept under the carpet when we were growing up,” Vicki says. “I just wanted to do anything to help her.”
The sisters gathered Marie’s four daughters, who were scattered across the North Island, and settled them into schools in Whakatane. It was a good start.
But Marie met Rob Hohua, a Mongrel Mob member. They moved into a Housing New Zealand home together.
Vivienne was born in March 2015. Marie was already pregnant when she met Hohua, Vicki says, but his name is on the birth certificate.
“Love you my princess,'' Hohua posted on Facebook with a photograph of the baby.
But that show of tenderness was an isolated one. Once again, Marie’s life was overshadowed by violence and alcohol. The couple became “well known to police”, a euphemism for troublemakers.
The police were constantly being called to their home to stop Hohua bashing Marie.
Vicki: “Every time he got arrested, he’d ring me up for bail, bail, bail. And like a dumb bitch, I’d do it because my sister was begging me.”
Because Marie refused to give evidence against him, Hohua had only one conviction for violence against her: a common assault in May 2015.
A year later, the couple were evicted from their Housing NZ home for growing cannabis.
Marie claimed the dope was for personal use but quickly pleaded guilty to possession of a Class C drug for supply.
Vicki suspects her sister was taking the rap for Hohua, a belief shared by the probation officer who interviewed her and noted several police callouts for family violence.
“Ms Harlick claims she is in the process of removing herself from this relationship. The report writer voiced her concerns . . . and challenged her reasons for taking full responsibility of the charge, however Ms Harlick declined to shift the blame.”
Even if she was protecting Hohua, she had taken responsibility in the eyes of the court.
Sentencing Marie to eight months’ home detention in August, 2016, Judge Louis Bidois had a warning.
“Make sure you comply with this sentence Ms Harlick. You put one foot out of place and you will end up in jail.”
It was not the last time Bidois would make a decision with consequences for Marie. M arie moved to Opotiki to serve the sentence. Less than five weeks later, she had moved back in with Rob Hohua.
Corrections approved the change in Marie’s home detention address, after the relative she was living with became tired of Hohua turning up.
As part of Marie's sentence conditions, Hohua was not supposed to live with her at the new address on Wellington St, because of the probation officer’s concerns about their violent relationship.
But like so many other times, they flouted the rules.
The couple were drinking with friends at their new home when an argument rapidly escalated.
Marie, drunk, hit him in the face. Hohua punched back, then stomped on her face twice as she lay on the ground.
Marie was charged with breaching her home detention conditions. Hohua was charged with assault with intent to injure. “They rang me to see if I would bail him out,” Vicki Harlick says. “And this time, for the first time, I actually said no. I felt like a dick but I just had this feeling something bad was going to happen.
“Mush begged, begged, begged . . . when I told her no, I didn’t want him bailed with me, she didn’t text back.” Assault with intent to injure carries a maximum sentence of three years