Those unruly tourists: One admits theft
CCTV footage shows woman ripping off same Auckland service station twice
A26-year-old tourist who is part of a reviled family of travellers has admitted theft charges in court. Tina Maria Cash, 26, stole energy drinks, rope and sunglasses from an Auckland service station on two occasions.
Community Magistrate Ngaire Mascelle turned down media applications to photograph and film Cash when she appeared in the Hamilton District Court yesterday morning.
The court heard Cash stole a can of Red Bull from a Caltex service station at Albany on December 31.
At the same time a woman she was with hid a bottle of Primo under her dressing gown while paying for cigarettes. Cash waited at the door until the assistant was distracted serving the other woman and left with the Red Bull. The other woman did not pay for the Primo.
On January 3, Cash returned to the Caltex with her children and stole more Red Bull, rope and sunglasses valued at $50.
Her lawyer told the court she did not remember the incident, but accepted the theft was caught on CCTV video. She was convicted and ordered to pay $55 in reparation.
The court heard Cash arrived in the country on December 29 with her extended family, believed to be either Irish travellers or English citizens, on a six-month visa.
Mascelle declined media applications to photograph Cash in the dock, saying that it was her first offence in this jurisdiction and relatively low-level offending.
She noted the media attention the family had received after skirmishes with locals in Auckland and Hamilton during the past week.
Mascelle said the offending did not warrant further media attention. She gave Cash credit for the early guilty pleas and noted that a night in the cells was a significant penalty.
Cash was convicted on the two theft charges and ordered to pay back the $55.20 by 4pm yesterday.
Caltex regional manager Ankur Patel told the Herald that staff spotted the thefts on CCTV footage and confronted the family when they returned a third time.
“A woman came back and the site manager talked to her and showed her pictures but she told him in the face ‘that’s not me’,” Patel said.
However, a man eventually paid for some of the stolen items but refused to pay other outstanding bills and Caltex contacted police.
Patel said the Caltex workers were “honestly shocked” by the group.
Cash, from England, spent the night in custody after being arrested in Hamilton on Tuesday. She is among a group of holidaymakers from hell causing trouble across Auckland and Hamilton.
The woman has been on a supposed two-week trip of a lifetime trip with her now infamous family.
Family member John Johnson on Tuesday told the Herald they were all from England, not Ireland, as had been widely reported. The family also denied not paying for food at eateries.
But police and Immigration officials caught up with them after staff at Burger King Te Rapa, Hamilton, complained about their behaviour. Police made them buy car seats for two children in their vehicles.
Hot weather does strange things to people and in New Zealand the summer heat manifested itself in a sudden outbreak of moral indignation. The trials and tribulations of a group of tourists from the UK prompted much holier-than-thou tut-tutting from the populace of New Zealand.
There was rubbish left on the beach, threats to “knock your brains out” by a young boy, rude treatment of restaurant staff, attempts to dodge payment. There were reports from passengers on the same plane, including of dirty nappies left in the overhead locker.
They got pinged for the wrong child seats in the car and — oh, gasp, clutch those pearls — an attempt to walk through the drive-through at Burger King. That was the tipping point for the police to be called.
One of the group was treated to charges of shoplifting and pleaded guilty. It was hardly worth the effort — a pair of sunglasses, some rope and energy drinks from a servo. There was some evidence of dressing gowns being worn to the servo.
The crime that most outraged people was not shoplifting, but boorish and obnoxious behaviour. New Zealand, being a nation of saints, was having none of it, thank you very much.
Even the politicians weighed in. Rotorua MP Todd McClay announced on Facebook they were personae non gratae in his hood. Auckland Mayor Phil Goff denounced them as “a***holes”, “leeches” and “trash”.
“We know who they are,” he added rather ominously.
Immigration New Zealand eventually concluded they were of bad character and issued deportation notices. Goff was allowed to remain.
This treatment of the tourists was a great shame and unjust consideration for their efforts in providing two days of sterling entertainment. They should be treated to a worldwide tour.
There were timelines and maps of their exploits as they travelled down the country, by this stage a convoy with a string of media trailing behind them.
The defence one gave was that he was “just a fat kid from England on holiday”. Another claimed his grandfather was the 10th richest man in England. The only place there was more of a circus on offer was in their homeland, where MPs were soundly rejecting British Prime Minister Theresa May’s attempts at a deal on Brexit.
Over here, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern appeared to be running under the motto that if you have nothing nice to say, say nothing at all.
It has been four weeks since New Zealand heard from Ardern but at some point in the next couple of days, she will re-emerge from the cocoon of a summer holiday to get on a plane and take off to Europe.
The primary aim of Ardern’s travel is not to deliver an eye for an eye on the unruly traveller front, but to go to Davos for the World Economic Forum.
Ardern will tout her Government’s move to put “wellbeing” indicators into financial reporting as the lead of a panel called “More than GDP”. Climate change will also be top billing.
But the greater value in the trip is the proximity of political leaders and the great and mighty.
Ardern has enjoyed a peaceful holiday but her European counterparts certainly have not. They cannot afford to. The current tumult around the Brexit deal is reason enough for Ardern to be there.
She will bookend her travels with tactical visits to other European countries.
The details of her travel are yet to be announced but if British PM Theresa May is in her schedule, Ardern may get the chance to make the same joke former PM John Key once rocked out about meeting an Australian Prime Minister: that it was always a surprise to walk into the room and find out who was waiting for him.
Ardern’s main job is shoring up New Zealand’s position whatever the outcome of Brexit talks and looming no-confidence vote in May. New Zealand is in preliminary stages of free trade talks with the UK and negotiations with the EU are well underway. They must not be derailed.
Her visit may go some way toward redeeming British tourists in the eyes of Kiwis. At Davos will be one of Britain’s greatest travellers, someone New Zealanders are fonder of than the socalled Unruly Tourists: Sir David Attenborough.