Reduced sentence angers victims

Victims of a driver who crashed into four cars in a bid to end his life are angry the conviction length has been halved.

On July 8, 2017, Kaama Waenga drove his partner’s Subaru near Rotorua’s Ngongotaha roundabout at high speed in the centre of the road.

After reaching speeds of 100 to 120kmh he veered into oncoming traffic, colliding with four cars carrying a total of nine people, including four children.

A report into the case determined Waenga was depressed, stressed and suffering from mental illness.

‘‘Waenga reported during the interview that he wanted to kill himself by driving into a tree and the psychiatrist’s report records him as saying that he wanted to kill himself and ‘take others out when he did it’.’’

Waenga was injured in the crash with the other occupants lucky to escape without further injury. He was originally sentenced to two years and four months’ imprisonment for his reckless driving. But this ruling was overturned by Justice Anne Hinton in April 2018 for being ‘‘manifestly excessive’’.

Hinton said the district court judge failed to take into account Waenga’s mental state in regard to his culpability for the offending.

‘‘I am therefore of the opinion that the judge has proceeded on the basis of an error,’’ her ruling stated.

Hinton quashed the earlier sentence and entered a new one of one year and 11 months’ imprisonment after discounts for guilty pleas were calculated.

But a driver of one of the cars Waenga collided with is ‘‘disgusted’’ at the sentence length and that Waenga will be able to drive a car again.

Shane Gilbert had two children in the back seat and said it was lucky they were not all killed.

‘‘Thankfully the airbag saved him,’’ Gilbert said.

‘‘He was pretty bruised up and unable to walk straight after the crash, but we didn’t have to go to hospital.’’

After colliding with Gilbert’s car, Waenga crashed into the car following behind which happened to be carrying Gilbert’s wife and another two children.

‘‘He could have taken out one whole family,’’ he said.

‘‘Things could have been very different.’’

Gilbert said their children have struggled to come to terms with the accident as they struggled to understand why the crash occurred.

Waenga lost his licence for 18 months but Gilbert wanted to see his licence stripped permanently.

‘‘If he had got a gun and shot at people, didn’t kill them but shot at them, there would be no way he would have his firearms licence given back,’’ he said.

‘‘This is the same thing, just with a different weapon.’’