Mei Fan ‘worried about being killed’

MEI FAN had been worried her estranged husband would kill her for trying to get full custody of her children, less than a month before her body was found.

A police family safety team supervisor has outlined a series of police involvements with the Wellington mother of two and her husband, Michael Preston, going back to 2011, including one occasion when Fan worried she would be killed.

Sergeant Caroline Marner said in October she heard Fan was applying for full custody of their children and was worried about Preston’s reaction. ‘‘She had fears for her safety and said sometimes he was so crazy she worried that he could kill her.’’

Preston, 60 has pleaded not guilty to murdering Mei Fan, 37, and breaching a protection order by physically abusing her on November 8, 2013.

The Crown case is that Preston, upset about a protection order served on him, and wanting full custody of the pair’s two children, killed Fan in a knife attack at her home in Miramar that left the knife embedded in her neck.

Marner told a jury in the High Court at Wellington yesterday that, since 2011, she had had numerous contacts with both of them, with allegations made on both sides during the breakdown of the marriage.

Her first contact with Fan was in November 2011 when Fan reported herself to the police for using water that was too hot to wash her child’s hair.

‘‘She was led to believe she was a bad mother because Preston told her she was,’’ Marner said.

In October 2013, Fan reported they were separated.

Marner also said Fan told her that, even though Preston was horrible to her and played mind games and hurt her, she would always have some love for him. She did not think she had a future with boyfriend Tani Hoyhtya or with Preston.

Marner’s contact with Preston included warning him not to breach the parenting order, serving two trespass notices on him and investigating whether he deleted all the data from Fan’s laptop.

Preston told her Fan had had affairs and had been with Hoyhtya for years. He also said he was expecting full custody of the children. He admitted to what he called minor breaches and had been told off by his lawyer.

Earlier, Fan’s good friend Cindy Dalziel was asked by defence lawyer Steve Gill about a conversation she had once had with Preston about someone or some people wanting to kill Fan.

He asked if Preston had told her it was Fan’s uncle who wanted to kill her over a debt, but Dalziel told him several times that had not happened.

Sergeant Daniel Hughes said he spoke to Preston in October. Preston told him Fan had come to New Zealand on a false passport or had obtained a passport with false information.

Her birthdate was wrong, and Preston presented a Facebook page as evidence of it.

Preston told Hughes he wanted her charged with forgery or fraud. Hughes remembered the conversation when Fan’s body was found.

Sergeant John Lewis served the protection order on Preston on November 7.

He did not tell him it prevented him having access to his children.