Killer says he gamed the system

A double killer deemed ‘‘low risk’’ and freed from prison before he committed a copycat killing of his first murder has told a coroner he gamed the system.

Paul Pounamu Tainui, born Paul Russell Wilson, was on parole for the 1994 murder of his girlfriend Kimberley Schroder, 21, when he raped and murdered 27-year-old Nicole Marie Tuxford at her Christchurch home in a similarly brutal manner.

Schroder’s father, Gary James Schroder, 67, was ‘‘inconsolable’’ when he found out Tainui had killed again, and he died in a suspected suicide three days later, on April 10, 2018.

A statement from Tainui to the inquest into their deaths was read yesterday. ‘‘Overall, I think that Corrections worked their backsides off to help me out. I misled them into thinking I was good, especially at the end of my parole,’’ the statement began.

Tainui said he believed that Tuxford and Schroder’s deaths were no-one’s fault but his own.

‘‘I would often mislead or tell lies to the probation staff I was seeing . . . I knew that if they knew or thought something was up, I might get recalled.

‘‘Things were not going well for me, but I pulled the wool over them.

‘‘After the David Bain thing, (his employer, whose name is suppressed) made a really good presentation about ‘second chances’, which helped a lot.’’

In 2014, Tainui was a groomsman at the wedding of Bain, who in 2009 was acquitted of murdering five members of his family in 1994. The pair had met while in prison.

‘‘I think everyone walked over broken glass to help me. I am here because of me, me, me. I am the piece of scum that shit on everyone that trusted me.’’

Poor practice in Tainui’s risk assessment was highlighted in evidence and cross-examination of senior Corrections psychologist Nick Wilson yesterday.

Despite Tainui seeing a psychologist at least 275 times before his release, the rape and sexual elements of his crimes were never properly explored, the inquest was told.

A psychologist who treated him over 100 times was also used to assess his risk, something that was also considered bad practice due to the bias such familiarity could create.

Psychologist reports sent to the Parole Board also contradicted themselves, the inquest heard.

Despite his lack of insight and remorse for over two decades, Tainui was still assessed as being of low risk when he was released by the Parole Board in December 2010. His self-reporting to psychologists was also relied on too heavily.