Bomb threat to stop woman dating
Slurs carved into a car door, slashed car tyres, fake bomb threats and covert tracking and listening devices.
For more than two months Eugene Halgryn used a plethrora of intimidating tactics and sophisticated stalking techniques in a bid to deter a young woman from dating other men. It was an ultimately ill-fated campaign that led to the sentencing of the apparently failed suitor in the Hamilton District Court on Friday, on charges of criminal harassment, threatening to kill, wilful damage, unlawful interference with a motor vehicle and intercepting a private communication with a listening device.
But while there was no doubting the sinister intent and the seriousness of his deeds, the 22-year-old Hamilton man did earn praise from a judge for his efforts to resolve his issues and apologise to his victim – an apology he delivered to her personally at a restorative justice meeting.
Eugene Vincent Halgryn and the then-19-year-old woman met on a dating site – and dated twice – about 10 months before his harassment began.
It was offending that took several unusual forms, and began on
December 5, 2018 when he attached a tracking device onto her car while it was parked in a car park at Wintec in central Hamilton. He later replaced it with a second tracking device – while her car was parked at her home – and a few days later reattached the first tracking device.
Sometime prior to the morning of January 11 he slashed two of her car’s tyres while it was parked outside an accommodation block, and he did the same again while it was parked at her home on January 21. A further two tyres on her car and one on another person’s car were slashed on February 5. That same day the word ‘‘Whore’’ was scratched into the paintwork on the driver’s side door.
On February 1, she received a threatening text message from a four-digit number.
‘‘For the eyes only. Stay calm. This is your first and last chance,’’ it read.
‘‘We have been paid generously. We are thorough and precise. We have firearms and explosives. We can see you right now from the park. A 3kg bomb containing Gelignite has been placed inside the house at [her address]. Failure to comply with the following will result in detonation. Accepting our request will result in the deactivation.
‘‘We will know if you contact the police so don’t bother. Unless you don’t value your life.’’
The message then instructed her to call a Wellington phone number within three minutes.
‘‘We will not answer but will see a missed call. Failure to comply will begin the process. We know where you, your friends and family live.’’
The message was signed ‘‘The Hell’s Angels Waikato’’. Three days later she received a voice message.
‘‘We have been watching you since you left your house last night around 8.30pm. We were watching you from the tree line. If you ever go back ... to see him again we will hunt you both down and kill you with rifles when you least expect it in the months to come.
‘‘We know where you live, we know where all your friends live and we know where all your family live. We will also hunt down your family and friends if you don’t comply. I have been paid a lot to undertake this, so we take it very seriously ... We are watching.’’
More threatening messages followed and at one point he listened in and recorded a phone conversation between her and another person by activating an audio device he had placed under her car. He later sent the recording to her in the form of another voice message.
The summary of facts for Halgryn’s case does not mention how he was identified, but when he was later arrested by the police he told them he thought the woman was ‘‘cheating’’ on him.
While he wanted to have her for himself and wanted to scare her, he said he had no intention of hurting her. In court, Halgryn’s counsel applied for a discharge without conviction on the basis such a black mark would hinder his prospects of international travel and his chances of registering with Engineering New Zealand as a chartered engineer.
Halgryn had struggled with depression and had sought help from a psychologist but – as Judge Philip Connell noted – could not provide evidence of any kind of causal link between his condition and his offending.
Judge Connell declined the application and sentenced Halgryn to 12 months of intensive supervision, 70 hours of community work and ordered him to pay the outstanding $1901 of $3000 in emotional harm reparation.