Anti-vax campaigner's sentencing delayed

DELAYED: Christopher Savage's court sentencing on a charge of criminal nuisance has been delayed. PHOTO WARREN BUCKLAND

A judge has declined to sentence an Australian policeman-turned-backstreet medical advisor without more information on the man who in Hastings on Monday admitted a charge of criminal nuisance involving alternative treatment for a Hawke's Bay diabetic.

Back in the Hastings District Court today, Judge Tony Adeane further remanded 53-year-old former Queensland police officer Christopher William Savage for sentencing on November 4, saying it could not go ahead without a full probation report an Savage, now a campaigner against vaccination.

On Monday, the Court was told Savage intended leaving New Zealand and not coming back.

But deciding against the immediate sentencing yesterday, Judge Adeane told defence counsel and Hastings barrister Matthew Phelps: "I want to know more about Mr Savage's belief's and intentions."

He said that understanding "the public interest," and armed with a victim impact statement and the issue of reparation for further costs, it was appropriate to put the case off, and said: "I think we've squeezed it as far as we can. We're overloaded with everything."

He said reparation for further medical treatment the victim needed as a consequence of the incident was "a few hundred, to start with."

The Court has been told Savage arrived in New Zealand in April and in Hawke's Bay advised a 46-year-old man with whom he was said to have been communicating about four years, resulting in stopping the man's prescribed treatment and injecting him with a magnesium-based alternative.

The diabetic became ill and was taken to hospital by ambulance and admitted.