A High Court jury in Napier has been unable to reach a verdict in the trial of a prisoner alleged to have all but killed a fellow inmate in Hawke's Bay Prison.
The jury of seven men and five women, which started deliberating on Thursday afternoon, informed Justice Denis Clifford of its position a short while before 5pm yesterday, about 90 minutes after it had been given an option of deciding the case on a majority rather than unanimous verdict.
The victim, Jason James Poi, now 32 and from Napier, suffered a serious brain injury in a prison cell assault which lasted up to half an hour on the afternoon of March 21, 2015. He was carried out unconscious and was not able to walk, talk or do anything for himself again.
Before the court was 34-year-old Paka Junior Leota, of Auckland, who had pleaded not guilty to a charge of causing grievous bodily harm, while another inmate, convicted murderer and prison lifer Joseph Sam Samoa, 40, had previously pleaded guilty.
The Crown alleged the assault was sparked by the failure of a plan to use Mr Poi's partner and another woman to take drugs and other items into the prison on behalf of Leota and Samoa during a family day.