When confronted about his behaviour, he said he could not remember what he had done.
He later pleaded guilty to two charges of raping the girl, two of unlawful sexual connection, and one of doing an indecent act upon a young person.
He appeared in the Napier District Court on Tuesday, when he was sent to prison for more than four years.
All the charges related to a single event in September 2024, at a Hastings house where both Taiaroa and the girl were visitors.
Taiaroa arrived in the evening after drinking at a party elsewhere.
He found the 14-year-old and another girl drinking alcohol in a shed.
He joined them there and told the 14-year-old she was beautiful and had pretty eyes.
He deliberately blew cannabis smoke in her face and later gave her some cannabis and told her to smoke it.
In the early hours of the morning, he and the girl ate food in the kitchen before she went into a bedroom to go to sleep.
Girl was ‘shaking with fear’
Taiaroa followed her and closed the door. She asked him what he was doing, and he told her he wanted to say good night.
She waited for him to leave and, when he did not, she began to play video games on a PlayStation.
She and Taiaroa took turns playing the game, during which time he started touching her.
She tried to stop him by squeezing her legs together, but he persisted and began taking her clothes off, even though she was avoiding eye contact, trying to ignore him, and continuing to play the video game.
“She began shaking with fear and froze,” a Crown summary of facts said.
Taiaroa sexually violated her, then moved her to the bed and raped her twice.
He eventually left the room around sunrise, and the girl fell asleep.
When she woke up, she told an adult woman in the house what had happened, and the woman confronted Taiaroa.
He told the woman he “wasn’t in [the] right mindset” and said, “I shouldn’t have done that.”
When interviewed by police, he said he had been drinking heavily.
‘No recollection’ of offending
He claimed he had blacked out earlier and had no recollection of the remainder of the night. His first memory was of waking up in bed with the girl.
Judge Richard Earwaker said he accepted that Taiaroa was genuinely remorseful, but “this type of offending does cause long-term and permanent harm”.
There were several aggravating factors, including the girl’s vulnerability, the fact that he gave her cannabis, and that he had full, unprotected sex with her.
“It is regarded in our society as a very serious crime ... There does need to be a sentence which stops you and others offending in this way,” Judge Earwaker said.
“She was entitled to feel safe at that address.”
He sentenced Taiaroa to four years and three months in prison and made an order that he be listed on the child sex offender register.
Ric Stevens spent many years working for the former New Zealand Press Association news agency, including as a political reporter at Parliament, before holding senior positions at various daily newspapers. He joined NZME’s Open Justice team in 2022 and is based in Hawke’s Bay. His writing in the crime and justice sphere is informed by four years of frontline experience as a probation officer.
