Dante Te Wero Noa Takiwa Lamont, 21, has pleaded not guilty to six charges – four of drug-driving causing death and two of drug-driving causing injury. Photo / Kelly Makiha
Dante Te Wero Noa Takiwa Lamont, 21, has pleaded not guilty to six charges – four of drug-driving causing death and two of drug-driving causing injury. Photo / Kelly Makiha
A Rotorua District Court judge has asked for an earlier hearing date for a case involving a man accused of drug-driving killing four people, for the sake of the families of those who died.
Dante Te Wero Noa Takiwa Lamont, 22, from Rotorua, has pleaded not guilty to six charges– four of drug-driving causing death and two of drug-driving causing injury.
The two-vehicle crash happened on State Highway 5 at Rotorua on December 9, 2024.
Police alleged he caused the deaths of Napier siblings Amelia Rose Stockdale-Frost and Ruben James Stockdale-Frost, as well as Tray-Dee Wall and Mary-Jane Heke. He allegedly injured Dion Herbert and Josiah Lamont.
The case was called in the Rotorua District Court on Wednesday before Judge Anna Skellern. A hearing before a judge, called a substantive hearing, was set down for March 1 next year.
The hearing is needed because Lamont’s defence counsel, Max Simpkins, has previously said in court he intended to call an expert witness to challenge the “authenticity” of the Crown’s THC evidence, which was the basis of the defence case.
Crown prosecutor Kris Bucher raised concerns about the date for the hearing being so far away, and further concerns that the date was only for a reserve hearing - which meant it would only go ahead if another case set to go ahead on that date fell over for whatever reason.
Bucher said that given this case involved the deaths of four people, it would be preferred if the hearing was sooner, and on a date that was confirmed for this case.
Bucher noted there had already been unavoidable delays in the case.
Judge Skellern agreed, saying it wasn’t appropriate for this case to be a reserve hearing next year.
She asked that it be recalled in June in the hope that another earlier date would become available.
Lamont, whose appearance was excused in court this week, allegedly had 25 nanograms of THC per millilitre of blood, exceeding the 3-nanogram per millilitre level legally considered high-risk.
Ruben James Stockdale-Frost, 19, and Amelia Rose Stockdale-Frost, 26, both of Napier, died after the crash in Rotorua in December last year. Photo / Supplied
Kelly Makiha is a senior journalist who has reported for the Rotorua Daily Post for more than 25 years, covering mainly police, court, human interest and social issues.
