The body of Adrian Humphreys was found at Bushlands Campground in Tāngarākau on May 7, 2022.
“Guess what?” Justice Williamson-Atkinson asked his mate while stealthily vaping inside a whare as their minders slept around them. “What?” the boy responded.
That was how an alleged conversation between the two teens in which Williamson-Atkinson supposedly confessed to being involved in the murder of Adrian Humphreys at Bushlands Campground in Tāngarākau began.
The 16-year-old on the receiving end of the alleged confession sunk into a couch of an interview room as he gave his account of a conversation with Williamson-Atkinson, 17, to a police officer months after the May 7, 2022, death of Humphreys, 57.
On Tuesday, that interview was played to a jury in the High Court at New Plymouth in the second week of the trial of Williamson-Atkinson, who is defending charges of murder and burglary.
While the tape showed the teen witness, who has name suppression, was confused by some of the questions put to him by the police officer, he was confident in his recollection of the alleged conversation.
“[Williamson-Atkinson] said that the night that it happened, it was him and [another teen] that done it [sic].
“He said that they stole a knife from the kitchen the night before, and then they went - they said that they went to his tent [in the] early hours of the morning to try [to] get the keys.”
The teen told the officer Williamson-Atkinson allegedly admitted to punching Humphreys in the face when he woke up and found the boys in his camper.
He said the other teen, who also has name suppression, then put Humphreys in a chokehold, put the knife against his throat and asked for his keys.
“Justice was looking around, but couldn’t find them.
“Then the old man tried to move his arm, and then [the other teen] stabbed him and then Justice beat him up, yeah.”
Williamson-Atkinson allegedly told the young confidant he and the other teen then ditched the knife and a blood-soaked hoodie by the river as they walked along the track that leads out of the campground, located off Forgotten World Highway in eastern Taranaki.
“They were gonna run away but they didn’t know the way to Taumarunui, so they just came back to the tents and just acted like they wasn’t there [sic].”
Williamson-Atkinson and the two teens arrived at Bushlands Campground with three mentors on May 6, 2022, as part of the at-risk youth programme Start Taranaki.
Humphreys, an outdoor enthusiast from Rotorua, arrived that same day.
The anaesthetic technician had stayed at the campground only weeks prior and was excited to be returning with the camper trailer he had just bought.
But his trip was tragically cut short, as overnight he was stabbed five times and died about 20 metres from his camper.
The Crown allege it was at the hands of Williamson-Atkinson, who they claim was motivated to steal Humphreys’ car and leave the campground.
But the defence team maintain it was the other teen - the one whom Williamson-Atkinson claimed committed the act in his alleged confession.
If the jury believed it was the other teen who killed Humphreys, Williamson-Atkinson could still be found a party to murder, the Crown has told the jury. The other teen is not facing any charges.
The Crown has said there was a string of evidence which placed Williamson-Atkinson at the scene and pointed to him being the person responsible, including his DNA being found in the stab marks of Humphreys’ sleeping bag.
In the teen witness’ police interview, he told the officer the alleged confession came at the end of the eight-week youth programme while he and Williamson-Atkinson were staying at a whare in Kaponga, South Taranaki.
“He woke me up early in the morning and we were just vaping inside, which we’re not allowed [to do], and he told me about it while the staff were still sleeping,” he said.
“He was like, ‘Guess what’, and I was like, ‘What’?”
The teen also alleged to police that on the night before Humphreys’ death, he saw Williamson-Atkinson take a knife with a black handle from the camp’s kitchen and put it down his pants.
He claimed Williamson-Atkinson took it to his tent and put it in his sleeping bag.
“I said, ‘What’s that for?’, and he was like, ‘I’m gonna try [to] get some car keys’.
“I didn’t know they were gonna do that... kill someone.”
The teen witness said Williamson-Atkinson and the other teen had asked him to run away with them.
“But I said, ‘Nah’, ‘cause then I’d go back to [a youth justice] residence.”
The teen said during the night he had heard someone “crying” and “moaning”, but then he went back to sleep.
While he did not know why Williamson-Atkinson made the alleged confession to him, he said it also came with a warning: “Don’t tell no one [sic].”
“I was like, ‘Yeah, all good’.”
He said he felt like a “snitch” for telling police but, “it is what it is”.
During an earlier police interview, about five days after Humphreys’ death and before the alleged confession, the teen did not divulge any information about seeing Williamson-Atkinson with a knife, hearing a plan to steal a car or about waking in the night and hearing noises.
He later told police he had not mentioned any of it because he did not “feel confident enough”.
The youth also told police that he briefly spoke to Humphreys while at the camp, complimenting him on his camper and on a tray of muffins he had carried into the kitchen.
He described Humphreys as “a nice person” due to his friendly response, which was “thanks, buddy”.
Under cross-examination, defence lawyer Nicola Graham suggested Williamson-Atkinson had not confessed to him that he had hurt Humphreys or that he was present when he was stabbed, which the teen rejected.
The teen witness also denied Graham’s suggestion he was actually outside the camper with Williamson-Atkinson while the other teen stabbed Humphreys inside, and that the two “gapped it” back to their tents when they heard a scream.
The trial, set down for four weeks, continues tomorrow.
Tara Shaskey joined NZME in 2022 as a news director and Open Justice reporter. She has been a reporter since 2014 and previously worked at Stuff, where she covered crime and justice, arts and entertainment and Māori issues.