18-year-old apologises for murdering best friend

A teenager is beginning a life sentence today for murdering his best friend and seriously wounding his former girlfriend.

Ross Adam Anderson, 18, will spend a minimum of 11 years behind bars.

Anderson, of Levin, stood in the dock in the High Court at Palmerston North yesterday and, with his voice trembling, addressed a packed public gallery.

"I just wanted to say I am very sorry for what I have done. I really wish I didn't do it... I just wish I could take it all back.

"I will never forget what I have done. I am really sorry."

After his speech, Anderson resumed his seat and quietly wept. Others in the gallery were also weeping.

He stabbed his best friend Chevy Aramakararaka Koltai to death in Levin on April 11.

He then rounded on his former girlfriend, Terri Ann Murray, and stabbed her in the abdomen and forearm. He had to chase her along the street, only managing to catch up with her after she fell.

Miss Murray and Mr Koltai had begun a relationship, but Anderson couldn't come to terms with the fact she was no longer with him.

Anderson and Miss Murray had met last year at a training course in the town. He considered her "very special", his lawyer Fergus Steedman told the court.

He met Mr Koltai at the start of this year, and before long the two were close friends.

But in early April, after Miss Murray broke up with him, Anderson became obsessed about "a degree of closeness" he felt was developing between his two closest friends and on April 10 he learned Miss Murray and Mr Koltai were an item.

He had met another woman himself, but she was no replacement for the girlfriend he had lost, Mr Steedman said.

Miss Murray agreed to meet with Anderson at his flat on the afternoon of April 11.

However, when Anderson heard the distinctive sound of Mr Koltai's car, he became incensed and concealed a knife in his pants when he went to meet them.

He stabbed Mr Koltai a number of times in the chest and abdomen as his friend climbed from his car and advanced to shake hands.

After stabbing his ex-girlfriend, Anderson tried to run over the dying Mr Koltai with his victim's own car. He failed only because of onlookers who had rushed to Mr Koltai's aid.

Justice Alan MacKenzie told Anderson he was obliged to impose a life sentence for the murder of Mr Koltai, with a minimum non-parole period of 11 years.

If Miss Murray had died in the attack, Anderson would have received a minimum 17 years non-parole, he said.

A concurrent four-year term was added on the wounding charge.

A psychiatric report that attempted "to explain the inexplicable" showed Anderson to be a borderline paranoid schizophrenic, but his mental problems were not sufficiently serious to remove criminal responsibility for his actions, Justice MacKenzie said.

- nzpa