An Auckland teen is now living overseas, where she is rebuilding her life after enduring multiple sex attacks by men who have now been jailed for the offending.
WARNING: This story details rape and may be distressing for some readers.
During a time when life should have centred on having fun with friends, making plans for the future and managing the doom of impending school assessments, one teen girl instead shouldered the weight of sexual trauma and the justice system.
She sat in a courtroom, feeling broken beyond repair, and gave evidence against men who, in unrelated attacks, forced themselves upon her sexually and stripped her of her adolescence.
The Auckland teen has had her body medically probed, been interrogated by police and lawyers, been the subject of social opinion, and had to bare herself again to her attackers when penning impact statements for their sentencing.
She was first the victim of Charlie Ngapera, an older man who took the then 15-year-old to a lookout and sexually violated her by having sex with her, as she unsuccessfully tried to flee his car.
Later, that same year in 2022, she was raped multiple times one evening by a group of young men, including Teina Takimoana and Arthur Te Wera, who kept her in a room and took turns with her body.
While Te Wera pleaded guilty to his involvement in the pack rape, and a third person, who cannot be named, was dealt with under the Criminal Procedure (Mentally Impaired Persons) Act, Takimoana unsuccessfully defended his rape charge at trial.
This meant the teen was called to the stand and had to relive, in front of Takimoana, a judge, a jury, lawyers and court staff, the personal and horrific events from that night.
She was forced to do the same when Ngapera, who was initially charged with rape, also unsuccessfully defended a reduced charge of sexual conduct with a person under the age of 16.
But for all that the now 19-year-old, who has name suppression, has endured over the past four years, this is not a story about pain and despair.
This is a story about hope.
With all of the criminal cases now having wrapped up, the teen is making tremendous headway in her healing journey and is building a promising life.
She is proud of herself and speaks with optimism.
“I think I’m doing really well,” the teen says, speaking from overseas where she now lives.
While she acknowledges the pain of the past is not behind her, she is finding ways to manage and work through it.
She is now working in an industry she has long aspired to be a part of, and is pursuing qualifications towards a higher role.
There are also business and investing goals she has, and mental health and exercise have been a huge focus.
“I’m really getting into my health and fitness, and have been focusing on my self-care and my gym training.
“I’m also doing a lot of reading and a lot of research. I love researching about my health and, like, my hormones and stuff.”
She leans on family when needed and is pursuing a sensitive claim with ACC for continued support.
“I still have nightmares, just not as much, and sometimes I get scared. I don’t like being alone.
“But I try not to let what happened to me take over. If I let those things stress me out, then I’m just doing more harm to myself.”
She says the move has helped considerably.
“It’s way better [where she is now living] than in New Zealand. I had too many bad memories there, and I just didn’t feel comfortable.”
The teen says she no longer recognises the broken girl who once sat in those Auckland courtrooms.
“Having to go to trial was really hard. It felt like everything [the offending] just came straight back. I had to watch my police videos again, and watching those was always the hardest part.
“I saw how broken and destroyed it had made me. I was just really skinny, and I had lost all my hair.”
She battled anger for some time because of the men denying what they had done to her.
“They knew exactly what they did. And for them to just sit there and take me to trial, and to lie ...”
She says it was especially hard with Ngapera’s case.
He continues to insist there was no sexual contact between him and the teen, and the circumstances of the case meant it was her word against his.
“I had this feeling, like, what if no one believes me.
“It was really hard ... just the stuff that they were asking me. I just kept breaking down in the courtroom, and I was terrified.”
The court heard that in early 2022, Ngapera, then 42, picked up the teen, whom he knew, to attend an event.
But when they discovered the event was not on, he took her to get food and then drove to Maraetai Beach, on Auckland’s Pōhutukawa Coast, where they parked.
He put a sunshade across the windscreen and gave the teen cannabis.
Shortly after, he removed her pants and underwear and sexually violated her.
Ngapera then proceeded to have sex with the teen, during which she tried to open the car door to get out but was unable to open it.
While driving her home after, Ngapera warned the teen that no one could know what he had done.
She kept it to herself and did not see Ngapera for several months, until by chance, when she was out shopping with her mother.
“My body kind of just went into like a shock, and I got really pale and my mum knew something was wrong, and she just kept asking me,” she recalls.
“So I ended up just telling her and then she called the police.”
At this point, the teen had also endured the pack-rape, which she had already told her mother about, as well as the police.
In that case, the court heard Te Wera had picked the teen up from her house one evening in mid-2022, with the promise of taking her to a drag racing event.
But he instead took her to a friend’s house, and later to another address in Papakura, Auckland.
During the evening, Te Wera raped the teen three times, and at one point, she was put in a bedroom where Takimoana and the other co-offender went in and also raped her.
She cried throughout the evening and explicitly told the young men, “No,” but her pleas were ignored.
During one of the sex attacks by Te Wera, he ordered a co-offender to film the teen, pulling her by the hair so she would look at the camera.
Eventually, she was dropped off at home, and she immediately told her mother what had happened.
She underwent a sexual assault forensic examination that night at the hospital and was given medication to prevent her from contracting any diseases. Testing revealed Te Wera and Takimoana’s DNA was present.
While navigating the justice system was heavy and complicated, the teen says the most heartbreaking part was the sentences her attackers received.
“I was really, really, disappointed at the outcomes, if I’m being honest.”
Te Wera, then 24, was jailed in March 2024 for seven years and nine months, while Takimoana, then 20, was given a six-year prison term when sentenced in November of the same year.
Ngapera was sentenced to prison in September last year for two years and nine months.
The teen has described the sentences as “messed up”.
She says it’s hard to fathom going through the sexual ordeals, dealing with the ongoing trauma, and having to fight to have the men held accountable for only a few years behind bars.
But she has no regrets about pursuing the prosecutions.
“I feel like it’s one of those things that if you don’t say anything, you will regret it later down the track.
“You need to tell your story.”
In terms of moving forward with her life, the teen says it has all come down to her mindset.
“I’ve needed to change how I look at things. I think it’s made me stronger and I won’t be stuck in a position where I’m letting them win and control how I feel.
“I’m looking at it like, I’m over here, doing what I love, and they’re in jail.
“They might not be in there for long but I’ve come so far in life, and they just won’t.”
Tara Shaskey joined NZME in 2022 and is currently an assistant editor and reporter for the Open Justice team. She has been a reporter since 2014 and previously worked at Stuff covering crime and justice, arts and entertainment, and Māori issues.