Graphic content warning: This story discusses extreme violence
Confronting images of a bloody knife and the moment an armed man wielding a large blade stormed a couple’s Mt Wellington bedroom dressed as a soldier have been released by a court after a high-profile Auckland murder trial.
But a judge is still deciding whether to release graphic CCTV footage of a man smeared in blood and clutching the hunting knife as the homicide victim lies dying moments after he was stabbed in the jugular.
Former actor Finauga Faatoia succumbed to his injuries on August 31 last year in an incident at Tumori Place.
The court heard he had been hired as “muscle” by his landlady Rebecca Allcock to help evict two troublesome tenants who she claimed were behind on their rent and dealing drugs.
Faatoia expected to earn “big money” for the job, telling Allcock he might need to “rough them up a bit” to get them out, to which she responded: “I’m fine with that”.
Faatoia – a husband and father described by his family as a “gentle giant” – drove to the couple’s townhouse on a motorbike armed with two blades, a wire garrote and rope, smashed his way into their bedroom and threatened them with a Bear Grylls “survival knife”.
But his plan to intimidate the couple backfired when the boyfriend grabbed his own hunting knife and plunged it into Faatoia’s neck.
As Faatoia suffered heavy blood loss, the couple dragged him outside on to a patio where they stomped and kicked him about his body as he lay face-down on the ground, and stabbed him twice more in the back of the head and buttocks.
The boyfriend was charged with murder and the girlfriend with being a party to murder. Both denied the charges, claiming they thought they were going to die and were acting in self-defence.
After a four-week trial, a jury returned not guilty verdicts on November 25, agreeing with defence lawyers that the force used by the couple to defend themselves was reasonable in the circumstances.
CCTV footage of what the Crown described as a “furious and frenzied” assault on the patio was played to the jury.
The jury also watched grainy footage of Faatoia storming the couple’s bedroom, which the girlfriend had recorded on her mobile phone.
A 111 call was also played in which the woman could be heard screaming, followed by the sound of “gagging and gurgling” as Faatoia bled to death over several minutes from a 15.1cm neck wound.
The Herald requested access to the footage on the basis it had been played in open court, was of public interest and provided important context about the violent events on that day.
Justice James MacGillivray is yet to rule on the application relating to video and audio recordings, but granted the Herald access to a raft of still photographs shown as evidence.
The photos include an image of a red-handled hunting knife smeared with blood. This is the weapon the boyfriend used to stab Faatoia after the 40-year-old bodybuilder and martial arts fan threatened the couple and allegedly attacked the girlfriend on her bed.
Another image shows the Bear Grylls “survival knife” Faatoia wielded when he burst into the couple’s bedroom, telling them to “get the f*** out”.
In another file, dozens of still images were provided from the mobile phone footage. The visual record shows Faatoia – who stood 1.88m tall and weighed 115kg – blocking the bedroom entrance after bashing through the barricaded door.
He picks up a chair and throws it across the room before reaching behind his back and grabbing the blade from his “tactical belt”.
As the girlfriend tells Faatoia they will leave, the boyfriend pleads with the armed intruder, saying, “Brother, don’t pull that on me brother. That’s a breach of my rights”.
The images show Faatoia clutching the knife and cornering the boyfriend in an en suite bathroom. He then turns towards the woman when he realises she is filming him.
Still holding the knife, he moves towards her on the bed, demanding her phone.
The footage then ends.
The court heard the boyfriend then stabbed Faatoia from behind to protect his girlfriend, later telling police, “I stabbed his throat out. I head-locked him and twisted his head on the knife”.
Though fatally injured and bleeding heavily from his severed jugular, Faatoia continued to fight and the two men fell struggling to the bedroom floor, the defence claimed.
The woman then tried to grab Faatoia’s knife from his hand, cutting her finger in the process.
Crown prosecutors claimed what happened next was “gratuitous” and totally unnecessary.
The couple dragged Faatoia through a sliding door on to the patio where they allegedly “finished him off”.
As the boyfriend stomped, kicked and stabbed Faatoia, the girlfriend admitted yelling, “Get him, get him before he gets us”.
Part of the patio incident was captured on CCTV.
“It’s difficult evidence to watch,” prosecutor Claire Paterson told the jury. “Quite frankly it is over the top.
“It went well beyond what was needed in self-defence.”
However, defence lawyers argued that while perhaps gratuitous, the patio attack was largely irrelevant to the case because, unlike the initial neck wound, the injuries inflicted were “insignificant” and did not contribute to Faatoia’s death.
The jury were allowed to return majority verdicts when they could not reach a unanimous decision.
When the not guilty verdicts were read out, there were gasps from the public gallery, with one man storming out of court and one of the defendants weeping quietly in the dock.
The couple cannot be named for legal reasons.
Lane Nichols is Auckland desk editor for the New Zealand Herald with more than 20 years’ experience in the industry.
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