Bodybuilder - kidnapping was meeting between friends

Khalid Naser Slaimankhel, Jen Jay Law and Junior Iolimo Paea, appear at the Auckland High Court. Photo / NZ Herald

What the Crown has portrayed as a kidnapping in an attempt to avoid being jailed was really a pre-arranged meeting between good friends, a bodybuilder has testified at Auckland's High Court.

Khalid Naser Slaimankhel says that he and his alleged victim Marven Yacoub - a man he thought of as a younger brother - had arranged to meet at a South Auckland Burger King for a meal before visiting his lawyer and then heading to a gym for a workout.

When he couldn't get away from his supplement shop to attend the meeting, Slaimankhel arranged for a mutual friend, Junior Iolima Paea, to meet Mr Yacoub and drive him to his lawyer's office in Ponsonby.

The Burger King meeting had been arranged two days earlier when the three men and another man, Jen Jay Law, had hung out together in the carpark of Slaimankhel's shop.

The Crown contends that Mr Yacoub had never met Paea before Paea and two unknown associates detained him at the Burger King and then drove him against his will to Slaimankhel's lawyer's office in Ponsonby.

It is the Crown's case that Law pretended to Mr Yacoub that he would be at the meeting to sell him steroids but was instead at home in Hamilton.

The Crown alleges Mr Yacoub's family was threatened and he was forced to make a false statement designed to help Slaimankhel avoid being jailed on a breach of bail after 1048 steroid fat burner pills were found by police in the boot of his car. After swearing his false statement Mr Yacoub was instructed to appear at Slaimankhel's bail hearing the following day.

Slaimankhel, Paea and Law face a charge of kidnapping. Slaimankhel and Paea face an additional charge of perverting the course of justice.

Giving evidence in his defence, Slaimankhel said the alleged kidnapping was an agreed meeting between friends.

"We were just going to catch up at Burger King, have a feed, then me and Marven were both going to got to the lawyer's office, do the affidavit, then go have a workout at Les Mills," he said.

Slaimankhel said a text message he received from Paea before the meeting asking what type and colour car "that fella" drove was because Mr Yacoub frequently changed cars and had different friends drop him off.

Slaimankhel's defense counsel Mark Ryan asked him to explain a text he received he received from Paea after the alleged kidnapping that read: "Everything all goods. I think M will be tomorrow because he knows that we know his ins and outs and where he sleeps and the ones he loves will."

Slaimankhel said: "That's pretty much just saying, yes, we both know where Marven lives. Yes, we know his family and if his family finds out that, yes, he's still selling the steroids and that, they'll be disappointed at him 'cos he's done it numerous times."
Slaimankhel admitted he had interrupted Mr Yacoub when he made his statement at his lawyer Isaac Koya's office but only to say "tell the truth, bro."

He also denied showing Mr Yacoub a message on his cell phone that suggested he wanted him dead.

"Well if that was the case I'm sure the Crown would have charged me with threatening to kill, and plus they took my phone so he's [Mr Yacoub] clearly lying again."

Cross-examining, Crown prosecutor Claire Paterson put it to Slaimankhel that the fact Paea had enquired about the car of "that fella" in a text message was proof Paea did not know Mr Yacoub.

Miss Paterson also put it to Slaimankhel that Paea would not have needed to know the colour of Mr Yacoub's car if, as he claimed, Slaimankhel had intended to be at the Burger King meeting, and that he clearly did not even know his name.

Slaimankhel had "made the plan to kidnap Mr Yacoub and bring him to Burger King" after meeting with his lawyer on Friday to discuss his bail situation, Miss Paterson said.

"There was no kidnap and there was no plan," said Slaimankhel.