A man who suffered a fractured skull during an attack involving members of the King Cobras gang outside a Christchurch gay bar has no memory of the assault, he told a jury.
Heath James Matehaere appeared in the High Court in Christchurch on Monday before Justice Jonathan Eaton and a jury.
The 45-year-old pleaded guilty to one charge of assault with intent to injure, but denies charges of causing grievous bodily harm with intent to injure and injuring with intent to injure during the incident on March 21, 2021.
In his opening address to the jury, Crown prosecutor Mitchell McClenaghan ran them through the Crown’s case.
He said Matehaere was charged as a party to the alleged assaults. The Crown alleged that Matehaere was one of five involved in a group assault on three men outside Cruz Bar on March 21, 2021.
The other four men, Junior Faaiva, brothers Miguel Moagutuuli and Marcus Moagutuuli, and another man, who has name suppression, earlier pleaded guilty to being involved in the assaults, he told the jury.
Matehaere was a patched member of the King Cobras gang and had held several senior roles such as captain and sergeant in arms. He was known as chokes, or choke.
The complainants were brothers Branden Paseka-Moataane, Ricky Moataane, and their friend David Lolohea. The men, all of Tongan descent, had no gang affiliations.
McClenaghan told the jury that at about 2.40am on March 21, the group of defendants and associates arrived at Cruz Bar.
About 3.10am the three complainants, who had been socialising at other bars, arrived at Cruz Bar.
They tried entering the bar but were turned away by the doorman. They then walked to a nearby dairy on Victoria St.
At this time the Moagutuuli brothers were in the smoking area at Cruz Bar. The brothers saw the three men leave and walk to the dairy. McClenaghan said the brothers then spoke to an associate and it appeared that Marcus Moagutuuli used hand signals directing the associate to get the complainant.
Eventually, Matehaere, accompanied by two co-defendants and two other associates was observed walking towards the dairy and communicating with the complainants.
The two groups then make their way back to the bar.
Once they got into the bar, Matehaere told the doorman to let the three complainants in as he had paid for their entry.
Immediately upon entering the three men were “surrounded” by the defendants and associates who became “aggressive”, the Crown alleged.
One of the men could be seen shoving one of the complainants, and they decided to leave. Lolohea was first to try and leave, followed by Ricky Moataane and then Paseka-Moataane.
Once Paseka-Moataane got outside there was some “pushing and shoving” and he was punched. McClenaghan said CCTV showed the complainants face the defendants with their arms up in “surrender-type action”.
“The defendants and associates continue to come at these three complaints and rush them.”
The complainants ran in different directions across the road with the defendants chasing them.
Each of the men was caught. Lolohea was punched several times in the head, causing him to fall to the ground.
Lolohea covered his head and continued to receive kicks and punches.
When Paseka-Moataane made a run for it he collided with his younger brother, resulting in him being attacked by the group and ended up on the ground.
While he was on the ground he continued to be attacked, with kicking and punching until he was unconscious. The attack did not stop, with kicking and punching while he lay motionless.
Ricky Moataane was initially able to get away but then decided to go back and try to help his brother. On his way, he either intentionally or accidentally lost his footing and fell to the ground. While on the ground he was “set upon” and kicked, punched, and stomped on his head.
McClenaghan said the attack came to an end due to all three of the complainants being injured and unable to protect themselves as well as intervention from members of the public.
The defendants left soon after and were gone when police arrived.
As a result of the attack, Paseka-Moataane suffered a serious head injury with a fractured skull and brain bleed. He was placed in an induced coma for a number of days and was hospitalised for several weeks, having to undertake specialist treatment and rehab. Ricky Moataane suffered swelling and bruising to his right eye and head. He also had a concussion and was treated at the hospital.
Lolohea had bruising and swelling to his head, face, and body.
The arrests were not immediate, McClenaghan said, with police searching Matehaere’s property on May 7, 2021.
Matehaere went to the police station five days later and handed himself in and was arrested. He opted not to make a statement.
“The Crown case is that this was a group attack”, McClenaghan said with the men forming a “common intention” to assault the complainants.
The reason why the men were assaulted was not known to the Crown or police.
“What is obvious is these complainants were chased, they were attacked, and by the end… three men were in pretty bad shape.”
McClenaghan told the jury the Crown did not have to show that Matehaere inflicted all the kicks, punches, and blows. Rather, they have to prove that he and at least one other had a common purpose, an assault on the complainants.
The Crown alleges that Matehaere was “instrumental” and appeared to be the “primary instigator” in the CCTV footage. He got them entry, and when they were inside he was the first to make a move on Paseka-Moataane, he said.
Matehaere’s defence lawyer Tudor Clee told the jury his client was not guilty of the two charges he faced.
“Mr Matehaere accepts he was in a fight, he pleaded guilty to what he did. He will face justice for that.”
Clee said there were three “important facts” the jury needed to consider. First, he never touched Paseka-Moataane or Ricky Moataane, and that he “wasn’t even looking” when they were assaulted as he was “having a fight with someone else”.
He also said that when Matehaere became aware that the brothers were on the ground, CCTV footage showed him coming over and moving the associates away from them.
“These are not the actions of someone forming a common intention to assault someone, it’s the actions of someone trying to stop it.”
Clee told the jury that the four men who committed the assaults had pleaded guilty, but that did not mean Matehaere was also guilty.
Paseka-Moataane was the second of the Crown’s 18 witnesses to be called at the trial.
The 28-year-old told the jury the last thing he remembered was “walking away from the bar”, and he had no recollection of the assault.
His next memory was “waking up in hospital”.
When he was spoken to by police on July 29, 2021 he was not able to say who attacked him.
Asked how his injuries had impacted him, Paseka-Moataane said it had “sort of changed my life”.
He had issues with his memory, smell, and taste, he said. He was unable to work for a year, and had to do a different job.
His brother, Ricky Moataane, told the jury he remembered getting out of the car, going to the dairy, and then lining up for the bar but could not remember anything else.
Lolohea said he was sober-driving the brothers around town, with Cruz Bar the last bar they went to.
He said once they were inside the group were “approached by these guys”. Lolohea said he could tell by the men’s body language “something was up”.
“My first instinct was get out of the bar,” he told the jury.
Once outside the men ran in different directions.
“I came off and I was trying to get away. There was one guy trying to swing at me that whole time, running at me.”
He recalled being hit in the face, chest, back, and forearms. He was unable to fight back and he tried covering up to not get hit.
When he got up and saw the brothers they were “unconscious and bleeding”.
Asked if he heard the defendants say anything, Lolohea said they were saying: “Get him, get him, f him up. They were pretty much just egging each other to do it”.
The trial continues on Tuesday.
Sam Sherwood is a Christchurch-based reporter who covers crime. He is a senior journalist who joined the Herald in 2022, and has worked as a journalist for 10 years.
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