Couple not happy with attacker's sentence

Stanley Aholotu was sentenced in the Auckland District Court over attacking an elderly couple. Photo / Dean Purcell

An Auckland man has been jailed for beating a couple unconscious, stealing their car and ramming a family vehicle during a booze-fuelled rampage.

Stanley Aholotu, 29, was sentenced to three years and four months in prison when he appeared at Auckland District Court today on two counts of assault with intent to injure, three of intentional damage and one of receiving.

But for the man against whom he launched a frenzied attack, the prison term was not enough.

"He should have gone for 15 years," he said.

For Aholotu -- a Bandidos member, who now claims he is putting the gang life behind him -- time behind bars is nothing new.

The last birthday he celebrated on the outside was his 23rd, the judge said.

Aholotu was jailed for five years in 2010 on a charge of wounding with intent to do grievous bodily harm -- one of his 40 convictions -- and had only been out on parole for a couple of months when he ran riot again.

On April 4, the defendant began darting out in front of traffic on Mt Smart Rd in Onehunga.

After vehicles swerved around him and no one stopped, he staggered further down the street to where a woman was getting out of her car.

She quickly called out for her husband who was confronted by Aholotu.

When the resident told him there were no drugs in the house, he became angry and abusive.

While trying to take the defendant's attention from his wife he was punched in the face and the attack continued as he was out cold.

The woman intervened and Aholotu gave her the same treatment until she too lay unconscious beside her husband.

The male victim, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said once the punches began flying the man was "off the planet".

Regrettably, he said his wife had got the worst of it.

"If he'd just focused on me I'd rather have taken that hiding," he said. "For that I can't find it in my heart to forgive."

But Aholotu did not stop there.

While the couple were laid out he grabbed their car keys and made off in their vehicle.

After picking up a relative from south Auckland he drove to Manurewa where they were spotted driving haphazardly.

A motorist, with his children in the back, gestured for Aholotu to calm down but instead of take the advice, the 29-year-old followed the vehicle.

He rammed it from behind three times before the man pulled over at a petrol station and was again rammed as he and his family sat there terrified.

When arrested, Aholotu said did not know why he had attacked the Onehunga couple and only remembered hitting them once. He put the crazed driving down to the fact his passenger had encouraged him.

Judge Anne Kiernan called it a physically and emotionally "life-changing experience" for the pair he attacked, who said the incident had cost them more than $20,000.

But because of Aholotu's limited financial means, the judge refused to order reparation.

His lawyer Jo Scott said her client had "a huge amount of insight into his offending and a real desire to change".

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