A former security guard company owner turned overstayer who murdered AUT law student Farzana “Zana” Yaqubi has been ordered to serve at least the next 17 years in prison after a judge noted his seemingly continued lack of remorse for the frenzied knife attack.
Kanwarpal Singh, 30, ambushed the 21-year-old in an alleyway near her Massey, West Auckland, home last December as she tried to walk home from work. The attack was the culmination of more than two years of disturbing stalking that included taking a video outside her family home and threatening to throw acid in her face.
Despite having pleaded guilty in April, his “lack of remorse is staggering”, prosecutors said today as they read aloud from a report prepared for the hearing. The report was described as showing his “self-pity and callous indifference to the extreme suffering” he caused the victim and her family.
“I killed someone’s daughter even though she was a bitch to me,” the stalker is reported to have explained to the report writer. “I was dumb. She was dumb. But I’m a good guy. I don’t deserve to spend the rest of my life in jail.”
Singh’s lawyer Sumudu Thode argued that her client was remorseful and that the killing had been spontaneous. Justice David Johnstone rejected both notions.
“You knew Ms Yaqubi wanted nothing to do with you,” he told the defendant, adding later: “For no rational reason you harbour a sense of disgruntlement.”
Singh stared ahead, nodding slightly as the judge announced his sentence: life, with a minimum term of imprisonment of 17 years. He gave a slight bow to the judge as he was led away from the dock by two guards.
Multiple members of the victim’s family, who had filled the gallery in the High Court at Auckland, sobbed.
“F***ing pig!” one woman yelled.
“You piece of s***!” yelled another. “You coward! You coward!”
Yaqubi was born in New Zealand shortly after her father arrived as a Tampa refugee from Afghanistan, fleeing Taliban persecution. An observant Shia Muslim, Yaqubi had been preparing for a religious pilgrimage to Iraq with her family.
“Despite being in a war-torn country … we were a warm and happy family,” her father wrote in a victim impact statement that was read aloud in court today by his son while he stood silently with his head bowed. “Seeing the children grow was the best moments of my life.
“I’m heartbroken that I could not protect my child. She was only 21 and had a great future ahead of her.”
His difficult childhood and remaking his life as a refugee “did not affect me, but this incident destroyed me”, he said, explaining that he can no longer sleep - waking up every few hours as he thinks about his daughter.
The youngest of seven siblings, Yaqubi was described by family and friends today as beautiful, brave, kind, loving and incredibly hard-working. She was extremely smart, having received a full scholarship and just finished her third year of studies towards a law degree, her best friend pointed out.
“That animal crushed the whole earth down on us and changed our lives forever,” one of her three surviving sisters told the judge as all three stood in court weeping. “This animal robbed our entire family in broad daylight.
“The times we have seen this monster [at previous court hearings] there has been no remorse shown by him.”
The victim’s youngest brother later described their mother spending entire days in his sister’s former bedroom, “inhaling the lingering scent that reminds her of her beloved daughter”.
“I feel helpless in the face of her sorrow,” he explained. “Witnessing her daily anguish only serves to compound my own grief.
“Farzana was a radiant presence in our life - a radiant soul.”
Court documents made public for the first time today outline a disturbing two-year history of stalking that started with a coffee date when the victim was still a teenager.
The two met in September 2020 after Singh, working as a security guard on Queen St, struck up a conversation with Yaqubi, who was attending university in the area. At some point after the coffee date, it became clear that Yaqubi wasn’t interested. But Singh was developing an unhealthy obsession.
Yaqubi blocked him on social media because of his continuous messages, but he created multiple new social media accounts in 2021 and 2022 as he continued his efforts to reestablish contact with her, according to the agreed summary of facts.
“Mr Singh began threatening Ms Yaqubi via these accounts,” the documents state. “In one message, he threatened to kidnap Ms Yaqubi, saying, ‘if u don’t wanna say anything I will kidnap u n give u 365 days to fall in love with me’.
“In another message, he threatened to throw acid on Ms Yaqubi’s face. Mr Singh also added Ms Yaqubi’s family and friends on social media in an attempt to contact her.”
Yaqubi made her first complaint to police last October, reporting “harassing” behaviour in a report that was submitted online. Court documents do not specify what the police response was, if any.
Then on December 5, she noticed the defendant following her at Westgate Shopping Centre and sought assistance from mall security staff. The following day, he used a social media account to send her a video taken outside the home where she lived with her family.
That prompted Yaqubi to go to Henderson Police Station, where she showed police screenshots of Singh’s messages and made a statement about his “stalking”. But he appeared to be undeterred, arranging for a pizza to be delivered to her home the following day, December 7.
Less than two weeks later, on December 19, Singh was again in Yaqubi’s West Auckland neighbourhood. This time he was laying in wait in his car with a large knife, court documents state.
Yaqubi, who was taking the alleyway shortcut from the bus stop to her home, tried to call police as she spotted Singh approaching her with the knife. But it was too late.
“Mr Singh approached Ms Yaqubi and stabbed her multiple times to the stomach and chest region with the knife,” court documents state. “As Ms Yaqubi fell to the ground screaming, Mr Singh stood over her and continued stabbing her.”
When people approached, Singh retreated down the alleyway, jumped a fence, and fled in his vehicle.
The young student died at the scene, and Singh was arrested the next day - immediately acknowledging his part in the killing even though he wouldn’t officially plead guilty until this year.
A post-mortem examination showed the victim had suffered 12 stab wounds - four of which could have been individually fatal - as well as defensive injuries.
Members of Yaqubi’s family sobbed as the details of the attack were read aloud in court today.
Murder convictions in New Zealand generally carry an automatic life sentence with a minimum period of imprisonment of at least 10 years. However, at today’s hearing Crown prosecutor Fiona Culliney sought a minimum period of imprisonment of 17 years, taking into account the planning that would have gone into the attack, the victim’s vulnerability and the high level of depravity and callousness that went into the killing.
“Mr Singh traumatised Ms Yaqubi,” she said. “He engaged in sinister... tactics designed to ensure she spent her final days in fear.
“She knew she was in danger.”
Defence lawyer Sumudu Thode sought a minimum period of imprisonment of 14 years, taking into account his upbringing in India, where she said he was raised in a conservative Sikh family and culture where male dominance was reinforced by violence.
Although he moved to New Zealand as a student, leaving his parents and siblings in India, he was still influenced by his upbringing enough to mimic the behaviour he learned as a child from his father, she said.
“I do not accept that submission,” Justice Johnstone later responded. “I will not accept, in the absence of far more extensive evidence, that such patriarchal values as might be drawn from your upbringing might in any way support the stabbing to death of a lone, 21-year-old woman.”
A 17-year minimum term was necessary, he said, to hold Singh accountable and to serve as a deterrent for such conduct.
“Ms Yaqubi flourished in New Zealand,” Johnstone noted. “She was smart and independent... She should have had a rich and fulfilling life ahead of her.”
Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.
Nine homicide cases this year have added to the delays in the High Court at Whangārei.