Hinekura Tuhakaraina appears in the Auckland District Court via audio-visual link for sentencing. Photo / Sylvie Whinray
When battered woman Hinekura Tuhakaraina was told by the sister of the man who allegedly assaulted her that she had deserved the beating, she lost it.
Tuhakarina began swinging her fists, which led to a foot chase. And after the woman she was pursuing tripped, it ended in a bloody stabbing as Tuhakarina stood over her in the middle of a residential neighbourhood.
Details of the shocking scene, which took place in Auckland’s Mount Wellington, were outlined for the first time in open court this week as the 34-year-old appeared for sentencing on a charge of wounding with intent to injure.
She faced up to seven years’ imprisonment.
Neighbours told the Herald in May that the incident had happened after a series of escalating shouts and screams. It ended with a woman screaming: “The pain, the pain!”
“This was a serious stab wound and you effectively followed [her],” Judge Stephen Bonnar said as he ordered two years’ imprisonment for the defendant.
He added that he had sympathy for the situation Tuhakarina found herself in when she had been the victim days earlier. But it didn’t excuse her behaviour, he said.
“You appeared somewhat indifferent to your offending,” he said, noting a “lack of empathy” during an interview with authorities she gave prior to her sentencing. “There was an element of victim blaming or minimisation of your behaviour.”
Court documents state Tuhakaraina, who is from Timaru, had recently started staying with family in Auckland and had recently met the victim through Tuhakaraina‘s sister.
Around 1pm that day, the victim had been visiting Tuhakaraina‘s sister at the same address when she and the defendant got into an intense verbal argument. That spat didn’t result in violence, however. The victim left the home and Tuhakaraina went to her room, where she “consumed copious amounts of alcohol”, according to the agreed summary of facts.
The victim returned about eight hours later looking for the defendant’s sister, but she wasn’t home. The argument resumed and Tuhakaraina ordered the woman to leave.
“Ms Tuhakaraina‘s mother at the front door observed the argument to be about [the victim’s] brother that had recently assaulted Ms Tuhakaraina,” court documents state, adding that Tuhakaraina had a cut lip and swollen face.
“You deserved to be donged,” the defendant’s mother recalled the victim saying before she left.
Tuhakaraina began running after her as the victim walked towards a waiting car. She swung at the victim but missed, at which point the victim noticed something sharp in her hands.
“I’m going to kill you, bitch,” the defendant told her.
The argument quickly escalated from there, to the point where Tuhakaraina openly brandished a pair of scissors and started chasing after the victim until eventually she tripped. The defendant then stabbed her in the thigh, causing a deep wound.
A bystander who recognised both women got between them with his bicycle.
“Ms Tuhakaraina continued enraged stabbing motions ... despite missing on each occasion,” court documents state. Police arrived shortly thereafter, arresting Tuhakaraina and applying a tourniquet to the victim’s leg to stop the bleeding.
The victim did not appear in court last week, nor did she provide an impact statement.
Although Tuhakaraina had never been sentenced to prison before, she had been convicted for 51 other offences between 2010 and 2025, the judge noted, describing just over half of the convictions as violent or “quasi-violent” offending.
They included a wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm conviction in 2021, assault with a weapon in 2018, six counts of assaulting police on various occasions, and a threatening to kill conviction in February last year.
A probation officer who interviewed her was “rightly concerned” that the violence seemed to be escalating, the judge noted.
Had it not been for her prior offences, Judge Bonnar said he would have ordered a sentence of less than two years.
Crown prosecutor Mohammed Chiraagh noted that there wasn’t a suitable home detention address for Tuhakaraina, so a non-custodial sentence wasn’t an option.
“Given the level of violence for this offending, imprisonment ought to be the end outcome,” he added.
Defence lawyer Johann Schlebusch insisted that his client was remorseful and had hoped for a restorative justice conference. He noted that she came from a “traumatic and difficult” background that included fostercare as a child, an early introduction to drugs and alcohol and troubled relationships.
While the judge sided with the Crown, ordering prison, he also allowed the defence leave to return to court with a request for home detention if a suitable residence is found. However, that issue was likely to be academic, he added.
Because Tuhakaraina had been remanded in jail since May awaiting the outcome of the stabbing charge, she should be up for release on parole in just over a month, the judge noted.
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.
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