Fort St thugs show no mercy

By TONY WALL

A faulty central locking system meant Shane Norton's car was no protection against a band of thugs who hauled him from the car in downtown Auckland and pulverised his face.

Mr Norton and his wife, Lianne, yesterday spoke out about the vicious, unprovoked attack in Fort St three weeks ago in the wake of a second assault that has left a city waiter fighting for his life in Auckland Hospital.

Police are investigating whether the men who attacked Mr Norton were the same ones who left Stephen Byrne, a waiter at Cin Cin on Quay, lying close to death in a pool of blood last Friday.

Mr Norton was saved from a similar fate by a Manurewa solo father who interrupted the attack and scared the three attackers off.

The rescuer could become a crucial witness - he got a good look at one of the men and says he would recognise him.

Mr Norton, a 29-year-old father of four, was attacked at the end of a stag night that he had organised for his best mate.

The friends had hired a bus for a pub crawl around Auckland and ended up downtown around midnight.

Mr Norton lost his friends so he called on his wife, who works night shift in the city.

Mrs Norton, aware of the dangers of night-time Auckland, told her husband not to go looking for his mates, but to go back to his car for a sleep and make sure he locked the doors.

He returned to the car, which was parked in the Wilsons carpark in Fort St, and fell sleep. But the central locking system only locked three doors.

The next thing Mr Norton remembers was waking up in Auckland Hospital.

About 3.45 am, three men pulled him from the car and began kicking him in the head.

The solo father who intervened, who was returning to his car after a night at the Sky City Casino, told the Herald: "One of them had [Mr Norton] and was kneeing him in the head ... I think he knows martial arts by the way he was doing it."

The man yelled out at the trio and they ran off. He described them as Pakeha in their mid to late 20s, of scruffy appearance.

Mr Norton was robbed of his T-shirt and watch, but not a wallet containing $150.

At the hospital it was discovered that his eyeball had been kicked out of its socket, his cheekbone smashed, eardrum burst and his nose broken.

He has had two long operations, one to rebuild his eye socket with titanium mesh and plates, and the other to reconstruct his cheek.

Head-injury therapy is helping him to deal with a lack of balance, tiredness, double vision, forgetfulness and impaired motor skills.

He has had to stop his job as Auckland manager for an East Tamaki diesel parts firm, but was able to fulfil his best man duties - turning up to the wedding in a wheelchair.

Mrs Norton said she was shocked to hear about the attack on Mr Byrne, as her brother worked with him at Cin Cin.

"I don't know if it's the same guys doing the attacks, but if it is, they're on a rampage."

She said one officer told her that in his previous seven shifts there had been 15 serious assaults.

The officer in charge of the Byrne case, Detective Senior Sergeant Allan Boreham, said the other attacks could be important to the inquiry and he would liaise with the investigating officers.

He said street violence was always of great concern to police, and with that in mind 20 staff would be on the case from today.