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A witness says he saw a girl go over the top of a car and land on the road as a Samoan man Sila drove through the crowd as he left the scene of a Christchurch party.
The account of Samuel Robert Edmunds, a storeman, was given on
the fourth day of the five-week trial in the High Court at Christchurch where 23-year-old Lipine Sila faces two counts of murder and eight of intentionally wounding or causing grievous bodily harm. He denies all charges.
Mr Edmunds told Justice John Fogarty and the jury that he had gone to the party with four girls.
About 10.15pm he heard people outside the party yelling that a fight had started. He went out to watch and found two men fighting in the middle of the road. The crowd was cheering them on, but the fight stopped when someone pulled one of the men away.
Then another fight started further down the road and the crowd went down to watch that too. There were another two men fighting, but one of them, a Samoan, was trying to get away.
The Samoan ran towards a red car. He got into the driver's seat and a younger man got in the passenger seat, he said.
Mr Edmunds estimated the car was going 70km/h when it hit the crowd. "The car went straight into people, it was going very fast when it impacted people, they didn't have time to move out of the way," Mr Edmunds said.
"People were running away, apart from those knocked over."
Mr Edmunds ran to his two friends who had been hit and saw the car head off down the road. People were doing their best to run and move out of the way. He saw a girl being hit by the car. She went over the top of the car and landed on the road.
One of his friends had a few cuts and was dazed so he suggested to the other friend to phone an ambulance then went back down the road to find his other friends to see if they were all right.
Another witness told the court that "everyone was fighting along the whole of Edgeware Road."
Connor Gregory Bensley, an aluminium cladder, said he went to the party with four friends.
There were at least 400 to 500 people there. Buses were trying to get through the crowds and having bottles thrown at them.
He saw Ben Sila, Lipine Sila's brother, being chased down the road by five men, and a man he identified as "Junior" was on the ground being punched in the head.
Mr Bensley took Junior back to his car and said he saw Lipine Sila standing by a fence with a T-shirt held to his head. He watched as Sila got in a red car and took off. "There was no one with him, no one around the car. I was the closest person to him," he told the court.
He saw the car run into people, saw bodies flying through the air, and four to five bodies flying over the top of the car.
Mr Bensley went back to his car where Ben Sila, Junior and the people he came to the party with were standing.
"Junior had a cut hand so I drove him and Ben Sila to the hospital," he said.
He dropped them off, stayed for about half an hour but didn't see them again that night.
The trial finished for the week at lunchtime, and is due to resume on Monday.
- NZPA