KEY POINTS:
Whetu Te Hiko says he killed Lois Dear for her car. "I didn't mean to kill her. She said she was going to call the cops, and I panicked," he told police.
Yesterday at the High Court at Rotorua, the 23-year-old admitted murdering the 66-year-old Tokoroa teacher.
One
of his brothers, Hamuera, is already in jail for sexually violating and beating his wife to death in 2001.
Te Hiko said he saw Ms Dear's car pull up at Strathmore School early on Sunday, July 16.
"I was really drunk, ah, and seen the car pull up and thought well, ah, there goes me a car," he said in a video-taped interview with police.
Te Hiko killed Ms Dear - a new entrants teacher, mother of two and grandmother - after she saw him trying to steal the car and threatened to call police.
Te Hiko ran towards Ms Dear and grabbed her, overpowering her by holding her hair, punching and kicking her, and eventually suffocating her on the floor of her classroom with her sweatshirt.
An autopsy found she died of asphyxia, or smothering, with blunt force trauma to the head and chest contributing to her death.
The details of the murder are disclosed in evidence for the case which the Weekend Herald is now permitted to publish after Te Hiko's guilty plea.
Ms Dear's life was brought to a brutal end as she prepared for the first day of term for her new entrants class.
She suffered head injuries, a broken nose, extensive bruising and lacerations to the face, black eyes, fractured ribs and bruises to her hands.
Pathologist Lloyd Denmark, of Auckland Hospital, said the pattern of injury was consistent with blows from a fist to the face.
Te Hiko initially denied the killing when told his DNA had been found in the classroom but, after being charged with the murder, said he wanted to set the record straight.
"I just want to clear it up and tell you what happened," he told police.
The evidence also discloses details about how Ms Dear's body was found by other teachers.
The lower half of the corpse had been stripped, a sweatshirt wrapped around the head and the entire body covered in plastic table cloths.
"All I could see of the body was a right foot covered with a thermal green sock," said Jasmine Dahm, a teacher in the classroom next door.
Ms Dahm was called to Ms Dear's classroom by assistant principal Janene Baird, who became suspicious after smelling cigarette smoke and seeing a shape on the floor.
"My first thought was that it was a drunk who must have got into the class," Ms Baird said.
She went to fetch Ms Dahm - "I thought if it was a P-head, I did not want to be there by myself" - and the two called police.
Police and paramedics came upon a gruesome scene, finding the badly beaten body had also been desecrated.
"Her eyes were swollen and blackened, and her neck appeared to be swollen as well," paramedic Jill Terry said.
Te Hiko was charged eight days later, on July 24, after forensic tests identified him as a "person of interest".
Te Hiko arrived at Tokoroa police station late on the afternoon of July 24, the evidence not saying whether he came for a scheduled interview or for another reason.
The day before the murder, he had been at a party with logging workmates, who said he was drunk and obnoxious.
"That night Whetu was being a pain in the arse. I felt like smashing him," one said.
Te Hiko carried on to a pub after the party and then went to another party near the school. He had consumed beer, bourbon and vodka during the night.
After the murder, he stole Ms Dear's car, later dumped it and continued going to work.
Te Hiko is the father of two boys born 20 days apart in December 2003.
The youngest of six children, he was previously jailed for assaulting the mother of his second son.
Te Hiko will be sentenced on May 4.
