KEY POINTS:
Lipene Sila was angry when he drove away from a crowded Christchurch party with blood over his face following a confrontation last May, a witness told a depositions hearing in Christchurch yesterday.
Sila, 22, a factory hand, was yesterday formally committed for trial on charges he murdered two Christchurch schoolgirls by driving into a crowd of young people milling around an unruly Edgeware Rd party late in the evening of May 5.
At the end of the four-day depositions hearing in Christchurch District Court, Justices of the Peace John O'Hara and Percy Acton-Adams told Sila they believed there was sufficient evidence to send him for trial.
Sila was asked if he wished to plead guilty, but answered "not guilty" in a soft voice.
His defence lawyers Pip Hall and Lee-Lee Heah had conceded on the first day of the hearing last Thursday that there was a prima facie case for him to answer.
Sila is charged with murdering Jane Ada Young and Hannah Perkins Rossiter, both 16, who died after he allegedly drove a car into hundreds of partygoers.
He also faces alternative charges of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm to six other people who were injured in the incident, two individual charges of wounding two others with intent to cause grievous bodily harm and drink-driving.
Giving evidence via a Samoan interpreter, Faagase Faauiga told the court he'd played rugby with Sila earlier in the day and knew him through their employment and rugby. After the game they bought beer and drank it at Sila's friend's house.
They went into town and arriving at the Edgeware Rd party Mr Faauiga said he answered a "call of nature" behind a tree, then heard Sila call his name.
"I think he was calling that we had to go," Mr Faauiga said.
Sila had blood on his face and was walking backwards with a "big white guy" walking towards him.
Mr Faauiga said he'd tried to hold on to the "the white guy" who was trying to fight Sila and remembered being scared "for my life". He remembered getting hit, feeling dizzy and suffering blurred vision.
He said he couldn't remember getting into the front passenger seat of Sila's girlfriend's red Honda car or Sila getting into the driver's seat.
"I only know he was in the car."
Mr Faauiga said he couldn't remember being chased to the car, or people surrounding it.
"I got hit and I don't remember anything."
Mr Faauiga said he heard a "boom, boom" sound soon after Sila drove off.
Asked what he thought the sounds were, Mr Faauiga said: "I don't know. I was scared."
He said the car's windscreen was broken.
"I was bending in front and all I can hear is the air coming in front."
Mr Faauiga said he knew "that we hit somebody" and he felt scared. He thought Sila was "very frightened" also. He said there had been no talking between him and Sila as they drove away at a speed of "about 40km/h".
Asked by Ms Heah what he was thinking, Mr Faauiga said: "All I can feel was scared, but I know Lipene was angry" because his face was covered in blood.
When Sila eventually crashed the car in a street well away from the party scene, Mr Faauiga said he got out and walked away, without speaking to Sila.
He said he was scared and he knew "that there was a person who got hurt".
Sila was remanded in custody by consent to appear in the High Court at Christchurch for a pretrial conference on November 15.
- NZPA
