By Tony Stickley
For six years the abduction and rape of a Blockhouse Bay woman in 1991 went unsolved - but when it was, not only was the evidence against Steven Leonard Panapa a billion to one, but his collaring was a remarkable long-shot, too.
It was only when Detective Richard Reese
was going through old files at Auckland Central Police Station in late 1997 that the police finally got their man.
As a result of the officer's diligence, Panapa was yesterday convicted of the crime by a jury at the High Court in Auckland.
Panapa, who has two previous rape convictions from 1984, now faces the prospect of preventive detention.
Justice Nicholson remanded him in custody for sentencing next month.
Detective Reese was poring over unsolved rapes when he came across a sketch which the 1991 victim had helped police to draw. He spotted the similarity to a photograph he had seen of Panapa in another file.
He contacted the woman - who had been snatched off a street in Blockhouse Bay as she went to work around 5.30 am on October 18, 1991 - and she identified Panapa as her attacker.
With her evidence the police could have charged him, but they decided also to seek a sample of his blood for DNA comparison with semen found on the victim's pants.
Panapa refused to give a blood sample voluntarily, but when the High Court ordered him to he had no option.
Police were stunned when Institute of Environmental Science and Research scientists told them that it was more than a billion times more likely to be Panapa's semen than any other man's taken at random from the population.
"This was just the icing on the cake," said a jubilant Detective Reese after yesterday's verdict.
At his trial Panapa claimed that he and the woman had had a relationship and that they had had sex early on the morning of October 18. But Crown counsel Steve Bonnar told the jury that was a total fabrication designed to explain away the overwhelming DNA evidence.
The woman was "palpably shocked," he said, when the suggestion was put to her in the witness box.
Mr Bonnar asked the jury why the woman would wait seven years before identifying her attacker if she already knew his name, where he lived and how to contact him.
Halfway through the trial Panapa and his lawyer, Lucy Postlewaight, parted company and a new defence team headed by Paddy O'Driscoll was called in.
By Tony Stickley
For six years the abduction and rape of a Blockhouse Bay woman in 1991 went unsolved - but when it was, not only was the evidence against Steven Leonard Panapa a billion to one, but his collaring was a remarkable long-shot, too.
It was only when Detective Richard Reese
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