KEY POINTS:
Lipine Sila has been found guilty on all charges of murder and causing grievous bodily harm for his angry rampage in a car that scattered partygoers along Christchurch's Edgeware Road, hitting 28 people and killing two teenage girls.
The 10 guilty verdicts were delivered in the High Court
at Christchurch this afternoon, on the fourth day of the jury's deliberations in the five week-long trial.
Outside the court, Sally Rossiter, the mother of one of the murdered girls, 16-year-old Hannah Rossiter, was asked if she had any words for the family of 23-year-old Sila.
She replied: "I think the whole thing is a waste.'
Harry Young, father of 16-year-old schoolgirl Jane Young, the other girl killed in Sila's seven seconds drive, said the waiting for the verdict had been torture.
"It was a no-brainer from the beginning for us."
He also commented that the legal system was imperfect and the jury had not been told everything.
"We can just grieve for Jane now," he said on the Court House steps, with his wife Lorraine beside him. "We can be together and think about Jane, and think about the rest of our lives."
Sally Rossiter told media she was pleased with the verdict. "I think it's a very just verdict."
Defence counsel Pip Hall had no comment for the media as he left the Court House, where Justice John Fogarty had remanded Sila in custody for sentence on June 26.
The jury had signalled yesterday that it was at an impasse, and asked for further directions. Justice Fogarty then spoke to them and they retired to a hotel for a further night before viewing all of Sila's video interviews again at a closed court session this morning.
They then signalled that they had reached their decisions, and their verdicts were delivered in court in a brief sitting at 2.15pm.
Sila remained impassive in the dock, with the Samoan interpreter standing close to him, as the 10 guilty verdicts were announced.
The jury found him guilty of murder of the two school girls, and guilty of intentionally causing grievous bodily harm to eight other people who were injured as he sped away from the out-of-control party on May 5 last year.
There was a brief reaction, including a clap, from the public gallery as the first verdict of guilty was announced.
Justice Fogarty stopped the jury foreman and said to the court: "I am not going to tolerate that kind of remark. If there is anybody here who cannot contain themselves, now is the time to go."
The public gallery remained silent for the rest of the sitting, apart from gasps as the murder verdicts were announced - counts five and seven in the indictment. At least one woman juror was in tears as the verdicts were announced.
Sila was then taken out of court and into the cells, and family members, including his mother, were shown through to see him.
The defence had tried to convince the jury that the driving had been the result of panic by Sila who had been under attack in the street in the minutes earlier, and had sped away for his own safety.
But the crown argued that it was an act of anger, and that Sila had wanted to harm people and had aimed for the densest part of the crowd where partygoers were milling on the street. That was where the two schoolgirls received their non-survivable head injuries. They died in hospital early the next day.
Sila was a former representative boxer, a factory hand who lived in Mairehau.
- NZPA
