Teenager who had $43,000 fines wiped back in court

A Rotorua teenager who sparked an outcry when his $43,000 court fines were wiped and replaced with community work spent last night behind bars.

Seventeen-year-old Nigel Caleb Wikiriwhi Dixon was supposed to appear in Rotorua District Court last Monday for breaching his community work order.

He failed to turn up and police had been looking for him since.

Dixon turned himself in to the court yesterday, where he appeared on charges of breaching community work and bail.

Judge Cecilie Rushton remanded him in custody to reappear on Thursday.

The court was told yesterday that at the time Judge Phillip Cooper wiped Dixon's fines and sentenced him to more community work, it should have been picked up that he had breached a community work order.

In September, Dixon was sentenced to 150 hours' community work for charges of interfering with motor vehicles.

He breached his bail conditions last week by failing to tell police he went to Auckland for a funeral.

Nearly two weeks ago, Dixon had his massive tally of traffic fines wiped in exchange for 300 hours' community work.

It was a move which led to Judge Cooper being criticised and called "soft" and there were calls for him to be removed from the bench.

Lawyers sprang to the judge's defence, noting the law did not allow judges to impose jail sentences for non-payment of fines if the person told the court they could not afford to pay.

Dixon said at the time he chose not to pay the fines because he "hated the police".

Boof Richardson from the Community Probation Service told Judge Rushton yesterday that when Judge Cooper sentenced Dixon on November 24, the matter was heard in a different courtroom from the one in which daily court hearings usually took place.

Mr Richardson said the other courtroom did not have the facilities to let the Community Probation Service connect its computer, therefore it was not picked up that Dixon had a poor record of carrying out community work.

"The breach should have been presented to the court but it wasn't on that day because it was in courtroom one and we didn't have access to our records [there]."
Mr Richardson said Dixon had done nothing about starting his new order of 300 hours' community work.

Judge Rushton said yesterday it was Dixon's ninth court appearance this year and he had a "long history" of offending while on bail. She remanded him in custody to reappear on Thursday to allow the Community Probation Service time to prepare a file on the latest breach.

Caption: Nigel Dixon had $43,000 worth of traffic fines wiped in exchange for 300 hours' community work.

- DAILY POST (ROTORUA)