Tracey Castle found guilty of intentionally driving her ute into woman after New Plymouth street fight

Moments after a young woman was threatened she would be killed, she heard the rev of an engine and then turned and saw a ute hurtling straight for her.

“By that point, there was no time to move. I looked at the ute, I’m like ‘f*** I’m dead’,” Sarahphine Hoyle said.

“I closed my eyes, I got hit then I got flung against the wall then the ute crushed me against the wall so I actually got hit twice.”

Hoyle recalled the frightening moment while giving evidence at the trial of Tracey Lee Castle, the woman who was behind the wheel of the ute as it drove into her in the early hours of September 3, 2023.

She spoke with NZME this week, after the trial, and said the incident had left her with significant injuries to her hips and ankle and now, 18 months later, life as she knew it remained significantly changed.

It took her six months to relearn to walk and still, she has trouble. She has had multiple surgeries, with more to come, and spent more than three months away from her young daughter while in hospital.

She struggles to be active with the preschooler, can no longer take part in her sporting passions like snowboarding and wakeboarding, has limited movement in her hips and ankle and is often in pain.

Hoyle, now 25, has also not been able to swim or have a bath since the incident and the lower part of her body is not allowed in direct sunlight.

Sarahphine Hoyle spent months in hospital after the incident and is still recovering 18 months on. Photo / Supplied

“It’s been a long road to recovery,” she told NZME.

“I think I’m going to remember this day for the rest of my life, it’s etched in my brain.”

The trial heard it was around 2.30am when Castle stopped at the Liardet St and Devon St East traffic lights in central New Plymouth and began yelling through the window at a young man on the street, who was with a young woman.

Castle eventually got out of her Nissan Navara, leaving it running at the intersection, and confronted him about allegedly drugging someone she knew at an earlier party.

She said she wanted to make sure the woman was okay and to warn her against the man, who has permanent name suppression.

But the confrontation, which turned physical, did not go in her favour as the then 38-year-old, who directed violence at Hoyle, was in the end “much worse off” after Hoyle then “pummeled” her.

Castle then retreated to her ute, bleeding, and performed a three-point turn. She accelerated and ploughed into Hoyle, pinning the young mother to the concrete wall and crushing her pelvic area and ankle in the process.

A friend of Hoyle’s laid into Castle, attacking her, while Hoyle was picked up from the ground and moved away from the ute and others phoned emergency services seeking help.

‘I just wanted to scare her’

After the incident, Castle described herself to police as “seeing red” and being “so angry and so worked up” at the time.

However, at the judge-alone trial before Judge Russell Collins, held in New Plymouth District Court earlier this month, she back-pedalled on that part of her statement.

Castle opted to give evidence in her defence, during which she said she did not recall feeling angry after the fight and could not remember her interview with police.

She did recall, however, being “annoyed” by the “group jumping”.

“If you’ve got a problem with me, fine, but you come at me one-on-one,” she said.

Castle, who was defending charges of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm and threatening to kill, said she could not recall threatening Hoyle.

She said she did not intend to drive on to the footpath or to hurt Hoyle, who was considered the main aggressor against Castle in the earlier fight.

Castle, who said she had five drinks during the night, had “just wanted to scare her”, she claimed.

Sarahphine Hoyle's pelvic area and ankle were crushed in the incident. Photo / Supplied

“Not once in my mind did it ever cross my head of hurting her, injuring her. I’ve acknowledged that she’s suffered some pretty horrific injuries, I’ve never denied that. But I never once intentionally thought in my head ‘I’m going to run you down, I’m after you’.”

Castle said she was driving at no more than 15km/h and planned to “come at her but swerve off”.

“I don’t know how it’s gone wrong,” she said, stating she believed she had applied the brake but acknowledged she may not have.

Under cross-examination, Crown prosecutor Rebekah Hicklin suggested Castle’s statement to police about “seeing red” was the truth.

“It’s understandable that you would want to now step away from what you were saying in that interview, isn’t it?” Hicklin asked.

“I’m not stepping away from anything, I’ve had my hand up the whole time and acknowledged I’ve hurt a person,” Castle responded.

Hicklin suggested that Castle considered herself the victim in the situation, pointing out her allegations about the man drugging women, her claim she was trying to protect the woman he was with, and how she had then been ganged up on.

She said from the beginning Castle had tried to minimise her role in the incident and was trying to skirt responsibility, which Castle rejected, stating she had taken responsibility but denied it was intentional.

‘The ute was coming towards me’

When Hoyle gave evidence she recalled coming out of the bar Our Place to find her friend, the man, having an argument with Castle, who Hoyle had briefly met on another occasion.

“She’s shoving him as I walk out of the club ... and [I see] him getting a little bit agitated.”

Hoyle ran to her friend to prevent matters from escalating and to ask Castle what was going on.

She claimed Castle responded aggressively and then repeated the drugging claim.

Tracey Lee Castle drove her ute into Sarahphine Hoyle on Liardet St in New Plymouth. Photo / NZ Police

But Hoyle refuted the allegation, telling Castle she had been at the party and that was not how the alleged drugging incident played out.

“She pretty much started shoving me at that point and aggressing her attack on me. She assaulted me a few times, knocked me to the ground a couple of times.”

Hoyle said she got up, looked at her friend, and said “Do not stop me”.

“Then I pummeled her, I fought back in self-defence because I knew she wasn’t going to stop,” Hoyle said, making a punching action with her fist in the witness stand.

The brawl continued for at least five minutes before it was broken up by a growing crowd of bystanders, Hoyle said.

Castle recalled it had been her partner and his friend who had brought it to an end.

Hoyle said Castle yelled “I’m going to kill you” as she returned to her ute, while Hoyle began walking down the street with her friends.

“I heard the vehicle rev, by this point, I was standing on the edge of the sidewalk. I turned and seen the ute was coming towards me.”

Hoyle recalled that after she had been hit, she was in and out of consciousness and could hear Castle “screaming” about her keys.

Under cross-examination, defence lawyer Julian Hannam put to Hoyle that Castle did not threaten to kill her, claiming she had failed to tell police that at the time, but Hoyle was adamant she mentioned it in her statement.

Tracey Lee Castle said she had five drinks throughout the night. Photo / NZ Police

The Crown called several other witnesses, including people who had seen the fight, heard the threats and witnessed Castle driving into Hoyle.

One witness, Castle’s partner’s friend who had been in the backseat of the ute at the time of the incident, described Castle as being in a rage after the fight on the street.

She “put her foot to the floor” and drove at speed, “probably around 50km/h”, before hitting Hoyle, he said in evidence. He did not feel the vehicle brake.

Castle’s partner, who was in the passenger seat, testified that when he realised she was aiming for the group he yelled at her to “Stop. Stop. What are you doing?”

Another witness, who did not know anyone involved and was relatively sober, said she saw the fight and as it came to an end, heard the “older lady” yell out “I’m going to f***ing kill you”.

She then saw the ute “flying around the corner and basically just go straight into the wall”.

‘The necessary intent at the critical time’

After assessing the evidence, Judge Collins said most of the case was not in dispute and his task was to assess whether Castle made the threat, and her intention.

He said Castle got out of her ute and “acting out of her own sense of vigilantism” provoked an altercation with a group of much younger people.

Her violence was mostly directed at Hoyle and in the end, she ended up “much worse off”, he said.

The judge found she then threatened to kill Hoyle, saying all the elements of the charge were made out beyond a reasonable doubt.

Judge Russell Collins found Tracey Lee Castle intentionally hit Sarahphine Hoyle with her vehicle. Photo / NZME

When considering Castle’s claim she only intended to scare the group, Judge Collins said all of her actions and words that night were deliberate and purposeful.

He rejected she was only trying to scare them, saying driving at her claimed 15km/h and staying on the road would not achieve that.

The judge said there was no evidence of her braking and she pointed the vehicle at the person whom she had threatened.

He had no doubt Castle intended to seriously harm Hoyle, finding her guilty of the wounding charge.

“That intention may have been a fleeting one and I have no doubt that after having achieved what she fleetingly set out to do she has ever since regretted it but that doesn’t mean for a moment that she didn’t have the necessary intent at the critical time.”

Hoyle told NZME the guilty verdicts were a relief but it would not be over for her until Castle was sentenced.

Castle was remanded into custody ahead of her sentencing on April 14.

She will be sentenced on the wounding and threatening to kill charges, as well as a charge of excess breath alcohol causing injury, laid under the Land Transport Act, which she admitted earlier and also relates to injuring Hoyle.

Several other charges laid against Castle relating to the incident have been withdrawn.

Tara Shaskey joined NZME in 2022 as a news director and Open Justice reporter. She has been a reporter since 2014 and previously worked at Stuff covering crime and justice, arts and entertainment, and Māori issues.