Tribal Huk gang leader Jamie Pink appeals conviction for attack on sergeant at arms

Allan James Pink, known as Jamie Pink, was jailed for 7 years and 4 months in the Hamilton District Court in 2020. Photo / Christine Cornege

A Waikato gang leader jailed for a violent axe attack on his sergeant at arms in a public de-patching is appealing his conviction and sentence.

Allan James Pink, known as Jamie Pink, was sentenced in December 2020 to seven years and four months in prison for the brazen attack, which happened on Ngaruawahia's main street in view of a crowd of locals.

The Tribal Huk leader was found guilty at trial of one charge of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, but was found not guilty of participating in a criminal group.

The charge came about after Pink ordered his gang members to search for his sergeant at arms, Zion Coker.

He was eventually spotted in his car on Ngaruawahia's main street and a group of 10 set upon him.

Pink turned up with an axe and smashed it several times into his knees as Coker lay curled up in a ball on the footpath.

He suffered serious injuries to his knees, as well as a broken thumb.

The incident, in August 2018, was seen by many locals, most of whom were too scared to testify against him.

However, two women and a truck driver eventually did and it was their testimony which convinced a jury Pink was involved.

Pink denied joining in the attack, saying he went to the scene to stop the violence and even took the axe off one of the members of the group.

In the Court of Appeal in Wellington today Pink's lawyer Nicholas Chisnall said the judge did not make an adequate warning to the jury about the possibility of misidentification.

Under section 126 of the Evidence Act, if a case against a defendant in a jury trial depends wholly or substantially on the correctness of one or more visual or voice identifications of the defendant or any other person, the judge must warn the jury of the special need for caution before finding the defendant guilty while relying on the correctness of that identification.

"This is a case where Mr Pink, of course, accepted that he was at the scene of the offence. The question was whether he had been correctly identified as the man with the axe," Chisnall said.

Jamie Pink was sentenced to seven years and four months in prison. Photo / File

The direction the judge gave the jury in this case contained the same "deficits" as other cases that had gone to appeal on the same matter, which were considered "no longer excusable".

Justice Simon Moore, one of the panel of judges in today's appeal, said although the trial judge "may not have used the particular words 'resulting in a miscarriage of justice'," he did tell the jury to take special care relying on the evidence "because case after case tells us mistakes can be made" with misidentification.

But Chisnall said the warning simply did not go far enough.

He also said one of the witnesses was difficult to get answers out of during cross-examination, and "continued to maintain that she was traumatised or had no memory of it", meaning she could not be properly tested. This negatively affected Pink's ability to defend himself.

Co-counsel Luke Elborough said the Crown accused Pink of lying and made it the central plank of its case, pointing to times Pink had lied to police in the past.

He said the judge should have made a direction to the jury under section 124 of the Evidence Act that if they believed he lied previously, they should not necessarily conclude he was guilty of the current offence.

Crown lawyer Stuart Barker said the warning on misidentification was not needed.

"On Mr Pink's own account it appears that he is saying there might have been a mistake as to his actions whilst he had the axe in his hands," he said.

That meant identification was not the issue, rather Pink's actions were, he said.

The court has reserved its decision.