Witness denies boss had P-fuelled parties in Head Hunters kidnapping trial

The 20-year-old, whose identity is being kept secret, was cross-examined in the High Court at Rotorua where eight Head Hunter gang members and an affiliate are on trial. Photo / File

A maintenance worker has strongly denied his rich businessman employer holds P-fuelled parties and is involved with guns.

The 20-year-old, whose identity is being kept secret, was cross-examined in the High Court at Rotorua where eight Head Hunter gang members and an affiliate are on trial for a raft of charges including kidnapping the businessman and his worker in February last year.

The gang members on trial are: Jordan Alexander Christian, 21, David Peter Clark, 36, Stephen William Daly, 33, Benjamin Paul Dwyer, 28, Brent Anthony Gunning, 37, Liam John Kane, 24, Matthew John McDonnell, 45, Stacy Walton Dennis Paora, 29 and Sam Wiremu Rolleston 23. They each pleaded not guilty.

Dwyer's lawyer, Tony Rickard-Simms, began questioning the maintenance worker this morning by asking him what his boss was like.

"Kind, loving, thoughtful," was the reply.

The lawyer asked if the witness agreed the older man had issues.

This was denied as were further questions about the man holding P-fuelled parties at his homes and having "lots" of firearms. Probed further, the witness dismissed claims the businessman supplied him with drugs and said he knew nothing of bunkers dug into the hillside at one of the man's properties.

However he agreed the man did harbour an idea of "going off the grid" to get away from society.

Earlier the jury heard how, after being held for more than a day during which the businessman was also taken hostage, the witness had been released.

He told of being driven around in several vehicles with a towel over his head before being taken to one that belonged to his boss' girlfriend, instructed to wait some minutes before he was free to do anything he liked.

One of his captors had given him $20.

He described injuries he received in beatings at a Mount Maunganui storage shed and while being tortured at a house in Rotorua before being forced to take several of the defendants to the businessman's lake house where he too was attacked and abducted.

The Crown claims the kidnappings and associated offending were retaliation for the businessman's dalliance on board a launch with Dwyer's girlfriend during which she was injured when a sex toy broke.