However, three were found not guilty of causing his death at all, while the jury was unable to reach a verdict for one defendant.
The nine accused were Kevin Allan Bailey and Shem Williams, both of Gate Pā; Mihaka Ratahi, of Pāpāmoa; Kiri Mereina Pini and Bodine Umuroa, from Parkvale; Hamiora Bennett of Brookfield; Huntly man Jahvaun Te Ari Layne; and Witaiawa Robinson and Samuel Mark Milosi from Tauranga.
Jamie Robin Thomas from Rotorua had his charges dropped earlier in the trial.
The judges
Umuroa pleaded guilty to his six charges, including manslaughter, as did Pini.
Bailey pleaded guilty to the assault charges but was found not guilty of manslaughter, along with Williams. However, Williams was found guilty of his two additional perversion of trial charges.
Bennett was also guilty of four counts of assault, but the jury returned a hung verdict on the manslaughter charge.
Layne was found guilty on the four counts of assault and one count of murder, along with Robinson and Ratahi, but Ratahi was also guilty of his further attempt to pervert the course of justice.
Unable to decide on Milosi’s assault-related charges, the jury returned four hung verdicts and found him not guilty of murder.
What happened?
Te Kani, 51, died outside his parents’ house late on Saturday, May 14, 2022, in what the Crown alleged was a revenge attack by the gang, after accused and patched-up member Bodine Umuroa was assaulted by Mitchell’s brother, Thomas, in their Maungatapu Rd driveway.
Umuroa, and his then partner and co-defendant, Kiri Pini, had turned up at the address previously unannounced to take some of her clothes but also look for Thomas.
Pini and Thomas were in a long-term relationship and had two children before breaking up in 2017.
Pini met Umuroa in the months leading up to Mitchell’s murder.
The Crown alleged that Umuroa was aggressive the night the pair appeared; he admitted a charge of threatening to cause grievous bodily harm to Thomas by saying he was going to “f***ing waste him”.
As the couple left, Thomas and his relative Whetu Hika got into a fight with Umuroa. Thomas overpowered him and then led him to his car.
Umuroa was heard saying as he left that he would be back with “the Rogues”, which is exactly what happened.
Witnesses reported seeing between 20 and 30 gang members show up in five different cars.
“Humiliated and angry or just putting on a show?”
Judge Becroft said the Crown case was about inferring that Umuroa was left feeling humiliated and angry after his treatment by Thomas and that he went back to Ohauiti Rd – where a large number of Mongrel Mob members were drinking – and sent a “call for help”.
In their statements, Ratahi and Williams appeared to accept that cry for help “in a general sense,” but that did not mean the other defendants did.
The case was based on how the charges were brought – jointly or as parties – and that they were all part of a “common unlawful purpose”.
In doing so, the Crown did not have to prove who threw the punch or fatal blow to Mitchell, but a series of other acts. The killer may not even have been in the dock because the Crown did not have to prove his identity.
Under the Criminal Code they were all responsible for the acts or acts of a person or persons who committed the alleged assault.
To obtain a conviction, the Crown had to successfully prove a number of aspects, including that there was a “shared agreement between one or more of the accused” that there would be a common unlawful purpose, that one or more agreed to help each other, and that they went on to the property.
The Crown also had to prove that the accused intended the offense to be committed or knew that the offense was of “likely consequence”.
Additionally, for the murder charge, the jury had to be certain that the defendant entered the property knowing that at least some of the group were carrying weapons and that they had either an intent or a “reckless intent” to kill someone.
If they came to the conclusion that only bottles were brought to the scene, they had to decide whether to just finish drinking or to intentionally use them as weapons.
In arriving at their verdicts, the jury had to use inferences, which were a conclusion of facts they accepted as reliable.
“It is not a guess, it is not speculation. Whether you draw that conclusion in a particular matter is a matter for you to decide,” Justice Becroft said.
He also touched on gang issues and notes, which had been shown during the trial; when the Crown presented a gang tag on a mannequin.
“The issue of patches is very topical at the moment. You can have strong feelings about gangs, as I said at the start of the trial, regardless of your views on gangs, they are a reality in New Zealand.”
But Umuroa’s defense lawyer Tony Rickard-Simms said his client and the rest of the group went to the property to “put on a show” and scare Te Kani whānau, but told the jury they could not be sure Umuroa believed anything other than “trivial damage” would occur.
As for Pini, defense attorney Scott Mills said she had been painted as “the Wicked Witch of the West” when she was simply “Dorothy, caught in a tornado” over which she had no control.
He laid the blame for the abuse and Mitchell’s death at the foot of the Mongrel Mob.
Apart from Hamiora Bennett, all the accused accepted being at the Te Kani property that night.
Layne and Robinson, through their counsel, suggested a verdict of manslaughter, while the rest said there was not enough to prove murder or manslaughter.
The defendants
Belinda Feek is an Open Justice reporter based in Waikato. She has worked at NZME for nine years and has been a journalist for 20.
