Russell Watts confronted Stevee Ormsby after she illegally parked on broken yellow lines near Te Wati Park in Tauranga. She hit him on his forehead and "clawed" his neck.
Russell Watts confronted Stevee Ormsby after she illegally parked on broken yellow lines near Te Wati Park in Tauranga. She hit him on his forehead and "clawed" his neck.
A man who regularly took photos of illegally parked cars and sent them to the council was assaulted by a woman who “clawed” his neck and struck him on the head.
Rotorua woman Stevee Ormsby, 32, has been found guilty of assault with intent to injure after a confrontation over her parking.
She denied assaulting Russell Watts, 63. At a judge-alone trial in February, she said all she did was push him back after he approached her in a “brash” mood.
The incident followed Watts' longstanding frustration with “dangerous” parking near his house, by Te Wati Park, in Tauranga’s Maungatapu. He regularly confronts those he sees parking on broken yellow lines and sends photos to the council.
Ormsby told the judge she’d been running late for rugby practice on April 2 last year and was putting on her boots in her ute when she saw Watts approach.
She said he swore at her and she spotted a fresh scratch down the side of her ute, which she thought he’d caused with a “sharp object” that he was still holding.
She said he came at her “aggressively” and she pushed him, causing him to fall backwards.
However, Judge Melinda Mason said, in her recently released decision, that she didn’t find Ormsby to be “credible or reliable”. Her account was inconsistent with what the judge considered “proven facts”.
Ormsby’s account about where the confrontation happened didn’t marry with the way the vehicle was parked, nor the injuries Watts received.
“Her evidence was that he was facing her and she pushed him back, using more force with her left arm,” the judge said in her written decision.
“I can’t imagine a fall from a push back where more significant force was used from her left arm to his right side, and with some force with her right arm on his left side, that would result in a fall where he somehow fell on to his forehead ...”
Watts had an injury to his upper forehead, which the judge found wouldn’t have been caused by falling to a level path, but was consistent with a blow to the head.
The judge also found it didn’t make sense that Watts would receive a “small fingernail-sized laceration” to the right side of his neck if the only force used had been applied to his chest and shoulder.
The judge found the injuries and likely location consistent with Watts' evidence.
Te Wati Park in Maungatapu, Tauranga, has limited angle parks available, and Russell Watts says it leads people to park illegally, and "dangerously", on broken yellow lines.
Watts said Ormsby approached him as he came to confront her about her “dangerous” parking.
He was about 1.5 metres in front of her ute, at the entrance of a driveway that had gravel on it.
Watts said that, after being clawed and struck on the head, he fell on the gravel and lost consciousness.
He remembered lying on the ground and Ormsby looking at him, as well as “seeing blood”.
“I don’t know anyone who would assault somebody and see the extent of those injuries and then go back and play sport,” Watts said in court.
Ormsby’s evidence was that the incident happened near the back of her truck, where there was a narrow pathway and grass. The judge found that wasn’t consistent with the cuts and abrasions on Watts' knees, hands and arms.
Judge Mason said Watts was candid, calm and consistent in his evidence, while also making concessions not always in his interest.
He agreed that a photo of a scratch down the side of Ormsby’s ute “looked fresh”, while still denying he had caused it.
Judge Mason was satisfied Ormsby assaulted Watts and found the level of force, regarding the blow to the forehead, supported an intent to cause injury.
HannahBartlettis a Tauranga-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She previously covered court and local government for the Nelson Mail, and before that was a radio reporter at Newstalk ZB.
