Latu Kepu at a previous court appearance. Photo / Christine Cornege
Latu Kepu at a previous court appearance. Photo / Christine Cornege
A Killer Beez gang member who killed a prison guard in 2010 - then was subsequently convicted of assaulting two other Corrections officers and an inmate in unrelated incidents - has been released from prison, but authorities want to continue to keep close tabs on him.
Lawyers for the Department of Corrections appeared in the High Court at Auckland today to ask that Justice Sally Fitzgerald grant an extended supervision order for Latu Kepu.
Kepu, 34, who has been in prison for much of his adult life, was paroled in April 2021 with just a few months left on his sentence.
Since then, authorities have sought an extended supervision order, or ESO - special restrictions, similar to parole, that can be imposed on a former prisoner for up to a decade after a sentence is completed. Due to their imposition on civil liberties, ESOs are supposed to be reserved only for former inmates who are believed to pose "a real and ongoing risk of further sexual or violent offending".
Kepu clearly fits that category, prosecutors Brett Tantrum and Olivia Thomson argued before Justice Fitzgerald today.
Temporary restrictions, including an electronically monitored ankle bracelet, were ordered last year for Kepu as he awaited the full ESO hearing. Since then "it hasn't gone well for Mr Kepu", Tantrum said, explaining that Kepu has "routinely" been accused of removing his monitoring bracelet and has found himself before judges on other matters.
Kepu was ordered last month to serve two weeks behind bars after pleading guilty to a police chase in which his vehicle was eventually stopped by road spikes. He remains in jail, awaiting trial in Auckland District Court on charges he threatened to kill a woman in May.
A bail hearing for those charges is set for next week.
Letu had already served prison time for a variety of offences including robbery of a taxi driver, attacking a pregnant woman and kicking a police officer in the head when he attacked Springhill Prison guard Jason Palmer in May 2010 as the guard opened the door to Kepu's cell.
Palmer, 33, received fatal head injuries after falling backwards and hitting his head on the pavement at the Waikato facility.
Spring Hill prison guard Jason Palmer died in 2010 after he was attacked by inmate Latu Kepu. Photo / Supplied
"When I get out of here, I'm going to punch him over," another Corrections officer would later recall Kepu threatening prior to the attack.
Kepu was sentenced for manslaughter in 2011, ordered to serve six years and four months on top of his existing sentence of two years and eight months.
After the incident he was moved to Auckland's maximum security Paremoremo Prison, and in 2013 he pleaded guilty to assaulting two more prison guards in separate incidents there. Both Corrections officers were taken to hospital but neither was seriously hurt.
His sentence was extended again in 2016 after he was convicted of participating in another prison attack in which a fellow inmate received non-fatal stab wounds.
Attending today's hearing via audiovisual feed, Kepu repeatedly interrupted lawyers and the judge, at one point sitting on the floor of the holding room as he appeared on camera. He fired lawyer Dale Dufty at the start of the hearing but appeared to rehire him shortly after Justice Fitzgerald indicated she would not postpone the hearing again after three prior postponements.
"The prison guards made every day a living hell for me," Kepu said during one outburst, adding at another point that he is a victim of abuse in state care.
Dufty argued that some of the special conditions proposed by Corrections would be redundant with potential bail conditions for his existing charges. Others - like continued electronic monitoring, an overnight curfew and a ban on spending time with Killer Beez members and associates - wouldn't meet the legal requirements of reducing his client's chances of reoffending.
"That's quite a severe restriction on his liberty," he said, describing continued electronic monitoring and a curfew as "another pseudo-sentence".
The law doesn't allow for extended supervision orders "just to keep an eye on him", Dufty added.
But Tantrum disagreed that would be the sole purpose, suggesting that such restrictions would help Kepu with his already difficult transition to life outside prison and serve as a constant reminder that he is being watched, making it more difficult to commit further violent offences.
Justice Fitzgerald directed lawyers today to two recent Court of Appeal decisions finding that the ESO regime is inconsistent with the Bill of Rights Act and therefore there would need to be "strong justification" to implement one and similarly strong justification for any restrictions that are ordered.
She is expected to issue a reserved judgment next month.
