Three people had to undergo emergency surgery after they were involved in a stabbing at a family gathering.
Three people had to undergo emergency surgery after they were involved in a stabbing at a family gathering.
Three guests at a booze-fuelled family gathering ended the night undergoing emergency surgery after a fight between two men turned into a bloody “three-way stabathon”.
As the party neared midnight, the dynamics between in-laws Brett Wilkinson and Damien Joseph soured and the pair came to blows outside a Cook St, New Plymouth address.
During the September 7 brawl, Wilkinson, whose partner is related to the party’s host, pulled out a knife and proceeded to stab and cut Joseph in the face, head, arms and body.
Joseph’s partner, Rowena Coppen, rushed over and tried to pull Joseph, who is a family member of the host, away from the fight.
She then retreated inside and took the knife with her.
Soon after, emergency services were called and Joseph and Wilkinson were taken to hospital in ambulances.
Brett Wilkinson and Rowena Coppen were sentenced in New Plymouth District Court. Photo / Tara Shaskey
Police initially arrested Coppen for her involvement, but realised she also needed immediate medical treatment. She was then transported to hospital.
Of the knife wounds Joseph suffered to his head and body, one penetrated his right lung and was considered life-threatening. He underwent emergency surgery and later spent time in the intensive care unit.
Coppen required surgery to reattach a severed tendon on her index finger, and Wilkinson also suffered a stab wound to a lung, which, too, was considered life-threatening.
One of his other several knife injuries included being stabbed in the buttock which caused almost completely severed tendons to his left hamstring. He underwent emergency surgery and was also admitted to the intensive care unit.
Both Wilkinson, 22, and Coppen, 37, were charged with assault with a weapon.
On Monday, Wilkinson appeared in New Plymouth District Court, where defence lawyer Paul Keegan said his client had been “extremely drunk” at the time of his offending and was also provoked.
However, his resorting to violence was “absolutely foolhardy and unacceptable”, Keegan said.
“He ended up in this, sort of, three-way stabathon.
“They were all on the ground together, stabbing away furiously.”
Despite the seriousness of the charge Wilkinson faced, Keegan submitted the circumstances of the offending and the mitigating factors should see an end sentence of home detention.
Keegan said Wilkinson was now “trying to do his best”.
The offender is a former Black Power member who handed in his patch after his partner gave him an ultimatum.
Wilkinson now sports a new patch in the form of his partner’s name tattooed across his neck.
Keegan said his client previously led a “gypsy” lifestyle, but recently secured himself a home in South Taranaki where he was settled with his partner and her two children, whom he was helping to raise.
Crown prosecutor Rebekah Hicklin emphasised the seriousness of the offending and said it was extremely fortunate nobody had died.
She acknowledged Wilkinson’s young age but also noted his “significant” criminal history.
Hicklin raised concern about the absence of Wilkinson’s remorse and his denial of some of the facts of the offending.
“In particular, his denials of having the knife with him.”
In regards to home detention, which Wilkinson heard at an earlier sentencing indication would be the outcome if he admitted the charge, Hicklin said the Crown was in the court’s hands.
Judge Tony Greig said Wilkinson’s view of what happened did not accord with the summary of facts to which he pleaded guilty.
“The bottom line is you clearly used the knife that night and you inflicted injuries on someone else, and you were so drunk that maybe your view of what happened and who did what first might not be the right one.”
He said a probation officer’s report said Wilkinson was a “likeable guy” who had endured a dysfunctional early life.
It would have been a “miracle” had he avoided ending up in the dock following his upbringing, the judge said.
He was heartened by Wilkinson’s desire to change his ways and wished him well after sentencing him to six months of home detention.
Coppen was sentenced for her part in April, with Judge Greig stating at the time his sympathies lay with her.
He said she had been acting to protect her partner and was “very brave” to put her hand in the way of the knife as Wilkinson attempted to strike Joseph’s chest.
