Armed police swarm a property in Green Bay, following an earlier homicide near the New Haven Motel, New Lynn. Video / Michael Craig
An Auckland motorcyclist who was shot through his helmet in a manner described by prosecutors as an “execution” would have died almost instantly after the bullet damaged his brain stem, a forensic pathologist says.
Robert James Hart, 40, also had Covid-19 during the November 2021 shooting and a “significant amount” of methamphetamine in his system, pathologist Charley Glenn told jurors in the High Court at Auckland today. But neither the coronavirus nor methamphetamine impairment, he said, would have contributed to Hart’s death.
“I’m certain the gunshot wound would have caused his death,” he said as testimony continued in the joint murder trial of Dylan James Mitchell Harris, Adam Malakai North and Jasmine Murray.
Hart was found dead in a residential driveway in New Lynn, West Auckland, during the third month of Auckland’s 2021 Covid lockdown.
Prosecutors Sarah Murphy and Robin McCoubrey alleged at the start of the trial last week that Harris had snuck up behind Hart and shot him at close range after co-defendants North and Murray had lured him to the location for a fake drug deal using someone else’s Facebook account.
There was no intent to kill anyone that day, defence lawyer Ron Mansfield, KC, said on behalf of Harris this week. Lawyers Sam Wimsett and Lorraine Smith, who represent North and Murray, said their clients were not aware of any plan to use a gun or kill Hart.
New Lynn homicide victim Robert James Hart, 40, was father to two sons.
The pathologist said it’s not common to test people for viruses during autopsies involving gunshot wounds but the post-mortem Covid test was administered because of the lockdown.
“It’s unlikely to have had much of a bearing on his health at the time of his death,” Glenn said of the positive test result, explaining he saw no inflammation in Hart’s lungs.
Forensic scientist Leah Tottey, who examined Hart’s motorcycle helmet after his death, said it had soot and propellant from the gun barrel on it, indicating that the shot had been fired from close range, she said.
The exact rangecan’t be determined because police never recovered an alleged murder weapon, she said. But after experiments with a short-barrelled pistol, a long-barrelled rifle and a variety of .22 calibre Winchester-brand bullets, she determined the gun would have been no more than 30cm away.
Witness Jade Nicholls recalled Harris, whom she knew as “Boo” or “Dillz”, calling her just after 11am that morning and asking her to pick him up, which she couldn’t do due to a family commitment.
“I’m f***ed,” she recalled him saying.
Dylan Harris, Adam North and Jasmine Murray appear in the High Court at Auckland. Photos / Alex Burton
Alyssa Horst, whose Facebook Messenger account was used to set up a methamphetamine purchase from Hart, recalled her uneasy interactions with North and Murray in the days before the shooting. Her mobile phone had vanished while the couple were at her home visiting her flatmate, Horst said.
“Yo just wondering if any of u guys have seen my phone,” she messaged North from another device on the afternoon of November 3, two days before the killing. “And I’m also telling u so that ur aware ... I found out that phone was actually stolen. So my mate stole it off someone. That person is now tracking it apparently and saying they’ll get police involved, so I’m not threatening u or whatever I’m letting u know that it is being tracked. So if u do have it can I plz have it back.”
After a brief video chat between the two, Horst backed down, according to messaging data that was later collected by police and shared with jurors.
“Allgood was just wanting to ask,” she wrote. “F*** I hate drama. Have a good day anyways sorry that.”
But North and Murray later said they might have found her phone and asked for the pin code to open it, she testified.
“He just hung up from what I can remember,” she said of North’s response after she gave the pin code, explaining that she saw the couple outside a New Lynn vape store later that day and was surprised when they didn’t hand over the phone.
In the days that followed, she said, she started seeing messages from her own Messenger account to people she hadn’t personally contacted. One of them was Hart, who exchanged messages with her account starting at 8.14 on the morning of his death.
“Eny,” Horst’s account asked as the exchange began, appearing to indicate she was seeking to purchase drugs.
“Yep wat u after?” Hart responded, to which the person typing on Horst’s account replied only “14″.
“Yep how much u got for it,” Hart messaged back. “Seriously..no fk arounds ae.”
