Prison for duo, including mum of torture-murder victim Dimetrius Pairama, responsible for hammer attacks in Auckland Central

A woman has been sentenced to prison for participating in a series of broad daylight attacks in Auckland Central - including a moment of “thuggery” in which a stranger was hit over the head with a hammer during a purse-snatching attempt.

Lena Ringatu Hetaraka, 40, was ordered to serve 14 months’ imprisonment as she appeared before Judge Brooke Gibson in Auckland District Court last week, five months after co-defendant Naphaneul Jarius Falwasser, 22, was handed a similar prison sentence.

But the judge said he would consider replacing Hetaraka’s prison sentence with one of home detention if a suitable address could be found. He noted, among other things, her history of personal trauma - including the high-profile torture and murder in 2018 of her 17-year-old daughter, Dimetrius Pairama.

Court documents state the pair were on popular pedestrian thoroughfare Queen St around 2pm on Dec 10, 2022, when Hetaraka tried unsuccessfully to grab a handbag from a woman walking alongside two friends.

“The defendant Hetaraka began yelling and swearing at the group and advanced towards them in an aggressive manner,” according to the agreed summary of facts.

She then grabbed at another handbag being held by the first victim’s male friend, pulling it “with such force that it caused the victim to stumble backwards”, documents state, adding that the victim then struck out in self-defence.

“At this time, the defendant Falwasser, who was lying in wait a short distance away, ran at the victim holding a hammer in his hand shouting ‘Black Power!’ The defendant Falwasser struck the victim in the head with the claw of the hammer.”

Lena Hetaraka-Pairama reads a victim impact statement to the High Court during the sentencing of Kerry Te Amo and Ashley Winter for the murder of Dimetrius Pairama in July 2018. Photo / NZME

With the victim dizzy, bleeding and having fallen to the ground, the defendants walked away from the scene, authorities said.

A short time later, the defendants attempted to steal food from a nearby St Pierre’s Sushi restaurant on Elliot St. When a security guard stopped them, Falwasser handed the same hammer to Heteraka, who swung the weapon at the guard’s head. She missed and the guard was able to take the hammer from her.

The co-defendants returned to the same eatery a few moments later and the guard again stopped Heteraka as she tried to steal sushi.

“The defendant Falwasswer came to her aid and pulled out a screwdriver,” court documents state. “He began taunting the victim as the pair made their escape.”

They were arrested a short time later.

Hetaraka was initially charged with assault with intent to rob, punishable by up to seven years’ imprisonment, and aggravated assault with a weapon, carrying a maximum punishment of three years. Falwasser was charged with both offences as well as aggravated wounding, punishable by up to 14 years’ imprisonment.

Hetaraka was also accused of an incident last March in which she allegedly told a security guard, “I’ll stab your eyeballs out,” and thrust a small pair of scissors at his face after he told her not to consume alcohol in public. That charge, however, was dropped prior to today’s hearing.

“This really is serious street violence - quite serious,” Judge Gibson said during today’s hearing, adding of Falwasser: “Clearly, he was armed ... for thuggery.”

The judge said he had “serious doubts” about Hetaraka’s claim that she didn’t know during the first attack that her co-defendant had a hammer. He noted her long history of dishonesty and violent offences. But the judge also noted that, aside from the recent relapses, her offending appears to have decreased substantially in recent years.

While he didn’t go into great detail about the murder of Hetaraka’s daughter, defence lawyer Joon Yi noted that the tragedy and the two lengthy trials that followed had impacted his client’s mental health.

Hetaraka steadfastly sat through both trials - which took place in 2019 and last year in the High Court at Auckland - even as jurors heard disturbing evidence of her daughter’s horrific final hours.

Pairama was repeatedly punched and stomped on, forced to disrobe and tied naked to a chair with soiled underwear stuffed into her mouth, had her hair hacked off, was burned on sensitive areas of her body with a makeshift blowtorch, had household chemicals and baby powder poured on top of her, burning her eyes, and was ultimately forced to choose the method of her own murder: hanging or stabbing.

Police later found the teen’s body discarded in a rusty steel drum at an abandoned Māngere state house.

Ashley Winter, who was 27 at the time of the killing, and co-defendant Kerry Te Amo, 24, were both found guilty of murder in 2019 and sentenced the following year to life imprisonment. A third defendant, who was 16 at the time, was initially deemed incompetent to stand trial but her mental status changed in 2022 and a new jury trial began last July.

She was handed a sentence last month of five years and 10 months - and ordered to return to the Mason Clinic lockdown psychiatric facility - after jurors found her guilty of kidnapping but could not reach a verdict for murder. Prosecutors have since indicated they will not subject family and witnesses to a third trial. The woman continues to have name suppression pending appeal.

Hetaraka read victim impact statements at the conclusions of both trials.

“My hand shook from the hurtful, evil things I was hearing,” she told the court in 2020. “Every time I close my eyes, I see her smiling.”

Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.