Joseph Brider is sentenced in the High Court at Christchurch for murder. Photo / John Kirk-Anderson/ Pool
Joseph Brider is sentenced in the High Court at Christchurch for murder. Photo / John Kirk-Anderson/ Pool
WARNING: This story contains graphic content relating to sexual violence and murder
The man who brutally attacked and murdered Colombian woman Juliana Bonilla-Herrera in her Christchurch home after becoming obsessed with her days after his release from prison for a violent rape and kidnapping has been jailed for life.
And Joseph Brider has also been sentenced to preventive detention, meaning he will never be released from prison unless the Parole Board are satisfied he is not a danger to the community.
Brider had only been out of prison for 72 days when he murdered Bonilla-Herrera in her Addington home.
The Parole Board refused to release him on multiple occasions as they believed he was too dangerous.
But shortly before his official sentence end date - when he legally had to be released back into the community - the board agreed to let him out so it could impose a raft of strict monitoring conditions.
Brider initially denied charges of murder and abduction but in September he entered guilty pleas on all counts.
He was sentenced this afternoon by Justice Jonathan Eaton in the High Court at Christchurch.
Before the judge began the formal sentencing the court heard Victim Impact Statements from those closest to the slain woman.
Bonilla-Herrera was 37 when she died.
Friends of the slain woman were in court today and members of her family including her mother and sister - who spoke to the Herald exclusively last year - watched the hearing by audio-visual link from overseas.
“My sister is gone - the pain hasn’t stopped”
The hearing began with a number of Victim Impact Statements from those close to Bonilla-Herrera.
A DVD tribute compiled by her workmates in Christchurch was then played in court - featuring the bubbly, curly-haired Colombian speaking directly to the camera.
Bonilla-Herrera’s sister Saray Bonilla had her statement read in court by Crown Prosecutor Claire Boshier.
“There are no words to describe this loss,” she said.
Bonilla said her sister “from day one” worked hard to have a “whole happy life” and Brider destroyed that.
“When a person like my sister leaves this world it’s a loss for the entire world,” her sister said.
Bonilla said she would find the best way to honour her sister and all the women in the world who had been taken in similar ways.
”Juliana wherever you are we love you today, tomorrow, and always and even if your physical presence is not here, we know your essence will awlays remain in our hearts,” her statement said.
“Your last moments were hell, now you’re in peace.”
Friend who found Juliana’s body faces ‘cruel and shameful’ killer
He said it was “impossible” to “truly articulate” the impact the murder had on him.
“I have been forced to live this nightmare due to your cruel and shameful actions… the most distressing, heartbreaking, savage and disgusting thing that has ever happened to me,” he said.
“My life as I knew it has changed forever.”
He suffered from deep depression and sadness “from the moment I walked into the murder scene” and has lived in fear of many things since that day.
The friend told the court that the day he found Bonilla-Herrera she had failed to show up for a bike ride.
When he went to check on her, worried when she did not answer her phone, he found the grisly scene.
Brider, he said, was standing outside Bonilla-Herrera’s flat and said “she will be sleeping”.
“I never thought that you were standing in front of me after brutally killing my friend,” the friend told the killer.
“The scene is still vivid in front of my eyes and it still haunts me.
“I couldn’t eat or sleep for many months… I was scared of everything… I used to smile… and now I don’t do that any more.
“She was murdered in her own home by a lowlife… she worked hard and lived her live abiding by all the rules… what happened to her was a tragedy that never should have happened and it is one that I will never recover from.
Bonilla-Herrera’s mother also wrote a Victim Impact Statement but asked that it was not read in open court.
Justice Eaton acknowledged the woman’s contribution.
The murder involved “calculated planning” during his two months in the community while on parole, including searching her name and buying items used in the offending.
Brider denied his crimes were pre-planned but Boshier said that claim was “unconvincing” and his explanations of his behaviour in the lead-up to the offending “implausible”.
The court heard Brider told one report writer Bonilla-Herrera would be an “easy target” as he knew she was home alone.
Further, he reported that he “felt better for hurting someone” after the murder.
”For any woman the offending would be “their worst nightmare... to be attacked in the security of her own bed,” said Boshier.
”This murder involved a high degree of brutality, cruelty, depravity and callousness.”
Experts who complied pre-sentence reports for the court said they doubted Brider would be amenable to any rehabilitation - and said he had “antisocial and psychopathic personality features”
“Any attempt to mitigate his risk... would be highly likely to be successful,” one said
He was also described as “unemotional, impulsive and callous” and it was clear he “took pleasure in harming others”.
Further, he “consistently displayed evidence of minimisation and blaming others” during his interviews.
“In the circumstances he has displayed no remorse… no empathy,” said Boshier.
Brider’s lawyer James Rapley KC said while the murder was “brutal and depraved” and no one would “ever understand how someone could act that way” - his client had accepted responsibility.
Joseph Brider in court on the day he pleaded guilty. Photo / Kurt Bayer
Rapley claimed that as Brider “spends decades in prison” he would receive treatment and get insight into his offending which may help to change his behaviour in the future.
He said while Brider’s offending was “very heinous” he did not think an indefinite sentence was necessary.
Rapley suggested a final sentence of around 19.5 to 20 years.
The killing of Juliana Bonilla-Herrera: What Brider did
At an arraignment for Brider in September Crown Prosecutor Claire Boshier read the summary of facts to the court - outlining the horrific attack on Bonilla-Herrera.
She revealed that just a week after Brider was released from prison he searched “Colombia lady” on his phone.
After that he purchased two rolls of masking tape and searched again for Bonilla-Herrera online - putting her name into Facebook and Google.
He purchased a box of condoms and latex gardening gloves and on the night of the murder he searched a number of pornographic sites including men sneaking in on women sleeping and “familial relations videos”.
That night Bonilla-Herrera returned home from a night out with a friend intending going to bed.
She saw Brider sitting outside his flat and asked her friend to drive her up to her door and wait for her as she felt “threatened by” and uncomfortable about him.
“He gave her a bad feeling and she felt like she was being watched,” a friend told police.
“She was deeply concerned for her safety... she did not feel safe because of the neighbour,” another friend said.
Bonilla-Herrera’s friend went to meet her at the flat the next day for a planned bike ride.
Brider spoke to the friend saying “she must still be asleep”.
Hours later Bonilla-Herrera was found dead in her own home - naked apart from one sock and showing distinct defensive wounds along with the almost 30 stab wounds that killed her.
Forensic examinations of both Bonilla-Herrera and Brider’s flats revealed blood, fingerprints and semen pointing directly to the killer.
Brider tried to conceal his involvement, showering, washing clothing and disposing of the murder weapon and other items.
Later when he spoke to police he acknowledged he knew a woman lived next door but claimed he did not know her or where she was from.
Life in prison + preventive detention - Brider’s sentence
Justice Eaton, after considering submissions from the Crown and defence, handed down Brider’s sentence.
Brider, in a green prison tracksuit with his balding head shaved, sat still through the hearing, showing no emotion and only uttering “nah” when asked if he had any comments to make to the court.
Justice Eaton said it was clear from the moment Brider moved in next door to Bonilla-Herrera that he “developed an unhealthy interest” in the woman
Joseph Brider is sentenced in the High Court at Christchurch for murder. Photo / John Kirk-Anderson/ Pool
As he outlined Herrera’s last moments Justice Eaton revealed he’d listened to the recording of the first part of the attack.
“She was crying, she was repeatedly begging for her life,” a sombre Justice Eaton said.
Justice Eaton said Brider claimed his early years were tough but there were “inconsistencies” in what he said about his upbringing.
Brider said he began using substances at the age of 13, and left school for employment at 16.
A short time later he joined the Mongrel Mob which made him “feel accepted”.
His criminal history commenced with minor driving offences as a 17-year-old in 2003 followed by reasonably frequent offending since then including raping a woman in 2014.
Justice Eaton said there was a “consistent theme” in the reports that he lacked empathy, had the inability to manage impulses and had a tendency to exert control through violence.
He said Brider was an “ongoing risk, particularly to women”.
Justice Eaton said there were a number of significant aggravating features of the offending - the fact it was premeditated for a start.
Brider claimed it was a “spur of the moment decision to kill” because he was “enraged” to find the man he thought his father, was in fact not.
He told report writers he was “going out to murder” and just happened to come across his neighbour.
Justice Eaton said he did not accept “it was just a coincidence” he had fixated on Bonilla-Herrera in the days before he killed and he was satisfied the break-in, attack and murder were calculated and planned.
Juliana Hererra was killed in her home in Christchurch. Photo / Supplied
He was “masking the telltale signs” that he was going to reoffend and breaching conditions repeatedly including drinking alcohol and trying to engage in relations with women.
“These are all significant aggravating factors,” Justice Eaton said.
Justice Eaton said it was “abundantly clear” Brider’s offending had “caused so much pain, so much grief”.
“The devastation caused to her family... is just incalculable,” he said.
He sentenced him to life in prison and preventive detention - saying Brider pose “a very high risk” of committing further violence, particularly towards women.
He could not find anything in any of the pre-sentence reports that indicated there was “any realistic prospect of rehabilitation”.
“Your history demonstrates an alarming pattern of escalating sexual violence against women,” Justice Eaton told Brider.
“There’s no doubt you pose a high risk of committing a serious sexual offence against an adult woman in future.
“You have tried to ‘fake good’ during previous treatment... I’ve reached the very clear view that... a determinate sentence would not provide adequate protection of society.
“I agree with the experts that even the highest level of supervision in the community is unlikely to mitigate the risk you would present.
“There simply is not a realistic alternative... it’s not to punish you Mr Brider, it’s to protect the community.”
‘Don’t forget Juliana so that history doesn’t repeat itself’
After the sentencing, Herrera’s family released this statement:
On January 22, 2022, our lives changed in the most terrifying and unexpected way possible, with the loss of our daughter and sister. I don’t think anyone can measure the great pain we still go through today.
Juliana, an extraordinary, beautiful and kind woman, with a great heart willing to always give, is gone, but her spirit will always be among us.
There will not be enough words to describe how hard it has been to face the suffering we have been through. There will never be enough words to erase the pain from our hearts.
We will not talk about justice. This tragedy should have never happened to Juliana and she should still be alive. We still have hope that her departure is not in vain, that her departure has set off the alarms and is a warning to prevent these types of cases in the future. We hope that greater attention is paid to the mental health of people in all stages of life; procedural errors are corrected in all organizations so that future tragedies can be avoided. We trust that her loss will have an impact on these organizations and their procedures. Because it is our right to feel safe, especially in our own homes and because no one has the right to take another person’s life.
We will always be missing one of us; we will be missing Juliana.
Our eternal gratitude to all the people who, in good faith, approached us to offer their support and have supported us from a distance. To the team of police, investigators, and lawyers who did a fantastic job, as well as the Victim Support team and Juliana’s friends and colleagues who were amazing to our family. To the population of Christchurch who, without knowing Juliana, also felt this loss as their own.
We can be sure of one thing: That all the love people showered Juliana with, when she was alive and after she was taken from us. Will never be known by the person who took her away.
Lastly, don’t forget Juliana so that history doesn’t repeat itself.
We appreciate your respect for our privacy at this painful time.
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