A man who is believed to have suffered a methamphetamine-induced psychotic episode - with a voice telling him “everybody would be saved” if he killed himself - has been sentenced to four-and-a-half years in prison for causing a fatal crash at an East Auckland intersection.
Jurors took just over an hour of deliberation in June to find Adam Michael Zachary Speir guilty of manslaughter for the January 28, 2019, crash that killed father-of-two Zhengwen “Alan” Hu.
A victim impact statement from Hu’s widow, Carol, was read aloud in court today by a victim support advocate while Hu watched the sentencing remotely via an audio-video feed.
“Alan’s life was tragically cut short at 50 years without any warning. That was the day our world was torn to pieces,” Carol Hu wrote, adding that not one of the 1347 days that have passed since her husband’s death has been without grief and pain for her and her daughters, who were 8 and 11 when their father died.
Adam Speir in the dock at the Auckland High Court. Photo / Brett Phibbs
“You have created lifelong misery for us.”
Speir wiped at his eye as the statement was read. He submitted a letter of apology to the family last week in which he described his actions as “atrocious” but Alan Hu’s widow was sceptical of the timing and did not want to see it, prosecutors said.
An accident reconstruction expert testified during Speir’s trial that the defendant was estimated to have been driving his Holden Commodore at about 110km/h in the 60km/h zone as he approached the intersection of Tī Rākau Drive and Botany Rd in Golflands, near the Botany Town Centre mall.
Dashcam videos from two vehicles showed Speir’s car slamming into the back of Alan Hu’s wagon with such force that the Commodore momentarily seemed to be at a nearly 45-degree angle from the road - its front wheels wedged under Hu’s stationary vehicle and its back wheels in the air.
Other motorists described odd and dangerous behaviour in the minutes before the death, including Speir honking and laughing hysterically. After the crash, as he was trapped in the vehicle, witnesses said he yelled “I am Jesus Christ!” and paramedics described him talking gibberish.
He had traces of methamphetamine and cannabis in his blood.
Speir told police about a week after the crash that he left his grandmother’s house in the car when he started hearing a voice.
“All I can say was I was going along there and someone said something to me,” he said in a recorded interview. “I don’t know who it was. That’s all I can say. It’s weird, you know. I can’t explain it.
“It f***ing feels real f***ed up but someone said something to me. I don’t know who it was. I feel like I was tricked, though, ‘cos they said I’d go on to a better place. Well, I haven’t.
“They said if I killed myself then everyone would be saved.”
Speir told a psychologist that he had experienced trouble sleeping for weeks because of methamphetamine use. He had used meth the night before the crash and had not slept again, he admitted. He smoked cannabis on the same day as the crash but said the drug only made him feel normal.
A police expert testified that impairment cannot be determined by the levels of methamphetamine or cannabis in the blood. However, the amounts found in Speir’s blood were similar to levels in people who have been found to be impaired, she said.
Crown prosecutor Luke Radich described the drug use as causing a domino effect of sorts - leading to the psychosis that led to the crash.
Radich said during the trial that Speir should have seen trouble coming due to his drug use, lack of sleep and indications earlier in the day that he might be on the verge of suffering a psychotic episode. Getting into the car anyway despite all those factors equated to gross negligence, he argued.
Defence lawyer Andrew Speed argued to jurors that his client shouldn’t be held responsible for something that occurred during a psychotic episode. While acknowledging the jury’s guilty verdict, he told Justice Ian Gault today that Speir should receive a shorter sentence than other vehicular manslaughter cases due to the unique factors.
“I accept that you experienced a psychotic episode ... but you were not incapacitated when you began driving after drug use,” Gault later responded. “Your decision to drive in these circumstances was grossly negligent.
“Harm was foreseeable even if your psychotic episode was not.”
He noted that Speir had 28 previous convictions dating back to 2009, more than a dozen of which were driving-related.
The fact he has not been deterred about unsafe driving in the past and that he was already on community supervision when the crash occurred were reasons to add more time to the sentence, Gault said. But his difficult upbringing - with parents who also suffered drug addiction and a criminal record - necessitated a discount, the judge said.
Gault did not approve discounts for remorse or for any injuries the defendant suffered in the crash, but he did give him credit for his “exemplary” compliance with electronic bail conditions while awaiting trial.
The judge also ordered that Speir be disqualified from driving for two years after he is eventually released from prison.
Alan Hu was a former high school sports teacher in Shanghai before moving to New Zealand in 2002 and taking on a job as an aviation security officer at Auckland Airport.
He was a devoted family man who made delicious dinners and was always quick to remind his girls to wear extra layers when the temperature dropped, his wife recalled, adding that her children miss the walks after dinner, library trips and bedtime stories.
He and his wife were building a dream home in Half Moon Bay, where they had decided to relocate so their daughters could attend better schools. His last day alive was Auckland Anniversary Day, and he had used the time off work to watch the installation of carpeting at their new home.
The crash garnered attention from across New Zealand and overseas. A Givealittle page set up for his widow and daughters raised nearly $170,000 - with messages of condolence from Australia, Malaysia, Hong Kong and China - before the family asked to close the page so that the “attention and kindness’' could be focused on other worthy causes.
Now being a single-income family has made life more difficult, Carol Hu acknowledged today in her victim impact statement.
“I have lost my rock, my anchor, my mate and my future,” she said.
