Finger chopped for talking of gang, says witness

A 22-year-old West Auckland man was made to take part in cutting off his own finger as a gruesome punishment for not keeping quiet about Head Hunter business, a depositions hearing was told yesterday.

The amputation was said to be retribution for the crime of speaking out of turn to a gang prospect about seeing a bashing that left a man seriously injured.

The 22-year-old was allegedly told if he did not cut off his own finger, his tongue would be chopped out instead.

In the end the terrified man held a knife over his right little finger while a gang prospect allegedly hit it with a sledgehammer. The finger was sliced clean off.

JPs in the Waitakere District Court yesterday committed Terrence Austin McFarland, aged 43, of Glen Eden, and Michael Robert Brooks, aged 33 of Te Atatu South, to the High Court for trial on charges of kidnap and maiming in March.

The 22-year-old, who has name suppression, mixed on the fringes with Head Hunter associates.

He told the court of seeing a man being beaten with a metal bar, punched and kicked by up to six men before being taken away unconscious for being a "nark".

The witness said McFarland later told him the man had died and asked him to help bury the body on top of a freshly dug grave at Waikumete Cemetery, but he refused.

(It later emerged that the man was in fact still alive).

McFarland allegedly told him to keep his mouth shut about what he had seen or "there would be consequences".

The witness told the depositions hearing that he was later imprisoned on remand at Mt Eden Prison for breaching his bail.

There he met a prospect who said he ran drugs for a patched member of the Head Hunters.

The witness said he spoke to the prospect about seeing the beating and of the conversation with McFarland about burying the body.

After his release a week later, the witness said he was visited by Brooks, McFarland's prospect, who said McFarland wanted to see him.

The witness went to McFarland's home, where he was asked about the conversation in prison.

At first the witness denied saying anything, but then admitted that he had spoken to the prospect.

He said McFarland told him that as a punishment he was going to lose a finger.

"I said I didn't want to lose my finger. Is there anything else I could do? I said is there any work I could do or get some money?"

Prosecutor David McNaughton asked: "And was he interested in that?"

Witness: "No.

" ... I said I don't want to lose my finger. He said, 'Then we will chop out your tongue'. At that moment I was pretty scared about what was going to happen."

Mr McNaughton asked who McFarland said was going to cut off his finger.

"He told me to cut it off myself. I said ' I can't.' I said, 'No, I can't'."

At the time McFarland looked "pretty intimidating".

The witness said that when he told McFarland he could not cut off his own finger, he was told: "It's either that or your tongue".

He said he was shown how to hold his hand over a wooden bench with his little finger out and the others folded underneath.

McFarland produced a large knife, but before the gory operation was performed, he allegedly sharpened the blade.

"He said he was going to keep it [the finger] for his collection," the witness told the JPs.

Mr McNaughton asked what the witness thought would have happened if he had not held the knife.

Witness: "That they would have cut my tongue out like they said."

The man said that as he held the knife over his finger, Brooks hit it with a sledgehammer, cutting the top of the finger off.

"He [Brooks] said something like, 'I'm getting quite good at this'," the witness told the court.

He said he was in shock and rushed to the A&E department.

He wanted to take his finger for the doctors to sew it back on, but McFarland would not let him have it.

"Terry said something along the lines of 'I will keep it for my collection'."

The witness said he was told to say nothing or "it would be over for me".

Documents handed to the court are said to show that blood found on the bench and ceiling was 800 million times more likely to be the witness' than anyone else's.

Both men denied the charges.

Defence lawyers Murray Gibson and Sanjay Patel conceded that there was a prima facie case to answer.

Part way through the hearing there was an outburst from McFarland, who said he wanted to leave the court rather than listen to any more lies.

For the next half-hour loud bangs and other noises were heard coming from the court holding cells.