Flowers mark the location where Kelly Donner (top right) died on March 4. Haami Hanara, 14 (bottom right) is accused of Donner's death.
Flowers mark the location where Kelly Donner (top right) died on March 4. Haami Hanara, 14 (bottom right) is accused of Donner's death.
CCTV footage showing a Flaxmere man's last moments has been revealed to a High Court jury in Napier.
Fourteen-year-old Haami Hanara , has pleaded not guilty to murdering Kelly Donner and is on trial in the High Court at Napier before Justice Peter Churchman. The trial started on Monday and is expected to last about two weeks.
The Crown alleges Hanara fatally stabbed Donner, 40, after an argument over a torch in the Flaxmere Tavern carpark on March 4.
On Monday the court was told Donner was a "kind and harmless man and some described him as a rough sleeper".
Detective James Forgie , who specialises in analysing CCTV footage, took the court through both video and still images.
At 10.21pm on March 4, CCTV footage recorded in the Flaxmere Tavern yard showed Donner looking through a tin for cigarette butts, before a group of youths arrived and the motion activated camera was destroyed.
A CCTV camera attached to the Flaxmere Library was then activated at 10.31pm, showing Hanara and four other youths standing outside the yard on a grassed area.
Moments later Donner appeared in the frame with a beer bottle in his hand, then one of the youths threw a bicycle at him. Footage taken at 10.31pm showed what Forgie believed to be Hanara with a knife in his hand who made "motions as though he's cleaning the blade".
Kelly Donner, who died in the Flaxmere Tavern carpark.
At 10.32pm footage showed Donner with his back to five youths, with Hanara immediately following behind him. They disappear from the frame for 33 seconds.
"When the suspect came back into view, the knife appeared red in colour".
"The knife was not that colour before the 33-second period."
Further footage at 10.33pm shows Hanara on his bicycle holding the knife in his left hand.
Forensic scientist Janina Hopkins said she had examined a black leather vest Hanara was wearing on the night.
She said there were "numerous blood stains on the inside and outside of the vest."
Police also discovered a knife in the bushes outside the Flaxmere Library in a flax bush, but no DNA or blood was found on it.
Crown prosecutor Steve Manning noted that it had been raining heavily when the knife was found and asked if that could have any effect on testing.
Hopkins said it was possible the weather could have had an impact.
Earlier in the day, forensic pathologist Dr Thambirajah Balachandra said Donner had 14 injuries in total, one of which was a 10.5cm-deep wound to the neck most likely caused by a knife.
He said knife had struck the carotid artery, which is vital in carrying blood to the brain. A person injured in that way would die within three to five minutes without medical treatment.
Defence counsel Eric Forster questioned Balachandra as to whether THC (tetrahydrocannabinol, the principal psychoactive constituent of cannabis) was found in Donner's system upon forensic examination.
Balachandra confirmed that 18 micrograms of THC per litre of blood was found, equivalent to smoking a single cannabis cigarette two hours before death.
