Man faces jail after allegedly stabbing woman in eye

File Photo / NZ Herald

A 24-year-old Hastings man faces up to 14 years in jail after a jury rejected his claims that he did not intentionally cause an injury which cost his children's mother one of her eyes.

While the Crown said gang member Sio Muliipu caused the injury by stabbing the teenage mum in the eye with a knife while detaining her in the bedroom of a suburban Hastings house.

Muliipu claimed it was caused by a toy he threw at her.

A High Court jury in Napier today deliberated for more than four and a half hours before finding Muliipu guilty of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm and five other charges relating to domestic violence late last year, all of which he had denied.

At the start of the trial on Monday he had admitted injuring with intent to injure.

The jury of six men and six women also found him guilty of assaulting the woman with a vacuum cleaner and assaulting her with intent to injure in another episode on November 23.

However, he was acquitted on a charge of unlawfully entering the house from which she was illegally taken.

His older brother Time Finai Muliipu, 26, was found not guilty on a charge of being a party to the kidnapping.

Sio Muliipu was remanded in continued custody for sentencing on December 21.