Police officers guilty of assaulting party-goers

Patrick Garty (L) and Wiremu Rakatau. Photos / Sarah Ivey

Two police officers have been found guilty of assaulting a group of party-goers after St Patrick's Day celebrations last year.

Constables Patrick Garty, 32, and Wiremu Bowers-Rakatau, 21, were found guilty by Judge Heather Simpson sitting without a jury in Auckland District Court this afternoon at the end of a five-day trial.

The prosecution said they carried out an unprovoked attack on a group of five students when they were off duty in downtown Auckland in March last year.

A third police officer - Chris Renata - is to stand trial separately for an assault charge relating to the same incident.

The prosecution said the officers were walking on High St in central Auckland, when they met a group of students who had been playing with a supermarket trolley left on the side of the road.

The three men confronted the students about the trolley.

They then followed them into the entrance of an apartment building and attacked two of the students.

Garty hit one student in the head and face, as Bowers-Rakatau kept the others at bay, kicking one of them in the knee, the prosecution said.

Lawyers for the defendants said they acted in self-defence after being attacked.

- NZPA