Prisoners guilty of attempted murder

File photo / Greg Bowker

Two prisoners have been found guilty of attempting to murder a fellow inmate in his cell at Hawke's Bay Regional Prison.

Tiaki Lance Erueti Phillips, 23, had denied putting a teenager in a headlock and trying to choke him, while Harley Vance Collier, 25, denied slitting the victim's throat with a blade from a disposable razor.

After a three-day trial in the High Court at Wellington this week, the jury of six men and six women took four hours - including their lunch break - to reach a unanimous decision against both men at mid-afternoon today.

Justice Alan Mackenzie remanded the pair in custody for sentencing on November 26. He called for pre-sentence reports to be obtained.

Crown prosecutor Russell Collins said both men had been charged with attempted murder because they were "acting in concert".

On Monday, Ahmed Najim, now 19, told the court he lost consciousness when one man tried to throttle him. He came to on the floor of his cell to find "someone standing on top of me and just slashing me".

When the pair fled he stood up and discovered blood pumping out of his neck.

In a panic he took off his jersey and wrapped it around the two large gaping wounds to try and stem the bleeding. Help arrived when he pushed an emergency alarm.

Najim had just been moved to the same Hawke's Bay prison block as the two accused on the morning of October 27 last year.

He was sitting in his cell, head bowed, when he saw the intruders out of the corner of his eye, Mr Najim said in evidence, his voice hoarse and visible scars around his neck.

From behind a screen blocking his view of the accused and theirs of him, he told the court that he had been able to identify them by their extensive and distinctive Mongrel Mob facial tattoos.

The jury was given only two possible motives for the attack; a good friend of Mr Najim had had sex with Phillips' partner, or an unexplained incident involving another prisoner about a week earlier.

Defence lawyers Russell Fairbrother (for Collier) and Tony Snell (representing Phillips) said closed circuit television footage recorded in the prison could have proved beyond doubt who slit Mr Najim's throat and exonerated their clients.

However, human error and/or technical failures meant the court did not have access to the footage.

The best evidence had not been revealed to the jury, Mr Fairbrother said.

Mr Collins, summing up for the prosecution, described the attack as "brutal, brazen and ill thought out".

He said the evidence of attempted murder was overwhelming and the attackers had not expected Mr Najim to get up afterward and be able to identify them.

Commonsense "would tell you" the attack would be personal, he said.

- NZPA