Tupe caught in brutal killer's web

By PATRICK GOWER

Darnell Kere Tupe wept when he saw the RSA killings on the television news. He had gone to the club rooms to commit a robbery with William Bell, the psychopath who had bashed three people to death, then read about it in the Herald and kept the copy as a souvenir.

Tupe was the getaway driver, so frightened as Bell took his time inside that he drove off and left him there.

The 23-year-old was the police suspect who couldn't read and write and spilled the beans during six hours of video interview without a lawyer.

Tupe was the dupe who nearly went down for murder. Now he's a convict pleased to have been found guilty of manslaughter.

Right to the end of the trial, he put up with Bell's manipulations - a letter in Bell's handwriting with Tupe's forged signature on it was produced as "evidence" of an admission that Tupe's cousin Roy Smith was inside the Mt Wellington-Panmure RSA.

It was just another of Bell's lies to spread the blame of his horrific rampage last December that left Bill Absolum, Wayne Johnson and Mary Hobson dead and Susan Couch all but dead.

As lawyers Mark Edgar and Shane Tait visited Tupe in the cells after the jury verdict, Crown Solicitor Simon Moore told reporters that he thought Tupe's fate - he was found guilty of manslaughter, not murder, and acquitted of attempting to murder Susan Couch - was fair. And Tupe felt the same.

"He was not at all gutted that he still got manslaughter," said Mr Tait.

"He was basically fighting the murder. He is relieved the jury accepted his version of events and that Bell's bullshit didn't wash."

Mr Tait said although handwriting analysis was inconclusive, the signature looked nothing like Tupe's and, more simply, "Darnell can't read or write".

Bell and Tupe, former Mangere neighbours, have been enemies since they fought in the cells at their first court appearance. They have been kept in different prisons and travelled separately to and from court.

The Herald understands that police are aware of death threats Bell made to Tupe during the trial.

They involved Bell saying he has Mongrel Mob connections in Paremoremo prison and that when Tupe is taken there after their sentencing in February he (Bell) is going to have him stabbed.

As one of the two men accused of the RSA killings, Tupe has already had a difficult time in prison. He found a pubic hair in one of his meals; there was also talk of "hits" out on him by other prisoners.

"When other prisoners would see him they would say: 'Watch out, bro. Watch your back. You are f***ing dead," says Rowena Singh, the mother of his former girlfriend and one of only a few people who supported him at court.

Mrs Singh says the problem was solved when Tupe received a copy of Susan Couch's statement to police that showed it was Bell who went inside the RSA; a photocopy was circulated among the other prisoners and "the pressure went off".

Tupe has had other problems while inside. His partner, Hiketea Hukatai - Mrs Singh's daughter - has left him for his friend, Rangi Rore, a witness in the trial. Tupe found this out when he rang home from prison to be told by one of their two children, aged 7 and 4, that "Uncle Rangi has been staying lots".

The two men presented opposite appearances in court. The stocky Bell would smirk and chew gum; the skinny Tupe would stare blankly, showing no emotion.

They had met as children in Mangere but were reunited five months before the murders when Bell moved across the road after his release from a five-year prison sentence last year.

They shared a love of Holden cars. Tupe was a backyard mechanic whose lawn was covered in old wrecks.

He had learnt his own way around their engines, getting Ms Hukatai to read the manuals to him.

Like Bell, he had a troubled childhood, an absent father and at least eight siblings shared between both parents. His mother has since died, and Mrs Singh says in a unusual twist Tupe once found that one of his half-sisters had unknowingly ended up with his father and they had had children together.

Although Tupe would "spot dak" - use cannabis - in front of his kids, Mrs Singh says he was a devoted father. The family are now involved in a custody battle; Tupe wants Mrs Singh to have the children rather than her daughter.

Mrs Singh says Tupe was never violent but did have a problem with drinking, drugs and driving - "going roamies".

She says Tupe never knew what Bell was going to do on the morning of the killings, when they skidded out of his driveway after an all-night session of drink and drugs, saying they "were off to the shop".

Afterwards, Tupe had wanted to go to the police but Bell threatened him, saying: "What about your kids?"

So when Tupe and Bell met in the court cells that first day, it was the dupe who attacked the psychopath. Tupe wanted to "smash" Bell because he was taking him down, says Mrs Singh.

At another meeting, Bell said: "Don't kill yourself, eh bro."

"Why should I? You are the cold-blooded murderer," said Tupe.

To which Bell replied: "You don't have to yell it out."