K-Cyn Nathan would visit neighbours on Lowe Street, Hastings, asking for food and cigarettes. Photo / Google Streetview
WARNING: This story includes details of a brutal attack and may be upsetting.
“You’re dead bitch.”
Those were the last words a woman heard before she lapsed into unconsciousness after a neighbour forced his way into her home and stabbed her 23 times with a screwdriver.
The woman survived, but one of the blows to her head and neck penetrated to the back of her throat and narrowly missed her jugular vein.
K-Cyn Jack Parezz Nathan, 22, attacked the woman after she turned down his request for a cigarette.
Two days earlier, he stabbed another neighbour with a knife after he also turned down a request for a smoke.
Nathan appeared for sentencing before Justice Peter Churchman in the High Court at Napier on Tuesday on charges of attempted murder and wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.
He had pleaded guilty to both charges at an earlier hearing after receiving a sentencing indication.
He was jailed for nine years with a minimum non-parole period of 4 1/2 years.
The court was told that Nathan had been using methamphetamine at the time of the attacks.
A Crown summary of facts said that Nathan moved into Lowe St in Camberley, Hastings, and would visit neighbours asking for food or cigarettes.
In August 2021, he went to a neighbour’s house asking for cigarettes, only to be told that he could not expect help all the time.
The neighbour said a lot of people in the street were saying the same thing.
On August 26, Nathan visited the same neighbour and when he opened the door asked, “You all good?”
When the neighbour answered “Yup”, Nathan suddenly stabbed him in his stomach with a 15cm knife, causing a wound two to three centimetres wide and five to six centimetres deep.
Two days later, he visited the other neighbour, this time carrying a screwdriver.
When the woman would not give him cigarettes, he punched her in the face, then forced his way into her house.
In the lounge, he stabbed her 13 times to the head and neck area, including the throat wound and under the right eye and to the left eyebrow.
He then stabbed her 10 times in the chest and limbs before kicking her in her throat and stomping on her face.
The woman tried to defend herself before slipping unconscious for about two hours.
“The last thing she remembers is the defendant stomping on her head and telling her, ‘You’re dead, bitch’,” the summary said.
The woman required emergency surgery for multiple stab wounds, a punctured lung, multiple fractures to the bones around both eyes, and a broken right thumb, which required temporary wire to repair.
She spent seven days in intensive care and still suffers from altered voice and speech because of the stab wound to her larynx.
When police spoke to Nathan, he said that he was angry that the first victim had not found him a job, and that the woman refused to give him a cigarette.
Both offences happened during a Covid level 4 lockdown, while Nathan was on bail.
The 19-year-old was found in a remote area in the hills of Upper Hutt.