Auckland Light Rail gets officially scrapped, a look at how well new strangulation laws are working in New Zealand and taps run dry as water restrictions loom in Wellington in the latest NZ Herald headlines.
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WARNING: This story details graphic family violence and may be upsetting.
The horrific crime of strangulation, fuelled by one person’s need to psychologically and physically control their victim, was commonly reported in the abuse histories of family harm murder victims. The introduction of a new law, a specific strangulation offence, was designed to highlight the fatal risks involved, facilitate a more effective criminal justice response, and highlight incidents of strangulation on the offender’s criminal record. Open Justice reporter Natalie Akoorie looks into whether the new law has made any difference five years on.
Reese Warwood was a bottle of Johnnie Walker deep when he lashed out at his pregnant girlfriend, grabbing her by a necklace she was wearing and twisting it around her throat until she couldn’t breathe.
The young mum-to-be gasped for air as Warwood choked her for 10 seconds. She felt dizzy as she began to pass out.
Warwood let go of the necklace and punched his partner in the face, knocking her down.
He punched her again, and again, and again – nine times in total.
At least three of the punches were with his full force, the woman would later tell the court in a victim impact statement.
“Disgracefully, you were on bail for assaulting her when you committed these offences,” Judge Brett Crowley told Warwood at his sentencing in the Hamilton District Court in October.
The 32-year-old pleaded guilty to impeding breathing/blood circulation, injuring with intent to injure/reckless disregard, threatening behaviour, two representative charges of assault on a person in a family relationship, and driving with excess blood alcohol.
Warwood had assaulted the woman five previous times and Judge Crowley called the man with the word “Honesty” tattooed on the side of his head a “repetitive domestic abuser”.
He is one of 6453 charged with impeding breathing since a new law was introduced five years ago.
The majority of perpetrators were men but less than half were convicted, though the majority of those convicted were jailed (807), or given home detention (551).
Strangulation was brought in as a standalone offence in December 2018 because victims of strangulation were more likely to go on to be killed by their partners.
Proponents believe the law will have a positive impact on reducing the crime by increasing reporting, prosecutions and wrap-around services for victims, though it’s still too early to know whether it is reducing murders.
A strangulation not unlike all the others
The Court heard Warwood was remorseful for his actions on December 27, 2022 when, after drinking a litre of spirits, he “inevitably” became angry with his partner, signalling her to go outside.
After being beaten and choked, the woman told police she felt stupid for letting Warwood back into her life to repeat his cycle of violence.
Judge Crowley listed the assaults in blunt detail.
“You shoved her, pushed her, punched her, kicked her. You told her you would kill her and her family, and her pet.
But Judge Crowley was alarmed by the woman’s acceptance that she played a role in her own assault.
“[She] is saying your daughter is missing out on you because of what you both have done, as if she is in some way to blame for this when all she did was get hit and choked and shoved and punched by you.
“It really concerns me that she takes on some blame for this.”
As Warwood’s mother sat quietly in the back of the court, a large bone carving tied around her neck, Judge Crowley noted a cultural report into her son’s background that detailed a troubled upbringing marred by a violent father.
A pre-sentence report gave insight into Warwood’s attitude toward his crime and Judge Crowley commented that it concerned him “as much as anything I have read recently”.
He said it read like an offender who would soon end up back before the courts on similar charges.
“They don’t accept they did it. Don’t accept it was that serious. Minimise what they did. And blame something else.
“Your view is it’s all the alcohol and drugs [methamphetamine] and you’re not really a violent person.”
However, the judge’s condemnation of Warwood was sobering: “You have a problem with being violent to women”.
“You get drunk and hit women. That’s what you do. You’re sitting there because you are violent.”
The violence, especially strangulation, was about the domination and control of women, and Warwood had form for it – he had previous convictions for assaulting women.
As for Warwood’s childhood, Judge Crowley warned he was setting his children up for the same fate as himself.
“You’re the proof of that. You’re sitting where your father sat. Your children would sit there too. I don’t know why you would want to consign them to that.
“I accept you weren’t shown the right way when you were brought up.”
Judge Crowley said strangulation was “almost always” a starting point for men who killed their female partners.
A strangulation, or impedes breathing conviction, comes with a maximum penalty of seven years imprisonment.
The reason for a standalone law
The introduction of the strangulation law in December 2018 followed a 2016 New Zealand Law Commission report that found 71 per cent of homicide victims in a domestic violence setting had been strangled previously in the relationship, and that victims of strangulation were more likely to be killed by their partners later.
Victims of family violence who had been strangled had seven times the risk of going on to be killed, the Law Commission report said.
Other risks from strangulation included losing consciousness within seconds and brain death within 4-5 minutes. There was also evidence of cardiac arrest, delayed stroke and miscarriages.
It also had a serious impact on victims’ psychological and emotional wellbeing with some cases ending in suicide.
“This psychological impact is what makes strangulation a ‘uniquely effective form of intimidation, coercion and control’,” the Law Commission said.
The point was conveyed in a Northern Irish Court of Appeal case by Lord Justice Ben Stephens.
“Strangulation is an effective and cruel way of asserting dominance and control over a person through the terrifying experience of being starved of oxygen and the very close personal contact with the victim who is rendered helpless at the mercy of the offender.
“The intention of the offender may be to create a shared understanding that death, should the offender so choose, is only seconds away. The act of strangulation symbolises an abuser’s power and control over the victim, most of whom are female.”
The Law Commission noted an abuser who strangled a victim might not be intending to kill, “but was demonstrating that he can kill”.
According to one overseas study, more than a third of strangulation victims thought they were going to die.
Since strangulation became a standalone offence in the Crimes Act, there had been 6453 strangulation/suffocation offences that resulted in court action, to September 2023.
The most in a single year was 1501 in 2019, according to police statistics, and the police district with the highest rate was Counties Manukau [983], followed by Canterbury [693] and Bay of Plenty [631].
According to Ministry of Justice statistics, 98 per cent of convicted offenders of strangulation were men, with the highest number of those charged or convicted aged between 25 and 29.
More Māori than European were charged and convicted, with the largest difference in 2019 when 59 per cent of convictions were Māori offenders compared to 37 per cent European offenders.
But of the 4353 charged over the five years [less than the 6453 noted by police], less than half were convicted. Only 40 of them were women.
Is the law working?
Shine senior adviser Rachel Kain said that in Auckland alone, a victim of strangulation was referred to its service every day.
“One thing that the law change has done is it’s really helped to highlight and identify the scale of strangulation and just how common it is because now we’re asking about it and now we’re better equipped and trained to identify it.”
Kain said strangulation included a hand on the throat and an arm around the neck.
She said the physical effects were as dangerous as the psychological impact.
“What we’re just starting to scratch the surface with is what is the ongoing damage to the brain.
“Family violence is a significant cause of brain injuries in New Zealand through strangulation and assault to the head.”
Shine senior adviser Rachel Kain says strangulation is an act of control. Shine supports victims of family violence. Photo / Supplied
One victim who reported multiple strangulations during pregnancies suffered ongoing cognitive impairment, Kain said. The harm to the babies was unknown.
Kain said the law was having a positive impact which was why there was now work underway to make stalking a standalone offence.
Detective Senior Sergeant Karen Simmons, of the Christchurch Police family protection team, said the creation of the law meant strangulation was now an obvious crime for frontline police, who previously had to slot it under charges such as male assaults female.
For that reason alone, the law was effective, Simmons said.
“The law has brought strangulation to the forefront of my colleagues who attend family harm events. It’s made it very clear.”
Like the courts, police took strangulation “very seriously,” Simmons said, because it was so high risk.
While there had been a lot of learning about strangulation as a crime, not just by police, but other agencies such as women’s advocates, it was too soon to know the full impact the law was having, Simmons said.
That was because family violence was very complex, tied to poverty, alcohol and drug addiction, and other root causes.
Strangulation was probably still under-reported and even after a complaint to police a victim might change their mind and request charges be dropped.
That was because relationships and emotions were at play, children were often involved, victims sometimes blamed themselves, did not want to raise a child alone, or had seen their mothers strangled and thought they could manage the risk.
“They don’t even understand themselves the risk they are under, or they would rather live with that risk than be alone.
“If the evidence is there, we would be very reluctant to withdraw any charges, but if we’re relying solely on the victim as the evidence then sometimes we struggle.”
Simmons said coercive control was at the core of strangulation but whether it should also be a standalone offence was up to the Government. However, she said, police would take any tool they could to stamp out family harm.
In June 2019, Shramka choked his ex-girlfriend on her bed until she almost passed out. When she broke free by kicking out at him and rolling away, he punched her hard in the back of the head.
When she reached for her phone on the floor to call 111, he punched her in the face.
Shramka, who was previously charged with male assaults female, complained to the Court of Appeal that the 27 months’ jail he was sentenced to was “manifestly excessive”. However, the three judges disagreed, dismissing the appeal and publishing guidelines for sentencing judges in future.
A list of eight aggravating factors to be taken into account included premeditation; a history of strangulation or very serious domestic violence; vulnerability of the victim; home invasion or breach of a protection order; aggravated violence or repeated or extended strangulation, in particular where the victim loses consciousness; threatening to kill; enduring harm – physical or psychological; and harm to “associated persons”, particularly in the presence of children.
The judgment, written by Justice Sir Stephen Kós, found Shramka’s offending moderately serious and involved four of the eight aggravating factors: his victim’s vulnerability, a breach of protection order, aggravated violence, and enduring psychological harm to the victim.
Reese Warwood was sentenced to jail at the Hamilton District Court for strangulation and other violence charges against his partner but set free for time served. Photo / Christine Cornege
In Warwood’s case, he told the court through his lawyer Rob Quin he wanted to address his anger and violence.
He had been accepted into a rehabilitation centre for drugs and alcohol when a bed became available.
The judge started with a prison sentence of 33 months.
Warwood faced increases for aggravating features including the fact he was on bail for assaulting his partner previously when the drunken attack took place, meaning he was already under warning from the court.
Another increase was applied for the earlier assault convictions.
Warwood pleaded guilty to the charges late in the court process, but the judge acknowledged this spared his victim the trauma of a trial and having to give evidence, and for this Warwood was given a discount.
He was also given credit for remorse and facing up to his victim and their families, which Judge Crowley acknowledged was “not easy to do”, and for his own childhood trauma.
His final sentence of 18 months on all charges then factored in time already served, with Warwood having been behind bars on remand for 10 months.
Because he had served more than half the sentence, Warwood was freed from custody that afternoon.
The conditions of his release included that Warwood not drink alcohol or take drugs, submit to alcohol and drug testing, undertake drug and alcohol counselling, and not associate with the victim without approval from his probation officer.
Before Warwood exited the dock Judge Crowley warned him to refrain from violence, unless he wanted to spend much of his life in jail.
As Warwood walked out, he politely thanked the judge.
Outside court his family, including two babies, waited to greet the man who, when he wasn’t drunk, was a good person.
Natalie Akoorie is a senior reporter based in Waikato and covering crime and justice nationally. Natalie first joined the Herald in 2011 and has been a journalist in New Zealand and overseas for 28 years, more recently covering health, social issues, local government, and the regions.
