New Zealand Case Law: Decisions & Judgments | LexChat

New Zealand Case Law

Conspiracy to defeat justice

  • 1 Aug 2019

    R v WALKER [2019] NZHC 1906

    Citation
    [2019] NZHC 1906
    Court
    High Court

    The appropriate starting point for the combined offending was nine years' imprisonment (broken down as five years for manslaughter, three years for kidnapping and one year for conspiracy/mistreating remains); this was uplifted by six months for prior serious violent offending to 9 years 6 months; a 25% reduction was applied for early guilty pleas, producing an effective sentence of seven years' imprisonment; concurrent sentences were ordered so the manslaughter term controlled the overall sentence because the offences arose from the same course of conduct and the manslaughter was aggravated b…

  • 1 Aug 2019

    R v WICKENS [2019] NZHC 1894

    Citation
    [2019] NZHC 1894
    Court
    High Court

    The court adopted a kidnapping starting point of two years three months (27 months), uplifted by 12 months because of the defendant's substantial involvement in the conspiracy to defeat justice to reach a combined starting point of three years three months (39 months), rejected credit for remorse, allowed full 25% discount for early guilty pleas, resulting in an end sentence of two years five months' imprisonment (29 months) on the kidnapping charge and a concurrent one year on the conspiracy charge, with the effective sentence being two years five months' imprisonment.