Her defence argues that she was framed for the arson by her now former partner, who hit her hours before the fire, cut off his ankle monitor and fled the property.
A spare phone
Earlier this week, the jury heard voice messages that the Crown claimed were sent by Williams moments before Anthony Buckton’s makeshift workshop erupted into flames.
“How about come get your f***in’ mutt before [it] f***ing just dies,” one of the messages said.
“All your shit’s already f***in’ burned so don’t so don’t even bother trying to get it,” said another.
Yesterday, Williams’ lawyer Vernon Tava suggested Pawa had access to his client’s social media and that Pawa had sent the voice messages herself.
Williams and Buckton were living in a caravan on a South Auckland property Pawa had rented from Kāinga Ora for about 20 years.
Pawa said she had two phones at the time of the fire, and the spare one in a purple case she often lent to Williams.
Williams did not own a phone at the time.
After she watched the workshop explode from her back step, she fought with a fleeing Williams before the accused woman escaped, Pawa said.
It was some time after that that Pawa went into the couple’s caravan to look for her purple phone, which she said she had found.
Tava accused Pawa of accessing Williams’ social media from the phone and using it to send the messages.
“I didn’t,” Pawa replied. “I would not have done that. I would swear on my granddaughter’s life, I would not do that.”
Tava showed Pawa a photo of the phone taken by police the day after the fire, which pictured voice messages sent from the phone to “Ants” – Buckton’s social media account.
It also showed that the “Ants” account was blocked on the phone.
“[Williams] obviously would have blocked him then,” Pawa said.
But during questioning, she said she was confused about social media, texting, who sent what message, and what Tava was asking her.
Tava asked if it was Pawa who had blocked “Ants” instead.
“No, I never block my children from my phone,” Pawa replied.
Tawa pressed: “You used that phone to send messages that looked like it was coming from [Williams].”
Pawa responded: “No, why would I have done that?”
A ‘rich collection’ of verbal ‘abuse’
Pawa said the threatening voice messages allegedly sent by Williams before the fire were typical of toxic verbal “abuse” between the couple.
She said their issues had been going on all week.
Tava asked then if Buckton had a “rich collection to choose from” in terms of incriminating messages from Williams.
Judge Nick Webby stopped Tava from continuing that line of questioning.
Tava and Pawa went over the young couple’s argument on the day of the fire, which had resulted in Buckton punching his partner in the face, cutting off his ankle bracelet and leaving the address.
Tava suggested Pawa was angry at Williams over her son breaching his 24-hour curfew.
Pawa said she was angry at them both.
Voice messages between Anthony Buckton and his mum, and between arson-accused Laura Williams and Buckton, have been played at the trial. Photo / 123rf
Another spare phone
The court heard a voice message from Buckton to his mother sent at 10pm, two hours before the fire.
In the message, Buckton tells his mother to “bear in mind” that there is a spare smartphone in the house.
Pawa said this was because she was not sure until after the fire if Williams had taken her purple phone with her.
Tava then pointed out what he said were inconsistencies in Pawa’s story.
Pawa said that after the domestic incident, she had gone to confront her son and was not in the house when Williams had called the police.
She also said they didn’t have a landline in 2022, or since.
But Tava played the 111 call where Pawa’s voice could be heard in the background.
He read out the 09 number the emergency call came from, and Pawa recognised it as her old landline.
Pawa had told police in a statement just hours after the fire that she had found an empty petrol can, which the Crown says is what Williams used to start the fire.
It is also Pawa’s version of events that she and Williams got into a scuffle when she spotted the woman walking away from the fire.
“You made up the fight,” Tava asked.
“No,” Pawa replied.
“You made up petrol being used to start [the fire],” the lawyer continued, which Pawa again denied.
Tava put it to the witness that the workshop was “just a fire waiting to happen”.
“For me, it was pretty safe,” Pawa answered.
‘I don’t want you to go to jail’
Then it was Crown prosecutor Kim McCoy’s turn to ask some follow-up questions.
He asked if Pawa ever sent a message impersonating Williams.
“No, I wouldn’t like it being done to me, so I wouldn’t do it to anybody else,” Pawa responded.
McCoy also pointed Pawa to the defence’s schedule, to messages she had sent her son after he had run away, but hours before the fire.
“She pissed and a sleep .. just tryed to wake her up,” a message just after 9pm said.
Pawa reported this was when she had gone and checked on Williams that evening and found her asleep in the caravan next to an empty bottle of vodka.
A message directly after that showed Pawa trying to get her son to come home and turn himself in to the police.
“Come home have show she doesn’t need to no your here and eat.. then go into cops … pls Anthony.. I don’t want you to go jail…,” the message read.
Pawa explained she was trying to get her son to come home while Williams was asleep.
“She wouldn’t have to know,” Pawa explained to McCoy.
The trial continues.
Ella Scott-Fleming has been a journalist for three years and previously worked at the Otago Daily Times, Gore Ensign and Metro Magazine. She has an interest in court and general reporting. She’s currently based in Auckland, covering justice-related stories.