Tekuru<\/a> carried her towards his home but let her go when she cried hysterically. She ran back to the centre.<\/p>\nJudge Bidois said the girl was in Tekuru\u2019s possession for about three to four minutes.<\/p>\n
\u2018Sick to my stomach\u2019: Impacts revealed<\/p>\n
The girl\u2019s parents cried when details of what happened were read in court.<\/p>\n
Her father was at times visibly upset, holding clothing around his head and putting his head between his knees.<\/p>\n
Before Judge Bidois entered the courtroom, words were exchanged in the public gallery between family members of the victim and the offender, prompting warnings from security officers.<\/p>\n
In a victim impact statement read to the court by Crown Solicitor Amanda Gordon, the girl\u2019s mother said the incident had left them living in fear for their safety.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt makes me sick to my stomach that this man had the motive and intentions to sexually harm my 3-year-old daughter.\u201d<\/p>\n
She said park trips were now short and they didn\u2019t go to big playgrounds any more. Public events were difficult for the family, given their ongoing fears of people.<\/p>\n
She said her daughter was getting counselling and suffers post-traumatic stress. She has nightmares and isn\u2019t able to sleep alone, often waking, talking about \u201cthe man who took her over the fence\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt has changed the way we live and see the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tekuru\u2019s lawyer, Scott Mills, said nothing he could say would take away from the fact that the incident was \u201cevery parent\u2019s worst nightmare\u201d.<\/p>\n
He said there were significant mental health issues and the case came close to an insanity plea.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis man is very, very ill and needs help. He has been receiving that help and receiving medication, and he is now back on his medication.\u201d<\/p>\n
The sentence<\/p>\n
Judge Bidois said Tekuru had used cannabis on the morning of the incident and noted his drug use exacerbated his mental health issues.<\/p>\n
Judge Bidois said the centre was supposed to be somewhere a child could enjoy themselves in a safe and secure environment.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo have someone climb over the fence and take their daughter away is nightmarish. Knowing what your intention was makes it even worse and compounds the fear and anxiety they have not only for the day but from now on wherever they go,\u201d he told Tekuru. <\/p>\n
He acknowledged Tekuru had a troubled background and had been put in care and protection services as a child.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople don\u2019t go into care and protection for a considerable time for no reason and, when they have been in care and protection, there is psychological damage that is done.\u201d<\/p>\n
Based on starting point suggestions from Gordon and Mills – which he described as low – he gave a prison sentence starting point of four years. <\/p>\n
He reduced the sentence by half, taking into account a mandatory 25% discount for Tekuru\u2019s guilty plea and other discounts totalling 25% for his young age, mental health issues, troubled upbringing and the fact he was a first-time offender.<\/p>\n
Judge Bidois said Tekuru lacked insight into his offending and his risk of reoffending was considered high.<\/p>\n
For that reason, he said strict conditions would be placed on him upon his release.<\/p>\n
These included six months of standard release conditions, and he must adhere to other special conditions set out in his probation report.<\/p>\n
Tekuru will also be automatically added to the Child Sex Offenders Register. This means he needs to report and constantly update personal details with police, including address, vehicle, and internet use.<\/p>\n
\u201cMake sure you take your medication, make sure you get the help that you need, Mr Tekuru, to avoid doing something like this again in the future. <\/p>\n
\u201cMy sympathies and condolences to the family because, as everyone acknowledges, this is a family\u2019s worst nightmare.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kelly Makiha<\/a> is a senior journalist who has reported for the Rotorua Daily Post for more than 25 years, covering mainly police, court, human interest and social issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It was revealed in court that Tekuru has a high risk of reoffending and suffers from schizophrenia. On…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248528,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[5195,85768,2082,123079,42,78,14641,43,17699,1327,144741,61,13835,40,38,41,39,1237,4518,1530],"class_list":{"0":"post-248527","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-be","9":"tag-daycare","10":"tag-for","11":"tag-freed","12":"tag-headlines","13":"tag-in","14":"tag-jailed","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-offender","17":"tag-rotorua","18":"tag-snatcher","19":"tag-to","20":"tag-toddler","21":"tag-top-news","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-topnews","24":"tag-topstories","25":"tag-two","26":"tag-weeks","27":"tag-years"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}