Although living mainly on the streets at the time of his death, Taylor had relatives who hailed from Tangoio, north of Napier.<\/p>\n
Arohaina stabbed to death<\/p>\n
After her mother died, Arohaina was brought up by another relative, Graham Mokaraka, who became her wh\u0101ngai father.<\/p>\n
In 2022, by then a mother of six, Arohaina was living in a sleepout on a Napier property where the main house was occupied by Taua and his partner.<\/p>\n
Taua, after a day of drinking and using methamphetamine and cannabis, confronted Arohaina in the sleepout in the early hours of November 18, 2022, because of a dispute in which he had asked her to move out.<\/p>\n
Arohaina had shoved Taua\u2019s partner during the disagreement earlier.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow dare you put your hands on my missus,\u201d Taua said to Henare as he swung a knife into her chest.<\/p>\n
He stabbed her even as she begged him to stop. <\/p>\n
Arohaina Henare’s photo from her funeral service memorial.<\/p>\n
After Arohaina dropped to the floor, bleeding and unconscious, neither Taua nor his partner dialled 111. Emergency services were called by friends of Henare, who came calling about 4.20am.<\/p>\n
She died at the scene.<\/p>\n
Bashed in the dock<\/p>\n
In September 2023, members of the Henare wh\u0101nau came to the Napier courthouse to attend a procedural hearing in Moses Taua\u2019s murder case.<\/p>\n
Mokaraka had not planned to be there. He went along to hand over some car keys to other family members gathered in the courtroom\u2019s public gallery.<\/p>\n
The family had been led to believe Taua would not be there in person, but would appear on an audio-visual link from prison.<\/p>\n
Instead, he stood in the dock immediately in front of the gallery where family members were seated.<\/p>\n
The half-hour hearing was nearly over and the lawyers and the judge were discussing Taua\u2019s background.<\/p>\n
When Mokaraka heard Taua described as partly a \u201cvictim of circumstances\u201d in terms of his own upbringing, he felt an overwhelming rage, the court was told later. <\/p>\n
He used the handle of a glass door in the barrier as a foothold and then scaled over the top, jumping down into the courtroom and moving towards the dock.<\/p>\n
A Corrections officer tried to stop him, in the process ripping Mokaraka\u2019s shirt from him, but the officer fell in a twisting motion, leaving him with a broken kneecap and other injuries.<\/p>\n
Police arrive to restore order at the Napier courthouse after Moses Taua was attacked in the dock in 2023. Photo \/ Ric Stevens<\/p>\n
Shirtless, Mokaraka began raining blows on to Taua.<\/p>\n
Trizarn Henare and his twin brother, Cylus, followed Mokaraka over the barrier, as did a fourth family member who has since died.<\/p>\n
They joined in attacking Taua as he tried to cower under a seat in the dock. <\/p>\n
The three surviving attackers all later pleaded guilty to assault with intent to injure. <\/p>\n
Mokaraka escaped a jail sentence after Judge Richard Earwaker said prison \u201cwould only extend the trauma inflicted on your family\u201d. He sentenced Mokaraka to 12 months of home detention.<\/p>\n
The twins, who were only 18 years old when they assaulted Taua and had no criminal record, were given 12 months of supervision and 150 hours of community work.<\/p>\n
Night on the town<\/p>\n
Trizarn Henare had completed his supervision sentence when he went out on the town with three others on the night of December 17 to 18, 2024.<\/p>\n
After drinking at a bar, the four got into a dispute with a man who was wearing a blue cap \u2013 which they took to be an indicator that he was associated with a particular gang. <\/p>\n
They subjected him to a prolonged assault, punching, kicking and stomping on him. <\/p>\n
That man was injured but survived. <\/p>\n
Police at the scene of Boy Taylor’s death in Emerson St, Napier. Photo \/ Doug Laing<\/p>\n
Two hours later, the four came across Boy Taylor, whom they subjected to similar treatment in an attack lasting more than two minutes, which was captured on nearby security cameras.<\/a> <\/p>\n Taylor did not survive. He died where he was beaten to the ground near an alcove where he had earlier been sheltering in Emerson St in the Napier CBD.<\/p>\n Four go on trial for Boy Taylor\u2019s death<\/p>\n Trizarn Henare, now 20, and the other three men \u2013 Takarangi Kumar, 19, Rua Hune, 34, and Tuarima Alexander, 22 \u2013 were all charged with murdering Taylor.<\/p>\n They all pleaded not guilty to murder but admitted manslaughter.<\/p>\n After a two-week trial, a jury found the murder charge proved against Henare and Kumar<\/a>, but not the other two. <\/p>\n The trial took place in the same courtroom where Trizarn Henare and his relatives had come over the barrier. He did not, however, occupy the same dock \u2013 the room has been remodelled in the meantime.<\/p>\n The murder trial jury did not know about what had happened in that room before. <\/p>\n