Tauranga Hospital<\/a>.<\/p>\n![\"Taane]()
Taane was taken to Tauranga Hospital by ambulance.<\/p>\n
A surgeon cleaned out the wound with a piece of gauze, pulling it through the hole and out the other side to make sure there was no debris or barbs left inside.<\/p>\n
\u201cUsually there\u2019s like a pen-like barb still stuck in the skin,\u201d Taane said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I think the stingray was probably a really big one because it just punched a hole right through … So it\u2019s straight through and out again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Taane was stitched up and sent home late that night. <\/p>\n
![\"]()
Tauranga Crown prosecutor Tobias Taane was barbed by a stingray at Papamoa Beach over Waitangi weekend, keeping him off his feet and out of court for two months. <\/p>\n
While the surgeon suspected severed tendons, it only seemed to be affecting the small toe and wasn\u2019t a major cause for concern.<\/p>\n
But a week or so later, Taane\u2019s condition deteriorated. He was having very high fevers and becoming delirious as a full-body infection took hold.<\/p>\n
He was hospitalised immediately, \u201cgot slammed with antibiotics\u201d, and had surgery to clean the wound out.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey reattached my tendons, stitched it all up, discharged me at the end of the week, and then basically it was just wound care for the stitching.\u201d<\/p>\n
After about three weeks, the stitches were taken out. Taane said he soon noticed the wound was reopening, and the hole kept getting bigger.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, yeah, I\u2019ve just had this hole in my foot since, I guess, mid-February.\u201d<\/p>\n
He has a pump attached to it, which helps it to continue to drain.<\/p>\n
The PICO device that operates the suction has been clipped to the waistband of his suit pants this week, as Taane went back to the courtroom for a trial.<\/p>\n
He hasn\u2019t been in pain, and said it felt great to be back in court. <\/p>\n
\u201cI missed it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Taane, who is in his early 30s, trained as a lawyer after an earlier career as a blacksmith and foundryman.<\/p>\n
He\u2019d left that line of work after a serious injury, deciding the work was too dangerous.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had molten metal spray on my leg, just hit me on the side of the leg,\u201d he said, adding that it was the same leg as the foot that was barbed by the ray.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat completely burnt through and just cooked a huge chunk of leg.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause it was so hot, though, I didn\u2019t feel anything. It just burnt through my nerves.\u201d<\/p>\n
It had taken two surgeries, and about two years of recovery until he got feeling back in that part of his leg, and he wonders if that earlier damage had impacted the recovery from the stingray barb.<\/p>\n
After two months off work, Taane began working from home, but now, three months on, he is back in the office \u2013 where he has a stingray as his desktop screensaver.<\/p>\n
He plans to get a tattoo of a ray on his foot, once it\u2019s healed.<\/p>\n
\u2018When\u2019s the prosecution coming for the stingray?\u2019, jokes defence counsel<\/p>\n
During his time working from home, he\u2019d been able to appear in court remotely, and had received lots of support from colleagues.<\/p>\n
He had received an email from the executive judge for the Tauranga District Court, Judge Paul Geoghegan, wishing him well for his recovery, which had been \u201creally nice\u201d to receive.<\/p>\n
And he had appreciated the collegiality of the Tauranga legal community.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a couple of defence counsel text me, or e-mail me saying, \u2018God, I heard what happened\u2019, \u2018I hope you\u2019re all good\u2019, or \u2018when\u2019s the prosecution coming for the stingray?\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Taane\u2019s view, a \u201cwounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm\u201d charge against the ray could be justified, but he concedes there would be a strong case for self-defence.<\/p>\n
Clinton Duffy, Auckland Museum\u2019s curator of marine biology, said it certainly sounded like Taane had received a stingray wound.<\/p>\n
He noted that first aid for stingray wounds was to stop the bleeding, then pour water as hot as the patient can bear over the wound. <\/p>\n
This would \u201calmost instantly stop the pain, which can be debilitating and worsen shock, as well as help clean the wound\u201d.<\/p>\n
No one in New Zealand was \u201cactively tracking\u201d stingray incidents, as far as he was aware, and nor had he noticed an increase in reports.<\/p>\n
Duffy said there were three species of stingray in New Zealand waters \u2013 eagle rays, and short and longtail stingrays. <\/p>\n
Eagle rays were present in shallow water, particularly in harbours and estuaries year-round, while short-tail stingrays tended to be most abundant inshore during summer.<\/p>\n
Longtail stingrays were predominantly found offshore. <\/p>\n
All three species were most abundant around the upper North Island, and it was possible rising sea surface temperatures meant they were becoming more prevalent around the South Island.<\/p>\n
Stingrays were not an aggressive species and \u201conly sting people in self-defence, generally when they are stood on\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cStingrays can be present almost anywhere,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cKeep an eye out for them when entering the water. Avoid diving over or stepping on objects that look like a smooth, dark rock. It could be the back of a stingray that is partially covered with sand,\u201d Duffy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cShuffle your feet when getting into the water to give stingrays a chance to get out of your way before you step on them. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen removing hooks from stingrays, flick them on to their back so they can\u2019t sting you, or get someone to hold the tail with a towel.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hannah Bartlett is a Tauranga-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She previously covered court and local government for the Nelson Mail, and before that was a radio reporter at Newstalk ZB.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI thought I had been bitten by something,\u201d he told NZME. His first thought was some kind of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":419858,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[74,1975,215648,7972,83935,111,43,139,69,23282,176430,1881,203351,215647,179910],"class_list":["post-419857","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-after","tag-at","tag-barb","tag-beach","tag-monthslong","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-ppmoa","tag-prosecutor","tag-recovery","tag-stingray","tag-taanes","tag-tobias"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419857","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=419857"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419857\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/419858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=419857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=419857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=419857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}