{"id":502484,"date":"2026-06-30T09:36:18","date_gmt":"2026-06-30T09:36:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/502484\/"},"modified":"2026-06-30T09:36:18","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T09:36:18","slug":"mongrel-mob-members-sentenced-for-making-false-statements-about-zain-taikato-foxs-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/502484\/","title":{"rendered":"Mongrel Mob members sentenced for making false statements about Zain Taikato Fox\u2019s death"},"content":{"rendered":"

Now, Beale and Nicholson have been sentenced in the Tauranga District Court<\/a>; the third man was sentenced for his role, and other charges, in another court earlier this year.<\/p>\n

In her victim impact statement, Fox\u2019s partner told Beale and Nicholson that Fox had trusted them.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe believed you would stand beside him … just as he would have done for each of you. Instead, you turned your backs on him, watching him suffer as his life slipped away.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said when he needed help most, the men \u201cchose silence\u201d and \u201cshowed cowardice instead of loyalty\u201d. <\/p>\n

She couldn\u2019t \u201cimagine the betrayal and fear he must have felt … \u201d and said their actions were \u201cweak, selfish, and shameful\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe betrayal and disloyalty you showed reveal the true depths of your character, and those choices will follow you for the rest of your life.\u201d<\/p>\n

A \u2018selfish\u2019 act of self-preservation<\/p>\n

Beale, Nicholson and the third man had been near the alleged gang confrontation in Maket\u016b<\/a> involving Fox, which will form the basis of a murder trial, set to take place in 2028, in which 12 people face charges.<\/p>\n

The charges Beale and Nicholson were sentenced on related to what happened after Fox suffered critical injuries.<\/p>\n

According to the Crown summary of facts<\/a>, the men had Fox lying injured in the back of a car as two groups made their way to Rotorua Hospital.<\/p>\n

They stopped at some point on the way and Beale, who police say is the captain of the Hawke\u2019s Bay Mongrel Mob MC chapter, told the others to \u201clie and say that Mr Taikato Fox had been hit by a car\u201d, and the others agreed.<\/p>\n

When they arrived at Rotorua Hospital, they stopped for a few minutes in a staff carpark, before continuing to the hospital\u2019s emergency entrance.<\/p>\n

Beale and the man whose name is suppressed went inside to get help.<\/p>\n

The summary noted that \u201cthe defendants were all aware that Mr Taikato Fox had died when they arrived at the hospital\u201d.<\/p>\n

Fox was pronounced dead shortly upon arrival, and police spoke to the defendants, all of whom provided written statements.<\/p>\n

\"ZainZain Matenga Taikato-Fox, 20, died at Rotorua Hospital from critical injuries after an alleged gang confrontation.<\/p>\n

Beale told police he had gone to Maket\u016b to \u201cdeal with some personal stuff between him and his friends\u201d, and, while heading back to Rotorua with Fox in his car, and others in convoy, they pulled over so the occupants \u201ccould urinate\u201d.<\/p>\n

He told police he heard a \u201cthudding\u201d noise and saw Fox lying in a ditch on the side of the road, and that he was \u201cpretty damaged and injured\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nicholson told police he had been driving in convoy, and saw the other vehicle had stopped, so he stopped too.<\/p>\n

He said he saw Fox \u201con the ground rolling around and moaning\u201d, and told police that Beale had told him Fox had been hit by a car.<\/p>\n

He said he helped get Fox into the back of his Nissan and took him to Rotorua Hospital.<\/p>\n

An \u2018unsophisticated\u2019 plan that \u2018slowed\u2019 police investigations<\/p>\n

Crown prosecutor Tobias Taane said it was accepted the attempt to pervert the course of justice wasn\u2019t \u201centirely sophisticated\u201d and likely a \u201cone-off decision\u201d, albeit they had stopped on the side of the road to come up with a plan.<\/p>\n

The key aggravating factor had been the fact that it occurred in the context of a murder investigation.<\/p>\n

Nicholson\u2019s lawyer, Matthew Dixon, said his client wanted Fox\u2019s family to know he \u201cwishes that he had done more that day\u201d.<\/p>\n

He said Nicholson had travelled to the tangihanga, staying in a motel in Rotorua with his partner and children, and attending the urup\u0101.<\/p>\n

However, Fox\u2019s wh\u0101nau indicated to the judge, through the police officer in charge of the case, that they hadn\u2019t seen Fox there.<\/p>\n

Beale\u2019s lawyer, Stephen Yee, acknowledged that \u201cwhat happened that day was obviously a horrible situation, and it is tragic, and that\u2019s accepted\u201d.<\/p>\n

The wh\u0101nau\u2019s \u201canger and grief\u201d was \u201centitled, justified, and recognised\u201d.<\/p>\n

Judge Greg Hollister-Jones questioned Yee about Beale\u2019s motivation to lie, saying that as captain of his chapter, he would have wanted to \u201cprotect the gang\u201d.<\/p>\n

But Yee said his actions had been about \u201cself-preservation\u201d and a concern over what questions they might be asked when turning up to the hospital with someone who had died.<\/p>\n

When it came to sentencing the men, Judge Hollister-Jones said there had been an element of premeditation, but it \u201cwas an unsophisticated plan and the falsity was not going to last long\u201d.<\/p>\n

An aggravating factor had been the \u201cseriousness of the underlying charge\u201d with the judge noting that with a murder investigation, \u201cpolice need the best evidence at the earliest stage\u201d.<\/p>\n

The men\u2019s plan \u201cslowed matters down\u201d and enabled those allegedly involved in the fatal assault to \u201cdig up the ground\u201d and \u201cbury some clothing\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cForensic analysis of clothing in these circumstances is critical. Anything that might detract from the quality of that evidence is serious,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

There was harm to the Fox\u2019s wh\u0101nau, and to the community when justice was perverted, and it was aggravating that the offending was gang-related.<\/p>\n

Nicholson was given a starting point of two years\u2019 and four months\u2019 imprisonment.<\/p>\n

He got a 22% discount for his guilty plea and 3% for remorse.<\/p>\n

That led to an end sentence of 21 months\u2019 imprisonment ,which was commuted to one of 10 months\u2019 and two weeks\u2019 home detention, with the judge acknowledging Nicholson wasn\u2019t \u201cthe architect\u201d of the plan, and had employment.<\/p>\n

Regarding Beale, the judge noted he had come up with the plan.<\/p>\n

He\u2019d \u201cexercised [his] leadership\u201d, as a captain, to involve other young people, and there had been a breach of trust because Fox had been taken to the alleged confrontation by Beale.<\/p>\n

The judge also thought Beale had, at least in part, been motivated to lie to protect the gang after Fox died.<\/p>\n

Judge Hollister-Jones adopted a higher starting point of two years and 10 months\u2019 imprisonment, applying a 5% discount for remorse and 22% discount for his guilty plea.<\/p>\n

This led to an end sentence of two years and one month\u2019s imprisonment, with the judge stating that even if he had reached an end sentence of two years or less, he would not have commuted it to home detention, given Beale\u2019s leadership role and the need for deterrence.<\/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":"Now, Beale and Nicholson have been sentenced in the Tauranga District Court; the third man was sentenced for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502485,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1443,634,16843,2082,81549,42,1446,4754,4281,4280,43,5161,5347,98141,40,38,41,39,1415],"class_list":["post-502484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-about","tag-death","tag-false","tag-for","tag-foxs","tag-headlines","tag-making","tag-members","tag-mob","tag-mongrel","tag-news","tag-sentenced","tag-statements","tag-taikato","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-zain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502484","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=502484"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502484\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/502485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=502484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=502484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=502484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}