{"id":516925,"date":"2026-07-09T03:32:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T03:32:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/516925\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T03:32:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T03:32:12","slug":"homeless-man-jason-mccutcheon-sentenced-for-threatening-to-kill-service-station-worker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/516925\/","title":{"rendered":"Homeless man Jason McCutcheon sentenced for threatening to kill service station worker"},"content":{"rendered":"

Judge Tony Snell said McCutcheon\u2019s offending occurred against a backdrop of recognised mental health issues<\/a> and a range of difficulties, including homelessness.<\/p>\n

However, he said McCutcheon\u2019s behaviour was affecting people and their wellbeing.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a multitude of ways, he is harming the community and I need to give some security to the community, or the court can try dealing with him holistically and keep him in the community,\u201d Judge Snell said.<\/p>\n

The most serious and lead charge on which McCutcheon was sentenced to 150 hours\u2019 community work was threatening to kill the service station worker.<\/p>\n

The court heard McCutcheon had previously been sentenced to supervision for disorderly behaviour and, as a condition of that sentence, was required to stay out of Nelson\u2019s CBD.<\/p>\n

Threat to kill service station worker<\/p>\n

McCutcheon had been begging outside a petrol station but went inside to purchase items one night.<\/p>\n

He threatened violence towards the attendant, who was working alone.<\/p>\n

After McCutcheon left, the worker locked the station\u2019s doors and barricaded themselves inside.<\/p>\n

\"AA condition of an earlier sentence of supervision for disorderly behaviour included that Jason McCutcheon keep out of the Nelson CBD. Photo \/ Oliver Weber<\/p>\n

The two charges of using a credit card for a pecuniary advantage followed his purchase of items, including tobacco, with contactless payment cards people had dropped, and which McCutcheon had picked up.<\/p>\n

Another incident involved McCutcheon urinating against the back door of business premises.<\/p>\n

A woman leaving through the door was splashed with urine when she opened it.<\/p>\n

Judge Snell described the incident as a \u201csad episode\u201d, noting it happened a short distance from a public toilet block.<\/p>\n

He said McCutcheon\u2019s latest offending added to 23 previous convictions, including for dishonesty, offensive behaviour and speaking threateningly.<\/p>\n

A probation officer told the court that despite being homeless and \u201cnot wanting to accept help with housing\u201d, McCutcheon had a positive history of reporting to Corrections on time, \u201csometimes earlier and more often than required\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nelson\u2019s homeless community \u2018friendlier than others\u2019<\/p>\n

Judge Snell said the homeless community<\/a> in Nelson tended to be \u201cmuch more friendly and less aggressive\u201d than in other areas of the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll communities have their Mr McCutcheons,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

McCutcheon\u2019s lawyer, Josh Friend, said his client had recognised mental health disorders but engaged positively with Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora<\/a> M\u0101ori mental health services.<\/p>\n

Friend said much of the offending reflected a tendency to be \u201cloose lipped\u201d when people asked him to move on from areas around the city where he chose to spend time.<\/p>\n

Judge Snell said he \u201cmight be loose with his mouth\u201d but his comments were taken seriously by others. <\/p>\n

He said McCutcheon needed to know he was \u201cmaking a real nuisance of himself\u201d and that he had good support available and was compliant to some degree but \u201conly when it suited him\u201d.<\/p>\n

The judge said that sooner or later, the only option would be to lock him up.<\/p>\n

From a starting point of 180 hours\u2019 community work on the threatening charge, Judge Snell reduced the sentence by 30 hours to reflect McCutcheon\u2019s guilty pleas.<\/p>\n

He was also sentenced to 50 hours on the intimidation charges, to be served concurrently.<\/p>\n

On the charge of urinating in a public place, he was convicted and discharged.<\/p>\n

Tracy Neal is a Nelson-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She was previously RNZ\u2019s regional reporter in Nelson-Marlborough and has covered general news, including court and local government for the Nelson Mail.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Judge Tony Snell said McCutcheon\u2019s offending occurred against a backdrop of recognised mental health issues and a range…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":516926,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[74,168550,114230,124706,2082,681,2944,29116,14910,2736,5158,256693,111,43,139,69,9061,14727,22126,5161,2552,13655,27051,18937,12419,61,12767],"class_list":["post-516925","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-after","tag-attendant","tag-barricaded","tag-begged","tag-for","tag-homeless","tag-inside","tag-jason","tag-kill","tag-lone","tag-man","tag-mccutcheon","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-often","tag-outside","tag-petrol","tag-sentenced","tag-service","tag-station","tag-themselves","tag-threatened","tag-threatening","tag-to","tag-worker"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516925","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=516925"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516925\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/516926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=516925"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=516925"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=516925"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}