Whang\u0101rei District Court, <\/a>Shannon Tana\u2019s lawyer Adam Pell criticised the charges and the length of time to resolution.<\/p>\n\u201cHome invasion? They didn\u2019t even enter the home. They\u2019re outside on the property,\u201d Pell submitted.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe purpose of the home invasion, as your Honour knows well, is for that kicking in the door and beating the living daylights out of somebody in their home, in their sanctuary, in their area of comfort. Not in the environment of the front of the bach.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pell said he had requested Murphy Tana\u2019s medical evidence for 18 months, which he said was \u201cdumped on us\u201d in the middle of trial one, forcing a mistrial.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we have here sir, is a burgeoning and a conflation of issues which ultimately all dovetail into the ultimate tragic loss of Mr Murphy Tana\u2019s leg,\u201d Pell said.<\/p>\n
Pell said Murphy Tana was warned multiple times by medical professionals that if \u201che keeps it up, he will lose it\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s ultimately what\u2019s happened there,\u201d Pell said.<\/p>\n
![\"Judge]()
Judge John McDonald said the Crown had over-charged. Photo \/ NZME<\/p>\n
Pell reserved some of his strongest criticism for the pre\u2011sentence report, describing it as \u201cabsolute nonsense\u201d for labelling the pair \u201cextremely serious offenders\u201d and fixating on the amputation.<\/p>\n
He said the defence had been trying to negotiate with the Crown for three and a half years, all while Shannon Tana complied with electronic monitored (EM) bail.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey also mention total non-compliance, firearms, police warrants, PSOs [police safety orders] being issued, knives and bats being brandished. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhere\u2019s the breach of EM bail?\u201d Pell questioned the court.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the police are called out and PSOs and knives and bats being brandished, why was he left on EM bail for the rest of the period?\u201d<\/p>\n
Prosecutors insisted the agreed summary of facts should guide sentencing, and said the car was intentionally used as a weapon, contributing to the eventual loss of Murphy Tana\u2019s leg.<\/p>\n
Charges were \u2018too numerous, too serious\u2019<\/p>\n
Crown lawyer Alex Goodwin sought a starting point of four years\u2019 imprisonment and said the amputation, family upheaval, and financial losses were significant aggravating factors.<\/p>\n
Judge McDonald pushed back on the Crown\u2019s version of events, saying the charges laid were \u201ctoo numerous and too serious\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve indicated to your lawyers, and back through the interview, that I thought the charges offered by the Crown, which they sought to put to the jury on, were over-charging and they\u2019ve taken every little crime that you\u2019ve committed and put them into charges,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s entirely a matter for the Crown solicitor and I make no further comment on it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Judge McDonald said he did not agree the summary of facts reflected what he heard at trial.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy memory of this was quite clear, that this was not as serious as what the Crown first made out to be,\u201d Judge McDonald said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not sentencing them to prison because that\u2019s unfair. What sort of justice system is that?\u201d<\/p>\n
Judge McDonald accepted that since the offending occurred, both men had turned their lives around.<\/p>\n
Shannon Tana was sentenced to eight months\u2019 home detention and Jack Tana to six months.<\/p>\n
Shannon Pitman is a Whang\u0101rei-based reporter for Open Justice covering courts in the Te Tai Tokerau region. She is of Ng\u0101puhi\/ Ng\u0101ti P\u016bkenga descent and has worked in digital media for the past five years. She joined NZME in 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s a fact defence lawyers used as a mitigating factor in trial and sentencing after Jack and Shannon…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":536602,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[95,17704,1121,10808,2082,78,22259,3958,30616,3605,111,43,139,69,12468,162419,19993,175753],"class_list":["post-536601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-and","tag-assault","tag-case","tag-crown","tag-for","tag-in","tag-jack","tag-judge","tag-kaikohe","tag-men","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-overcharging","tag-shannon","tag-slams","tag-tana"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536601","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=536601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536601\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/536602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=536601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=536601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=536601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}