{"id":568017,"date":"2026-08-13T17:48:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T17:48:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/568017\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T17:48:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T17:48:11","slug":"rotorua-judge-aborts-trial-of-moetu-kaitai-for-murder-of-kelvin-kana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/568017\/","title":{"rendered":"Rotorua judge aborts trial of Moetu Kaitai for murder of Kelvin Kana"},"content":{"rendered":"

The case is due to be recalled in court tomorrow, when a new trial date would be scheduled.<\/p>\n

Kana died on May 10, 2020, in Tokoroa. He had been with two other men in a garage at the rear of a friend\u2019s house on Moa St, where they often played darts and hung out.<\/p>\n

It was the Crown\u2019s case<\/a> that Kaitai arrived concealing a shotgun. <\/p>\n

She had an argument with Kana and presented the gun, loaded it with ammunition she had with her, then pointed it at Kana.<\/p>\n

There was a struggle before Kaitai shot Kana, the Crown said.<\/p>\n

\" Justice Layne Harvey. Photo \/ Kelly Makiha<\/p>\n

The Crown said in its opening address that Kana dropped to his knees with a bullet lodged in his torso and his last words were, \u201cOh Ava\u201d – a name Kaitai was known by.<\/p>\n

It was Kaitai\u2019s defence that she never intended to shoot or kill Kana \u2013 that she wanted him to \u201cget back\u201d, but he didn\u2019t, and her actions were in self-defence.<\/p>\n

A jury of six men and six women was selected to hear what was supposed to be a three-week trial.<\/p>\n

The Crown\u2019s case was led by Anna McConachy and Laurie McMaster while Tiana Epati, KC, and Matthew Jenkins represented Kaitai.<\/p>\n

Kelly Makiha<\/a> is a senior journalist who has reported for the Rotorua Daily Post for more than 25 years, covering mainly police, court, human interest and social issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The case is due to be recalled in court tomorrow, when a new trial date would be scheduled.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":568018,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[15027,2082,3958,275348,275349,82010,275347,4275,111,43,139,69,1118,1327,54],"class_list":["post-568017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-aborts","tag-for","tag-judge","tag-kaitai","tag-kana","tag-kelvin","tag-moetu","tag-murder","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-rotorua","tag-trial"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568017","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=568017"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568017\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/568018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=568017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=568017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=568017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}