{"id":57721,"date":"2025-10-03T05:49:06","date_gmt":"2025-10-03T05:49:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/57721\/"},"modified":"2025-10-03T05:49:06","modified_gmt":"2025-10-03T05:49:06","slug":"blade-herbert-sentenced-over-whangarei-drug-deal-gone-wrong-that-led-to-kidnapping","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/57721\/","title":{"rendered":"Blade Herbert sentenced over Whang\u0101rei \u2018drug deal gone wrong\u2019 that led to kidnapping"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dressed in black clothes and wearing a glove, Herbert began yelling at two victims in the lounge.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere is the money? Where is the money?\u201d he asked, insisting the victims owed him $7000.<\/p>\n

Herbert picked up an axe from within the lounge and began swinging it while threatening to \u201csmash their heads\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"BladeBlade Herbert’s vehicle was stopped at a police checkpoint on Riverside Drive, Whang\u0101rei. Photo \/ Tania Whyte<\/p>\n

He told them there was a man outside with a gun before roundhouse kicking one of the victims in the chest after they stood up from the couch. <\/p>\n

Herbert then went into a bedroom where a third victim was asleep and woke him up.<\/p>\n

He stood over him with the axe, leading to the victim handing over $100.<\/p>\n

The three victims<\/a> were detained in the house for about 90 minutes.<\/p>\n

One young woman attempted to take her phone with her to the bathroom, but Herbert threatened violence, forcing her to surrender the device.<\/p>\n

Eventually, one of the victims offered to withdraw cash from an ATM, prompting Herbert to leave the house with him in a car.<\/p>\n

But Herbert, a disqualified driver, was pulled over at a checkpoint on Riverside Drive, Whang\u0101rei<\/a>, and the victim escaped and told police he had been kidnapped.<\/p>\n

The court heard Herbert had racked up convictions every year for the past 18 years, with his most recent being a high-profile car chase through Auckland.<\/p>\n

In January, while on bail for the kidnapping, Herbert led 20 police cars through Auckland\u2019s suburbs in a chase that ended in the carpark of Onehunga\u2019s Dressmart shopping mall.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"BladeBlade Herbert led police on a pursuit that ended in an Onehunga mall.<\/p>\n

That offending resulted in a 13-month term of imprisonment, imposed in June.<\/p>\n

At this week\u2019s sentencing, his lawyer Wayne McKean submitted that his client had lived with undiagnosed ADHD and carried trauma from time spent in state care.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a vivid picture of this young boy just being exposed, through no fault of his own, to violence, drug abuse and alcohol abuse and then we have this terrible situation of the state taking over the care of him at the age of 7 and up until his teens just being moved from pillar to post,\u201d McKean said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnyone in that situation, doesn\u2019t matter how they were born, is going to end up, in my respectful submission, where Mr Herbert is today.\u201d<\/p>\n

McKean requested any sentence handed down come with a recommendation to the Parole Board that Herbert be assessed for ADHD before release.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s going to be compelling to the Parole Board and it would be a disaster if that was left untreated.\u201d<\/p>\n

Crown prosecutor Eilish O\u2019Connor said the victims in the kidnapping matter had a right to feel safe in their own home.<\/p>\n

Judge Gene Tomlinson agreed and noted that it appeared to be a drug deal gone wrong.<\/p>\n

In sentencing him, the judge said that throughout Herbert\u2019s criminal career, he had multiple opportunities to access help.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe state has tried and he\u2019s just said, \u2018not interested, I\u2019m going to keep doing what I want to do\u2019,\u201d Judge Tomlinson said.<\/p>\n

However, the judge said he wanted Herbert to put in the work while in prison. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want you to have a crushing sentence that will make you say, \u2018there\u2019s no point in trying\u2019,\u201d Judge Tomlinson said to Herbert, who was standing in the dock.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want you to try. I want you to succeed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWork towards that first Parole Board hearing and do what you need to do. You\u2019ve got to be really strong at doing what they want, so you have a chance to make changes so you don\u2019t keep coming back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Herbert was sentenced to four years and six months\u2019 imprisonment.<\/p>\n

His associate will defend his charges at trial.<\/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":"Dressed in black clothes and wearing a glove, Herbert began yelling at two victims in the lounge. \u201cWhere…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57722,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48154,1558,682,48152,24140,3468,543,3401,2219,48153,20920,20925,18557,111,43,139,69,1523,675,5161,14649,1361,61,6845,1869,1316,25152],"class_list":["post-57721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-abductor","tag-been","tag-being","tag-blade","tag-checkpoint","tag-deal","tag-driven","tag-drug","tag-gone","tag-herbert","tag-kidnapped","tag-kidnapping","tag-led","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-over","tag-police","tag-sentenced","tag-stopped","tag-that","tag-to","tag-vehicle","tag-whangrei","tag-when","tag-wrong"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57721","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=57721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57721\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}