The pack attack cost 31-year-old "family man" Damian Alan Bryce-Blewden his freedom.
He appeared in the Dunedin District Court this week after admitting a count of aggravated robbery and was jailed for two years and nine months.
His co-defendant, Jakane Regan Cruden, 19, who pleaded guilty to the same charge, as well as threatening to kill, got 11 and a-half months’ home detention — nearly the maximum non-custodial sentence.
Tawhiri Tairi-Rouvi, 18, and Ihaia Begley, 24, were also due to be sentenced at the same hearing but did not turn up to meetings with Probation and so had their cases adjourned.
The court heard the incident which led to the four men being in the dock had a relatively innocuous source.
The 17-year-old victim had racked up a debt of $100 for cannabis and the defendants decided to confront him.
Cruden sent out a message to friends to find the teen and on November 26, when they discovered his location, they set out in Bryce-Blewden’s car.
If he did not pay up, they would kill him, he said.
The teenager walked away; the four men followed.
They caught up with him in Princes St, outside the Fable Dunedin hotel.
"This never started off as a robbery, but a confrontation between some rather immature young people," Bryce-Blewden’s counsel, Judith Ablett-Kerr, KC, said.
But her client began the attack.
Bryce-Blewden punched the victim in the mouth and kicked him in the leg, before being struck in return.
"Get him, boys," one of the defendants said.
As the brawl rumbled on, Bryce-Blewden ended up on the ground with the victim and held him there as Cruden pulled out a metal bar and struck him at least six times
The defendants took the teen’s phone, hoodie, cigarettes and a shopping bag containing a phone charger and anti-psychotic medication.
They made off in Bryce-Blewden’s car — Begley behind the wheel — but ran out of petrol just metres away.
The quartet had to walk home.
"Clearly not a lot of thought had gone into this," Ms Ablett-Kerr said.
"It was very unsophisticated ... stupid young people and a man [Bryce-Blewden] who wasn’t thinking straight."
She told the court her client’s life had spiraled after he was diagnosed with long Covid and had to give up work.
Judge Michael Turner disagreed.
It was unclear, he said, whether Bryce-Blewden had any genuine remorse or whether he was simply sorry for the position in which he found himself.
Cruden, however, was assessed as having insight into the impact of his crimes.
He had engaged in counselling, had withdrawn from negative influences and had goals for the future, counsel John Westgate said.
"He’s not just talking the talk, he’s walking the walk," he said.
Tairi-Rouvi and Begley were remanded on bail and will appear in court next month, when a sentencing date will be set.
