Two jailed for ‘orgy of assault, rape’

Press, 26 February 1983, Page 7

Two jailed for ‘orgy of assault, rape’

PA Auckland Two Gisborne men have been jailed for five years for what a judge described as an orgy of indecent assault and rape over four hours on a woman, aged 19.

Mr Justice Wallace said in the High Court at Auckland that the two men had seized the woman in the street and forced her to go where they lived in Gisborne. There they had subjected her to an orgy of indecent assault and repeated rape over a period of four hours or more. “For the woman it was a terrifying ordeal," his Honour told Michael Kodi Pureau. aged 20, a labourer, and Ropehana Hautapu Munro, aged 23, unemployed. The pair had earlier pleaded guilty in the High Court at Gisborne to charges of rape, sodomy, and indecent assault.

Both were jailed for five years for rape, three years for sodomy, and two years for indecent assault, all terms concurrent.

Defence counsel. Mr Roger Chambers, said that both men had little to say about what had happened. He said that this was part of the embarrassment and concern they now felt at what they had done to the complainant. Mr Chambers said that Munro had said that the offence probably would not have happened if he had not had so much to drink, while Pureau had said that he was "stoned" at the time.