Bomber ‘wanted to die for beliefs’

Press, 18 March 1983, Page 7

Bomber ‘wanted to die for beliefs’

PA Wanganui The Wanganui Computer Centre bomber, Neil Roberts, wanted to die for his anarchist beliefs, according to witnesses at an inquest which this week returned a suicide verdict on his death.

According to an Auckland associate, he wanted to take either the computer centre or the. Beehive with him.

The Wanganui coroner, Mr Colin Riddet, returned the suicide verdict after hearing evidence at the inquest at the Wanganui District Court.

Taking 10 minutes deliberation after evidence lasting almost an hour, Mr Riddet said it was a “tragic waste of a young and talented life.”

Mr Roberts, aged 22, was an intelligent young man who enjoyed many hobbies, notably war-gaming, he said.

Referring to the incident

outside the centre just after midnight on November 18 last year, Mr Riddet said it was tragic Mr Roberts had decided to take his life in an attempt to change society. In a rare move, Mr Riddet decided against prohibiting the publication of evidence as the bombing had become a subject of “wide public interest.”

He explained that nonpublication was usually ordered so that “other people do not get ideas." “I would hope that this sad incident is accepted for what it is,” he said.

Mr Roberts’ parents were not in court, nor were any fellow punk rockers. Mr Roberts’ father was overseas, Detective Senior Sergeant R. L. Butler, of the Wanganui police, said. The head of the Wanganui C. 1.8., he was one of seven witnesses.

The others were (in order of evidence) Miss Bronwyn Dutton, aged 18, of Auckland. an associate or Roberts; Catherine Williams, aged 23, of Auckland, a former girlfriend; Margaret Wellington, on whose Stratford farm Mr Roberts stayed for the last four months of his life; David Ralph Hughes, the officer in charge of the Police National Bomb Data Centre; Peter Holman, a police fingerprint expert, and Dr James Burkinsnaw, pathologist at Wanganui Base Hospital.

The evidence of the two Auckland women was taken earlier this year and was read to the Court.

Miss Dutton said she had known Mr Roberts for three years and had met him on the Auckland pub scene.

They were close until the 1981 Springbok tour when “he went his way and I went mine.”

They shared opposite views on the tour: she supported it and he was opposed. She knew Roberts had bought a bus and gone to live at Greymouth. He was last in Auckland about four months before his death. She recalled his preoccupation with suicide. “He didn't like to conform with society,” she said. He hated the Wanganui computer centre, she said, and often talked of the "raw deals” he got from the police. “If he hadn’t done it (the bombing) at the Wanganui computer centre then he would have done it at the Parliament Beehive buildings,” Miss Dutton's statement said.

. His former girlfriend, Catherine Williams, aged 23, an occupational therapist, said she had tried to stop Mr Roberts talking about suicide. But she said it was a frequent subject. “He was scared of growing old and once mentioned blowing up the computer centre,” she said. It was in Auckland that he had tattooed on his chest “This punk won’t see 23. No future.”

Mr Roberts stayed with Margaret Wellington and her husband on their Stratford farm for the last four months of his life, she said.

Mrs Wellington described Mr Roberts as a friendly person who helped out on the farm.

They had deep discussions on suicide but it was not until he was leaving on the bus for Stratford to Wanganui that he mentioned bombing. Leaning out of the window of the departing bus, he told her: “Tell Ton (her husband’s nick-name) that if I do anything about blowing up the computer centre he can expect the cops." Mrs Wellington said Mr Roberts had once unsuccessfully tried to get information on himself from the computer centre.

According to police, personal information is granted to the person >it is about in nearly all cases. To .Mr Riddet, she said she understood Mr Roberts was going to Palmerston North when he left. She had helped send ’ Umbrella, his dog, to Auckland. His former girlfriend, Miss Williams, said in her statement that she had asked Mr Roberts to send her the dog if he was planning to kill himself.

Mrs Wellington said she did not know if Mr Roberts had the explosives he used while he was on the farm.' Mr Hughes, the bomb expert. said it appeared Roberts had used about three to four kilograms of explosives. It was wrapped in many sheets of newspaper and kept in a red knapsack. Mr Roberts activated the bomb by short-circulating a spark

to the detonator. There was no evidence of a switch or delaying mechanism. “There was only one way he could make it work," he said. “The amount of explosive

used to kill himself was many, many more times needed to do the job." He noted that Mr Roberts

had seemed to have only limited knowledge of explosives and detonators. Among the scraps of paper taken from the scene was a booklet called “About Anarchism," published in Australia. Mr Holman gave brief evidence of making prints from a severed right thumb to identify Mr Roberts. Detective Senior Sergeant Butler “heard and felt” the explosion at his home, about 1 one kilometre away. 1 Of the two guards on duty ' at the front door of the 1 centre, only one saw Mr J Roberts. According to his

report, Mr Roberts approached and stooped down. The blast then blew the guard off his seat. No evidence of splinters was found at the centre to suggest that Mr Roberts had made the bomb specifically to cause injury to any others, Mr Butler said. "He didn’t want to hurt anybody but wanted to emphasise’ his beliefs," Mr Butler said.

He said inquiries had revealed that the explosives used were originally taken from a farm near Westport, about the same time as Mr Roberts left the South Island.

He told the news media that “probably" all 35 missing sticks of gelignite were used.

He said police were satisfied Mr Roberts had killed himself deliberately and that he acted alone. When Mr Roberts arrived in Wanganui, he bought a battery (to activate the bomb) before going to the pictures. Before taking his life, he sprayed a slogan on public toilets near the centre. It read: “We have maintained a silence closely resembling stupidity.” It was followed by an anarchist sign — the letter, A, in a circle — and the words, “anarchy peace thinking.”

Dr Burkinshaw gave a brief description of a postmortem examination and said he had been in little doubt the blast was “entirely to kill himself."