Girl stabbed friend ‘in self-defence’

Press, 24 July 1984, Page 4

Girl stabbed friend ‘in self-defence’

A young woman was stabbed five times by another young woman, aged 17, during a drunken fracas at a house in Achilles Street, Shirley, after a group had been drinking for several hours at the Tavern Rachel and the Highway 61 gang headquarters, Mr Justice White and a jury were told in the High Court yesterday.

Waiana Suzanne Kotara, aged 17, an unemployment beneficiary, has pleaded not guilty to wounding Suzanne Margaret Berry, aged 22, on April 20.

His Honour will sum up this morning. Mr N. W.

Williamson called nine witnesses for the Crown. For Kotara, Mr A. N. D. Garrett raised the defence of selfdefence.

Opening his case Mr Williamson said that the Crown relied on the number and position of the stab wounds which were inflicted and the weapon used to prove its case that Kotara had intended to injure Berry.

No doubt the defence of self-defence would be raised but the force used in such a situation had to be reasonable, and the submission of the Crown in this case was that it was excessive and

could not be justified, Mr Williamson said. Miss Berry, an unemployment beneficiary, gave evidence of drinking all evening with a group at the Tavern Rachel and then going on to a party when the hotel closed. After drinking a considerable amount of beer at the hotel and the party she had then drunk whisky at her home in Achilles Street. She started arguing with Raewyn Kotara and when she had left, she took it out on Waiana Kotara. It was not until someone was screaming in front of her that she realised that she had been stabbed, Berry said. The person yelling at her was Joanne Paul. She fell down once and then got up again and had another drink. She thought that she had been punched in the back.

“I had gone to hit her (Kotara) across of the head with the axe, and she grabbed me and threw me on the floor. We were fighting, that was all. I didn’t seem Waiana, with anything in her hand. When Joanne

Paul screamed at me that I had been stabbed I didn’t believe it and just continued drinking. I didn’t know if I was bleeding at the time.” Berry said.

To Mr Garrett, Berry said that she was not sure if she had gone to the King George Hotel after leaving Tavern Rachel but she could have as that was her usual practice.

Beiry agreed that she was in a bad mood and was argumentative that night. She was responsible for throwing spaghetti and other things in the kitchen. She also threw a chair at Kotara and had hit her about three times with the axe handle.

At the time she was boarding with Raewyn Kotara and her family in Achilles Street, Berry said.

Detective Sergeant Robert John Hardie said he went to the scene of the stabbing in Achilles Street. The rooms in the house were in a normal state apart from the kitchen and a front bedroom.

The bedroom smelled strongly of alcohol and there was a pool of blood at the foot of the double bed. A bottle of bourbon had been knocked over on the floor and a photograph had been flung off the duchess. Also on the floor were an axe handle and spanner. Parts of a bloodstained singlet were on the bed and floor.

The kitchen was a shambles. A pot had been thrown through a window, and tomato soup had been sprayed about the walls and floor. There was a broken cup on the floor and another outside the back door, Detective Sergeant Hardie said.

Raewyn Kotara, a solo mother, said that in April Suzanne Berry was living with her family. They all went drinking on the evening of April 19. There was some “agro” from Berry when witness wanted to go home, and Berry had said something about one of their friends which made it worse.

They started yelling at one another and it was impossible to reason with Berry who knocked over the kettle which had been put

on for coffee. Witness threw it at her. Raewyn Kotara said she decided to go for a walk to cool off, and just as she got outside, Berry started to smash all the windows. She had never seen her in such a state, and she was frigthened. To Mr Garrett, witness said that Berry was regarded as part of the family, almost like her own daughter. In a written statement to Detective K. A. Dooley, Waiana Suzanne Kotara said that on Thursday night she went to the Tavern Rachel with her mother, Suzey Berry, Tania Haggerty, Eric Haggerty, and Joanne PauL They arrived at 7 p.m. and stayed until closing time. They then went to a party at the Highway 61 gang headquarters in Worcester Street. “We stayed there for a long time, and I don’t know what time we left and went back to our place at 28 Achilles Street. I heard Suzey Berry and my Mum, having an argument in the kitchen and I went in to see what was happening. Suzey picked up a chair and tried to hit me with it. “As I walked in I got splattered with spaghetti. I think it was my Mum who threw it. I think Suzey threw a cup through the window. They were yelling at each other over a friend,” Kotara said. At one stage she saw some water hit Suzey and she thought that her mother had thrown a jug of water at her. Eventually her mother went to ring her son to come around and sort Suzey out. While her mother was at the telephone box, Berry started to blame her (Waiana) for what had happened. They went into her bedroom but they were not fighting. Berry disappeared briefly and returned with an axe handle. “She was saying that it was my Mum’s fault and that she would get us back. She yelled at me to get her a smoke but I didn’t move and told her not to yell at me. She came over and hit me on the left thigh with a stick. She was poking me with it and went to hit me on the head.

“I was sitting on the sill of the open window. I saw a knife on the sill which we keep to open the window. I don’t thiii Suzey saw me grab the knife in my right hand. She went to hit me again and that is when I stabbed her,” Kotara said in the statement The first time Berry tried to hit her on the head with the stick she attempted to grab it and was hit on the left arm. “I pulled her towards me and I stabbed her in the back. I don’t know how many times I stabbed her but it was more than once. Then I just stood there and saw the blood all over her. I had the knife in my hand,” said Kotara. She gave the knife to Tania Haggerty and told her to throw it away. Later Tania told her that she had tossed it over a neighbour’s fence. It Was a white handled butcher’s knife. After Suzey Berry fell on the floor an ambulance was called. Kotara said that she was crying and was panicking. “I am very sorry about stabbing Suzey. She is normally a good friend of mine. I stabbed her because she was attacking me,” Kotara’s Statement concluded. In evidence Waiana Kotara said that Berry had been living with her family for about a year when the incident occurred. She had never seen her so angry as on that night. Berry threw a stool at her and hit her three times with the axe handle. Berry was very drunk and had taken drugs. Accused had just grabbed the knife when Berry came at her with the axe handle and stabbed Tier. Accused did not realise what she had done during the struggle. The scuffle on the floor lasted only a matter of seconds. In his address to the jury Mr Garrett said that Kotara had acted in self-defence when she seized the knife which happened to be on the window sill, when she was attacked with the axe handle. She had not gone and deliberately sought a weapon. It was an instinctive act of self-defence and she was entitled to be acquitted.