Trial hears of fatal struggle at doorway
A Rangiora man has told of yelling to his brother to “get a gun” during a desperate struggle with an intruder at the doorway of their home which ended with the fatal stabbing of the brother.
“I would have shot him,” Peter Graham Lochhead told the trial in the High Court at Christchurch of two men who are charged with the murder of his brother, Tony John Lochhead, in the September 2013 incident.
The Crown says the armed home invasion was a drugs robbery that turned fatal when Tony Lochhead was stabbed in the neck. It alleges two men decided to raid the property in White Street, Rangiora, to get drugs, guns and money.
Jason William Baker, 40, of Linwood, and Shaun Robert Murray Innes, 37, of Rakaia, deny joint charges of murdering Tony John Lochhead, and wounding Peter Graham Lochhead with intent to commit aggravated robbery. The Crown alleges Innes went to the door of the house, and lured the brothers outside to the driveway where Baker was armed with a knife and hiding in the bushes beside the house. The fatal struggle in the doorway followed. Innes is charged as a party to the offences.
The trial before Justice Rachel Dunningham and a jury began today and is expected to last two weeks.
Peter Lochhead told the court that he was colour blind, dyslexic, and could not read nor write.
He said he and his brother were home when there was a banging on the door. His brother opened the door and invited him in but he seemed to be speaking in a foreign language and ran away. Tony Lochhead followed him.
When they were outside they realised someone was behind them and got back to the house. Peter Lochhead was then at the door trying to strike the intruder – who had a knife – using a walking stick. Tony Lochhead was using a baton made of a cut-down branch that was filled with lead.
“I asked him to grab a gun, but he wouldn’t,” said Peter Lochhead. “I would have shot him.”
He had been stabbed a few times himself in the chest, face, and arm. “I knew there was blood running down, but I didn’t take much notice.”
When Tony came past him to the door he was stabbed in the neck. Peter Lochhead did not see the fatal blow. “He said, ‘He’s got me good,’ and then he hit the floor.”
While the intruder glanced away, Peter Lochhead struck his hand with the walking stick and knocked the knife out of his grip. The man then ran off.
There was blood everywhere, coming from Tony Lochhead’s neck. Peter Lochhead applied pressure and tried to call for help, eventually getting a neighbour to call 111.
Questioned by counsel for Baker, Gerald Nation, he said he had no idea that people would come to their house to get drugs. “I had no knowledge,” he said. He was not aware that Tony Lochhead used to supply drugs to people.
Crown prosecutor Anselm Williams said Baker and Innes intended to rob the Lochhead brothers of drugs, guns, and cash when they went to their house in White Street, Rangiora, about 9pm on September 13, 2013.
They had known the Lochheads but there had been a falling out over a debt that Baker owed and he was no longer welcome there. On the day of the incident, Baker had taken morphine and Ritalin.
The pair went out “earning” – getting money to buy drugs – and decided they would rob the Lochheads, the Crown alleged.
Defence counsel for Innes, Michael Knowles, said his client had run away from the scene of the incident before anything happened and had nothing more to do with Baker until after they had been arrested. “He wanted no part in it and took no part in it.”
Counsel for Baker, Gerald Nation, said his client had taken drugs and alcohol and had no memory of what happened that night. He urged the jury to keep an open mind in deciding who held the knife that night, and what was going through their mind at the time.
The Crown will call evidence from 37 witnesses.
Category: News
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