When they spotted Gage, they turned around, stopped the car and got out. Haenga shot from beside the car door, while Richards advanced on the car, shooting as he went.
Gage died at the scene, while his partner and three of his young children watched in horror.
Police found six bullets in Gage’s body, five of which came from Richards’ gun, and one in his arm from Haenga’s rifle.
Afterwards, the killers returned to their car and sped off, before instructing three lower-ranking gang members to set it on fire and dispose of any evidence. Those three were charged and pleaded guilty to arson.
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.Hori Gage was killed in a shooting on Sunday, August 6, 2023, in Palmerston North. Photo / Facebook
Getaway driver Neihana Cunningham pleaded guilty to manslaughter before the trial and became a Crown witness.
Police say that Richards travelled from Hawke’s Bay to respond to a call to arms after the stabbing of a Palmerston North Black Power president on August 4, 2023.
However, Richards denied being in the car with Haenga and Cunningham when they drove to Croydon Ave on August 6.
Haenga, on the other hand, admitted he was there with Cunningham and what he claimed was an unknown backseat passenger. He admitted shooting at the car but said he intended only to scare or intimidate Gage, not kill him.
The jury didn’t buy that story and delivered guilty verdicts today for both Haenga and Richards after deliberating for just over 11 hours.
Robert Richards and Royden Haenga in the High Court at Palmerston North. Photo / Jeremy Wilkinson
Neither Haenga nor Richards took the stand at the nearly three-week-long trial, and their lawyers didn’t call any witnesses.
However, Richards’ lawyer, William Hawkins, took aim at one of the main Crown witnesses, who initially lied to police about having driven Haenga and a man he later identified from a police photo-montage as Richards, from a Black Power house shortly before the shooting.
That witness, the only one to be given name suppression, then swapped places with Cunningham as the driver of the car shortly before the shooting.
In a police interview, the man initially lied about driving the car, but changed his story after he was played audio from a CCTV camera near Gage’s house, in which Gage’s partner and children could be heard screaming in the aftermath of the shooting.
Hawkins accused the witness of being in the car and said he was trying to cover up his involvement.
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Haenga’s lawyer, Scott Jefferson, said his client had never intended to kill Gage and wanted only to intimidate him. He had been “shooting low” on purpose.
Jefferson said Haenga didn’t plan the murder, and that the person in the back seat of the car, alleged by the Crown to be Richards, acted alone and unscripted.
“There is a huge distinction between what Neihana Cunningham and Royden Haenga did and what the guy in the backseat did,” Jefferson said.
Hori Gage, 27, was fatally shot in front of his family. Photo / NZ Police
The Crown’s case was that Gage was killed in retaliation for the attack on the senior Black Power member days earlier, and that he’d simply been wearing a red jacket at the wrong place and wrong time when Haenga, Cunningham and Richards drove past.
Prosecutor Guy Carter said cellphone polling data placed Haenga at the Black Power address shortly before the murder, and CCTV footage identified his white Nissan Teana fleeing the scene after the shooting.
Further CCTV footage showed Richards in Palmerston North after having travelled from Hawke’s Bay with several associates, and he was identified as being the backseat passenger by the witness with name suppression.
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Carter said the trial had been about holding the two shooters accountable.
“What they did does amount to an execution,” he said. “It was targeted, it was a callous, it was cold-blooded.”
Jeremy Wilkinson is an Open Justice reporter based in Manawatū, covering courts and justice issues with an interest in tribunals. He has been a journalist for nearly a decade and has worked for NZME since 2022.
