An Auckland police officer accused of faking a teen's arrest to get him away from his underage girlfriend wasn't trying to break up Romeo and Juliet - he was stopping a crime, his defence says.
The defence lawyers for Hurimoana Dennis and Vaughan Perry opened and closed their cases today. (Source: Other)
Inspector Hurimoana Dennis and Sergeant Vaughan Perry are standing trial accused of kidnapping a then-17-year-old - who cannot be named - in May, 2015.
Prosecutors at the High Court at Auckland say Dennis - aided by Perry - faked "booking" the teen at a police station and briefly locked him in a cell, before Dennis - successfully - threatened the teen with rape charges if he didn't flee to Australia.
The Crown says Dennis got involved on behalf of the teenager's parents - family friends - when police filed no charges over allegations the young man was having sex with his then 15-year-old girlfriend.
Hurimoana Dennis says his focus remains firmly on the plight of the people needing help. (Source: Other)
Opening the defence today, lawyer Stephen Bonnar, QC, told the court Dennis was trying to protect the teenagers, not hurt them.
"This case is not a love story. This case is not Romeo and Juliet," he said.
"The defence case is about this man trying to help ... Trying to help this young man, who was, on the defence case, on a path where he had been committing crime.
"Trying to restore balance in that young man's life ... restore the mana of that young man and the connections with his whanau."
He said the Crown had to prove that, at the time, the young man had not consented to being locked in the cell.
"Was he consenting, not withstanding what he may now say?"
Dennis denies he ever intimated or threatened the teen.
The officer is also separately charged with sending the teen back to Sydney when he tried to return to Auckland a month later.
The defence plans to call five witnesses, including an expert on tikanga Maori - or Maori customs.
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