Crown lawyer Jackson Webber told a jury during his closing statement at the High Court in Christchurch today that "the death of Lyn Fleming was no accident, no mistake and no manslaughter”.
Today marks an end of the second week of Hayden Tasker's trial. The 33-year-old is accused of murdering Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming and intentionally causing grievous bodily injury to another officer, Senior Sergeant Adam Ramsay.
The incident happened in the early hours of New Year’s Day 2025. The two officers were on foot, patrolling the streets of Nelson’s CBD as revellers rang in the new year.
Fleming and Ramsay were standing in a carpark in Buxton Square when they were struck by Tasker driving a white Honda Odyssey. The two officers were hit at a speed of around 45km/h, launching Fleming around 30m and Ramsay roughly 8m through the air.
The Honda left the carpark, spun back around and crashed into a stationary police car – injuring two more officers.
'A moment of madness'
Tasker contended he was guilty of manslaughter, and not guilty of the charge against Ramsay. The accused said he wanted to gain the attention of police, create a chase, crash his car, and kill himself.
His defence lawyer Marcus Zintl told the jury his client was "depressed, suicidal” and living in his car.
"This was a suicide attempt gone wrong," Zintl said.
"He wanted to join his father in heaven, his long-term girlfriend dumped him and he was unemployed.
"The whole event was a moment of madness."
Man charged with murdering Lyn Fleming says “it should’ve been me who died”. (Source: 1News)
However, the Crown said the defendant’s actions that night were inconsistent with a suicide attempt.
"At no stage did he explain how he would die, in fact, the opposite. He spoke about how he would get away from police."
Tasker was three times over the legal alcohol limit, having consumed around one and a half bottles of wine in the hours leading up to the killing.
"It may be that he needed a large amount of Dutch courage as he realised the enormity of what he was about to do," Crown prosecutor Jackson Webber told the court.
'Anger towards the police'
During his formal custody interview on New Year’s Day, Tasker told Detective Nathan Madden he was angry at police. He said the anger stemmed from when he was assaulted by a 17-year-old in central Nelson. He said police did not deal with the incident properly and he hadn’t felt the same since.
"Was just gonna like ram into some cops and then they would start chasing me but then I would get away, kind of like on a movie,” he said in his interview.
"My intention was that they would get away and then they would start chasing me," he reiterated.
The accused told Gaskell he’d put 40 litres of petrol in his car and would have made it to Christchurch.
When asked about his intention when driving into the officers, Tasker said “it was all just anger towards police, obviously, for what I'd been done for in the past.”
Jury shown police interview with Hayden Tasker shortly after he drove at a police patrol, killing one officer and injuring others. (Source: 1News)
Gaskell said he told the accused, "a police officer might die tonight".
In the video, the accused is heard saying: “If they die, I have to take that to the grave.”
The detective told the court on Wednesday: "He didn't appear to show much emotion in terms of what I just told him and the way he was describing how he was driving that night."
On Friday, Webber told the jury: "You can sum this case up as a man angry with police, kills police officer."
Zintl countered: "The consequences of Mr Tasker's dangerous driving – and I'm his counsel and I'm saying this – were despicable, deplorable, and dreadful. But that does not make him guilty of murder."
Fleming died around 10 hours after the incident from blunt head trauma.
She is the first female police officer in New Zealand to be killed in the line of duty.
The jury will begin their deliberations on Monday.
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