Woman sentenced for Manurewa manslaughter of partner

A woman who fatally stabbed her partner in the neck with a serrated kitchen knife, in front of his young son, has been allowed a reduced prison sentence due in part to her history as a victim of severe domestic abuse.

By Ella Scott-Fleming of RNZ

Warning: This story discusses domestic abuse. A list of helplines can be found at the bottom of the page.

But there was not enough evidence to suggest the stab victim, whom she had been dating for five months, was among those who had previously subjected her to sustained violence, a judge has noted.

Jurors in the High Court at Auckland found Margaret Jovander Green, 33, guilty of manslaughter in July after a three-week trial in which the Crown sought a murder conviction.

Green declined to testify during her trial and has said she has no memory of what happened.

But she was not acting in self-defence when she stabbed partner Selwyn Robson, 30, Justice James MacGillivray said.

She stabbed him with such force in the neck that the 20cm serrated blade penetrated his lung.

Green's lawyers suggested that, to a degree, the lack of self-defence was beside the point, and the judge agreed.

"While Ms Green stands here as an offender, she was undoubtedly a victim first," defence lawyer Susan Giles said, noting that her client's significant childhood trauma was compounded by "repeated intimate partner violence" as an adult.

It resulted in a situation, Giles said, in which "trauma is laid upon trauma until the person becomes so psychologically damaged that their responses are not driven by rational choice but by deeply ingrained survival mechanisms".

The couple had been living together at a Manurewa sleepout in May last year when the stabbing occurred.

Neighbour Anthony Hepi testified at the trial that he was doing some washing that day when he heard arguing coming from the backyard.

Moments later, Hepi told jurors, Robson came running with blood "p***ing out of his neck".

"Some b**** stabbed me," he recalled the victim yelling.

Robson died at the scene. An autopsy revealed the knife went more than 9cm into his neck, damaging multiple blood vessels and causing major blood loss.

Justice MacGillivray said there was evidence at trial that the two had a "loving relationship", although they argued at times, and there was evidence that Robson had been violent on at least one occasion two months earlier.

On that occasion, Green had sent texts to a friend noting that Robson had given her a black eye.

But when the friend expressed distress over the revelation, Green told her to calm down, explaining she had been attacking Robson when he head-butted her rather than hitting her with a closed fist.

Another witness at trial said Robson had been violent towards her in the past.

On the morning of the stabbing, the two clearly got into an argument, but it was not clear what it was about, the judge said.

Green told some witnesses she had become angry because Robson was talking down to her. She told another she had objected to her partner expecting her to watch his toddler son.

Green's accounts to witnesses about what happened next varied from Robson approaching her, to him kicking her in the face, to both hitting each other.

The argument was violent, but the judge said he was unsure to what extent.

"The jury's rejection of self-defence shows that you were not facing a level of violence that justified the use of the knife," the judge said.

"Using the knife against Mr Robson was excessive and unjustified."

But the jury's verdict, after three days of deliberations, also made it clear that Green did not intend to cause death or appreciate that it might occur.

To make sense of what occurred, the judge said, it was important to consider her history and mental health at the time of the crime.

A report prepared for the court before sentencing said Green suffered an "unsettled childhood" that included physical and emotional abuse when she was put into state care aged nine.

Her mother introduced her to cannabis at age 12 and methamphetamine at 13, the court was told.

She was later expelled from school and, at 17, her mother introduced her to escort work.

As an adult, she was in a number of relationships in which she was regularly subjected to violence and suffered serious injuries, the judge noted.

In 2018, she was hospitalised with a traumatic brain injury during one such toxic long-term relationship.

The past abuse caused complex post-traumatic stress disorder, which a psychiatrist explained can result in difficulty regulating emotional responses to situations, as well as reactive and impulsive behaviour.

AUT lecturer Rachel Smith, an expert on family violence and trauma, noted women in situations such as Green's may respond to isolated incidents as if responding to the cumulative experience of past violence.

Justice MacGillivray rejected the defence suggestion that the homicide was an example of "excessive self-defence".

But he did agree Green lashed out at her partner in a dysregulated and impulsive act caused by PTSD and the "cumulative experiences of past violence" against her.

"There is no evidential foundation for concluding your relationship with Mr Robson was one of coercive control," he said.

Robson was remembered by his large family this week as someone with a wicked, sometimes dark sense of humour, an interest in passing on family heritage to the younger generation and a hard worker who prioritised looking after those he loved.

He was a Black Power member, but the patch didn't define him, multiple family members said in a series of victim impact statements.

Prosecutors also said there had been no evidence his gang membership had any bearing on the relationship.

"I carry grief, confusion and heaviness that does not go away," the victim's father, Patrick Robson, told the judge as Green stared ahead.

"I take no joy in seeing another person's life ruined, so I'm choosing to process this with ... humility. She has a family, and I do not wish further harm on them."

But the pain of losing his son is enduring, he said.

"This tragedy has shattered our family in ways that will continue to affect us for the rest of our lives," he said.

Green also refused to look as Wepiha Webster, one of the victim's nine siblings, offered his reluctant forgiveness.

"Forgiveness is a big word, one that you honestly don't deserve, but if I carry this hate it will eat me," he said. "I forgive you, not for you, but for my brother."

Another sibling, Arnold Robson, described his brother as someone who was "very staunch" but humble and always "whānau-oriented".

"He was so much more than the circumstances of his death," he said, adding he hoped his brother could be remembered, "with love, with respect and as the person he truly was to us".

"His life mattered to me," he said. "His life mattered to our whānau."

At the sentencing hearing, Crown prosecutor Aysser Al-Janabi wished to distinguish Green's offending from cases in which female defendants felt trapped by lengthy relationships that involved significant degrees of domestic violence.

Green's "highly dysfunctional" relationship with Robson was short, and it involved at least one other scenario before he died in which he was the victim, Al-Janabi said, explaining there was no evidence of Green suffering social control, financial control or isolation.

The Crown suggested a 10% reduction for her background and 10% for her rejected offer to plead guilty to manslaughter six weeks before the murder trial began, but no discounts for remorse or rehab efforts.

Justice MacGillivray ordered a starting point of four years and three months' imprisonment before allowing 20% in combined discounts for her background, remorse and efforts at rehabilitation. Another 15% was allowed for her earlier offer to plead guilty.

It resulted in a sentence of two years and nine months' imprisonment.

Green's lawyers assured the court she is remorseful for having killed "her best friend and the love of her life".

"Her complex PTSD has deprived her of the ability to fully remember or comprehend what occurred in those moments," Giles said. "The fragments of memory that she is able to retrieve are, in her own description, akin to awakening in a nightmare."

But she has begun working with ACC counsellors and psychiatrists to understand how lifelong trauma has shaped her responses and behaviour, the defence lawyer said.

"Ms Green's actions on that day were a culmination of a lifetime of experiences that reflect the enduring complexity of family violence in New Zealand," she said.

"This requires the court to confront the consequences of what happens when children slip through the cracks, when they are exposed to multifaceted childhood abuse, abandoned by those who should protect them and denied the stable and supportive foundation necessary to become healthy adults."