The Court of Appeals today dismissed the appeal against the minimum sentence imposed on Samuel Moses Samson (34) last year for murdering Azaria Wilson at the Bavarian Motel in 2019.
After a jury trial in the Invercargill High Court on June 3, last year, Samsung was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum non-parole sentence of 17 years.
Wilson, the mother of Samson’s baby daughter at the age of 21, died on November 17, 2019, from a dull force injury to her head, neck, abdomen and face.
At a hearing earlier this month, Samson’s lawyer Nicolet Levy, QC, told Judges Gilbert, Mander, and Fitzgerald that the minimum sentence was too long given mental health issues and unfavorable upbringing. rice field.
She sought to admit the report of a consultant psychiatrist dealing with these issues as evidence and called for a reduction in the minimum sentence to 13 and a half years.
Ms. Levy was detained by then-lawyer Judith Ablett Carr QC at the time of the judgment by his instructions not to place the psychiatrist’s report in front of Judge Gerald Nation. Said that.
Samsung reportedly suffered from complex post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a more serious disorder than PTSD, and suffered traumatic brain injury in childhood.
That led to a tendency for violence and drug and alcohol addiction in domestic relationships, Levy said.
Even with Samsung’s progress, it was unreasonable to have to wait 17 years before qualifying for a return to the community.
In today’s judgment, Judges Gilbert, Mander, and Fitzgerald said they would not normally accept evidence of an appeal that was deliberately withheld from Judges for strategic reasons.
However, they have decided to allow “somewhat reluctant” applications for the overall benefit of justice.
They accepted Samson’s “really horrifying upbringing” to explain his discomfort and his deeply rooted urge and anger control flaws.
However, there was no evidence of serious intellectual disability and the breach was planned.
He went to the hotel with the intention of brutally killing Ms. Wilson, and his subsequent actions were “calculated and very ruthless.”
“None of this is properly explained by the lack of impulse control.”
Discounts that would otherwise have been justified would have to be reduced to take into account Samsung’s long history of serious and escalating domestic violence.
Therefore, the minimum period of imprisonment was appropriate and the judge dismissed the appeal against the judgment.
-Guy Williams
PIJF Court Reporter