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Offender Databases Christopher Kihi

Christopher Wharua Kihi

Alias

.

Offences

Shot his partner's brother with intent to do grievous bodily harm at Taupiri in January 2008

Victims

.

Offender Affiliations

Adrian Brown

Gang affiliations

none known

Age

Born 1972

Current Location

Prison

Parole/Release Dates

Sentenced to nine years in July 2009

Background
From the Waikato Times July 4th 2009
A family feud led to a shooting on school grounds. Now the man who pulled the trigger, and his partner have been jailed. Nicola Brennan reports. The shooting of a man at Taupiri School last year was premeditated and calculated, a judge said when sentencing the two perpetrators in Hamilton yesterday.

Taupiri couple Christopher Wharua Kihi, 37, and Adrian Brown, 28, both appeared for sentence at the High Court in Hamilton on a charge of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm to Brown's brother, Leonard Joseph "Joe" Brown, 48. Kihi was sentenced to 9 years in jail, while Brown was sentenced to 4 years 6 months. They were discharged on a charge of attempted murder following a jury trial in April.

A member of the public gallery yelled out to Kihi during the sentence. "You couldn't even kill him bro, you couldn't even kill him," before leaving the court room followed by a security guard. The court heard that on January 6, 2008, a dispute over a family estate finally boiled over, culminating in Kihi shooting Joe Brown at close range in the stomach on the Taupiri School grounds.

Kihi claimed at trial that he acted in self defence against an armed Joe Brown. Justice Simon France disputed that and said the shooting was premeditated. Kihi and Brown initiated the sequence of events that day, he said. After an earlier visit from a drunk Joe Brown, they acquired a gun and headed to his house at Ngaruawahia. Kihi pointed the gun out of the car window as he drove by Joe Brown's house.

Justice France said the pair knew that would annoy Joe Brown and make him return to their Taupiri house - next to the school grounds - where they could shoot him. "It was a calculated shooting," Justice France said. Justice France did not accept that Joe Brown brought to the house the gun that ended up shooting him. He believed Kihi had it in his possession before he and Brown drove to Ngaruawahia.

Joe Brown was seriously injured and spent the following two weeks in intensive care. Surgeons removed part of his bowel and he was facing ongoing surgery and also suffered post traumatic stress disorder. Justice France rejected claims by defence counsel that Brown was a lesser party in the incident and that she did not know there was a gun in the car when they drove to Ngaruawahia.

"She is guilty of significant encouragement of Kihi in his endeavours. "I'm not sure if she incited it, but she knew of it and supported it." Kihi and Brown have six children aged 3 to 15. The court heard the violence inflicted that day was out of character for both Kihi and Brown who was described as a exemplary mother and a caring partner.

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Corrections and Additional Information
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