escalating violence in our community Become a member of the Sensible Sentencing Trust

Mouseover links for full page descriptions

Offender Databases Dahir Shire

Dahir Shire

Alias

.

Offences

Indecent assault on a Wellington woman in June 2004

Victims

.

Offender Affiliations

.

Gang affiliations

none known

Age

Born 1968

Current Location

At large

Parole/Release Dates

Sentenced to six months in September 2005
Released December 2005

Background
From Dominion Post story September 2005
The disgrace and humiliation for a devout Muslim taxi driver convicted of indecent assault have been capped off with a six-month jail sentence. A Wellington District Court jury had found Dahir Noor Shire, 37, of Upper Hutt, guilty of touching a 17-year-old passenger's hair, breast and leg, then pulling her toward him when she tried to leave his cab in the early hours of June 18 last year. Defence lawyer Greg King asked yesterday for a community work sentence, saying the shame and disgrace of conviction had already punished Shire, along with his suspension from taxi driving 16 months ago when the allegations were made against him.

A second young woman had also complained of indecent assault but Shire was acquitted of that charge. Judge David Ongley said Shire had broken a taxi driver's obligation to respect the privacy and security of a passenger. A deterrent message had to be sent to other taxi drivers. Prison was the only realistic sentence, he said. He sentenced Shire to six months' jail and refused permission to ask for home detention. He said the victim was badly frightened and now found it difficult to use taxis. She had also lost more than $600 as a result of the court case.

Mr King said taxi driving was Shire's first job since he came to New Zealand from Somalia, via a refugee camp in Ethiopia, in 1999. It had been a long, hard struggle for him to learn enough English language and local knowledge to become a taxi driver without his job Shire could no longer send $600 a month to help support family members in Somalia who relied on him. Language and culture differences, and dietary and prayer needs, would make prison very hard for Shire, Mr King said. Shire, who had about 20 Somali men supporting him in court, still maintained that he did not indecently assault the woman, Mr King said. Judge Ongley said the evidence identifying Shire was overwhelming.

---

Corrections and Additional Information
We endeavour to make this database as accurate as possible, but we are at the mercy of whatever information we can find in various online and offline archives. We rely on the public - that is, people like you - to fill in the gaps that we cannot. If you wish to submit additional information or a correction to this file CLICK HERE . Privacy: Trust policy is that all sources are treated as strictly confidential unless we are explicitly told otherwise. If you wish to see a file removed from this database certain conditions must be met by the offender set out HERE Note that this does NOT apply for those that are the primary offender in a murder, rape, or any sexual offending involving minors. We do not enter into correspondence regarding the guilt/innocence of offenders. Such correspondence is not responded to, especially if the offender concerned has a number of prior convictions

Back to Top