Police are looking to seize a Mongrel Mob pad in Southland, not as proceeds of crime, but as an ‘instrument’ used to facilitate a kidnapping, part of an internal gang dispute.
This use of the Sentencing Act is under challenge.
In 2025, Turoirangi Atarea Harmer-Elers was convicted, with others, on charges of assault and kidnapping following an altercation during a Mongrel Mob disciplinary session at their gang headquarters on Albion Street, in Matuara.
Application for a forced sale of Albion Street was made by Police after he was sentenced.
At a preliminary hearing, Harmer-Elders said the court could not impose a Sentencing Act ‘instrument’ seizure when final sentence had been pronounced at an earlier hearing.
Sentencing was ‘done and dusted.’
Justice Gordon ruled there is no wording in the Act stopping an ‘instrument’ forfeiture order being made after sentencing. An earlier sentence can be recalled and modified in light of any subsequent asset forfeiture, she said.
Sentencing Act asset forfeiture orders are possible on conviction of any offence punishable by five years’ imprisonment or more. Property used to facilitate the offence can be seized.
R. v. Harmer-Elers – High Court (26.11.25)
26.024