The names of two men charged over the death of Ariki Rigby have been released after applications for name suppression were denied.
Thirty-two-year-old Jimmy Heremaia was arrested in Auckland last month, charged with murder and arson in relation to the car that Ariki’s remains were found in.
The orchard worker was living in Hawke’s Bay at the time of Rigby’s death.
Heremaia faces a maximum penalty of life imprisonment if he’s found guilty of murder and is being held in custody without a plea.
Meanwhile, 29-year-old Ropine Paul was arrested this month and is charged with being a party to arson. The Havelock North labourer faces a maximum penalty of 14 years’ imprisonment. He is also being held in custody without plea.
The pair both appeared by audio-visual link in the Napier High Court last Wednesday for a hearing on name suppression. Both co-defendants made applications for interim name suppression until the end of the trial.
Heremaia did so on the basis that publication would be likely to endanger his safety or cause extreme hardship. Paul did so on the basis that publication would create a real risk of prejudice to a fair trial.
The Crown informed the court that the members of Rigby’s whānau strongly opposed continuing interim name suppression.
Justice Radich said he could not accept that publication was likely to endanger Heremaia’s safety in prison or cause extreme hardship for him.
“Many of the people with which Mr Heremaia is most concerned — members of the Mongrel Mob — will know what he looks like, given that he was a patched member of that gang.”
Heremaia is currently segregated from other prisoners for his protection.
“As the Crown has put it, an order granted on the grounds that protective segregation would be insufficient to mitigate any risk, and that a risk of harm was likely, would amount to an acceptance that Corrections is unable to meet its statutory obligations.
“There is no basis for a conclusion to that effect.”
A three-week trial has been set down for November, 2025.
Body in a burnt-out car
Rigby was killed in September 2022, four weeks short of what would have been her 19th birthday. Her body was found in a burnt-out car in a Havelock North reserve.
She was on an unplanned holiday to see her father and stepmother.
Police failed to realise there was a dead body in the car when they first checked on it.
Officers visited the car after a caller told police on September 3 that they thought they had seen the body of an animal on the floor in the back of the vehicle.
Rigby’s body was not discovered until September 5.
