|
Waiheke Community Board member Nobilangelo Ceramalus appeared in the Auckland District Court last Friday facing a charge of assaulting a 14-year-old boy with a length of timber. He pleaded not guilty and was remanded on bail to appear at a defended hearing on 26 July.
Mr Ceramalus has vehemently denied the charge that made national headlines over the weekend. He was initially granted name suppression until last Friday but the suppression order was breached last week by another Waiheke publication and Mr Ceramalus says he is considering taking the matter to the Attorney General.
Waiheke Sergeant Steve Ambler has said any suggestion of leaks coming from the police were “completely unfounded.”
 Nobilangelo Ceramalus: Charge vehemently denied.
“I went out and saw two teenagers, each had a dog. I asked them what they were doing and they said “going for a walk through the bush.” I pointed out that they were on private property and therefore trespassing, and then I ordered them off my property. However they didn’t seem in a great hurry to leave. I then said I would call the police if they didn’t leave.
“They finally came out on the road several doors down and I thought I had heard the last of it until there was a thunderous knock on my basement door about a week later. It was the police, saying they’d had a complaint that I had assaulted someone.”
His version of events differs markedly from that of the 14-year-old complainant. The court was told that Mr Ceramalus picked up a piece of wood “about two feet long and two inches thick” which he swung at the complainant, then hitting him in the back of the head and causing him to fall backward into a small tree.” The boy allegedly sustained a minor injury to the back of his head. The boy’s family have said they do not want to comment at this stage, telling reporters they don’t want to jeopardise the trial.
Meanwhile Mr Ceramalus will remain on the community board until “a decision is reached in the courts”, board chairman Tony Sears confirmed this week.
However Mr Ceramalus says this case has taken away any choice he had about standing in the next local government elections. “It’s a waste of time. If you are standing for a public position, honour and reputation are everything, and if your honour and reputation are destroyed then you’re done,” he says. • Julianne Evans
|
