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Speaker 1: All Black and Crusaders players. Sevu Reese has been named

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Speaker 1: as the sports star who admitted to a charge of

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Speaker 1: wilful damage driving a car into a garage at a

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Speaker 1: Cup Day party in christ Church. He was granted a

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Speaker 1: discharge without conviction when he appeared for sentencing this morning.

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Speaker 1: Apologizing outside court, Cevu said he wants people to learn

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Speaker 1: from his mistakes. People could learn from some of the

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Speaker 1: things that we took it from today in court and

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Speaker 1: from some of my actions. So yeah, I think it

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Speaker 1: was it was a great idea to take an aim

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Speaker 1: suppression off and face it. New Zealand Herald reporter Anna

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Speaker 1: Leask has been in court for us today and she's

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Speaker 1: with us now Keilder and at let's just go back

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Speaker 1: to the incident itself, what actually happened.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well, Sevu was at this party in christ Church.

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Speaker 2: He was getting a bit disruptive and he was asked

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Speaker 2: to leave and then next minute he was sort of

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Speaker 2: behind the wheel of a car and he drove it

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Speaker 2: into a garage and then he sort of took off

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Speaker 2: on foot. So initially he was charged with unlawfully taking

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Speaker 2: a motor vehicle, but that was later brought down to

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Speaker 2: this single charge of wilful damage. So it's been sort

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Speaker 2: of a year or more waiting for this to be

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Speaker 2: resolved in court.

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Speaker 1: And under what justification did his lawyer ask for discharge

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Speaker 1: without conviction? Why did the judge grant it?

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Speaker 2: Well, the lawyer's point was, he's got potentially a big

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Speaker 2: career in front of him, which you know, his employment

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Speaker 2: requires a lot of traveling and future employment could be

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Speaker 2: hindered by a conviction. It was very in the grand

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Speaker 2: scale of things, it's very low level offending. And the

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Speaker 2: lawyer put to the court that it was just simply

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Speaker 2: the gravity of the offending it didn't, you know, require

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Speaker 2: a conviction. The judge agreed. She sort of outlined all

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Speaker 2: of her reasons for that and said at the end

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Speaker 2: that anyone in the same situation would have got to

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Speaker 2: discharge for that conviction as well, sort of reading between

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Speaker 2: the lines. She wasn't giving it to him so he

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Speaker 2: could play rugby. Wasn't because there was a celebrity. It

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Speaker 2: was literally because he's a young guy with a potential

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Speaker 2: career ahead of him. Was the low level charge and

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Speaker 2: that was their thing for her to do today.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that being said, this isn't the first time he's

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Speaker 1: been granted a discharge without conviction. Just remind us of

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Speaker 1: what happened in the past.

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Speaker 2: Not yeah, I think it was twenty and eighteen. He

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Speaker 2: was charged with common assault. It was a domestic situation

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Speaker 2: and he effectively assaulted his partner at the time. In

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Speaker 2: that case, he was granted discharge without conviction for similar reasons.

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Speaker 2: The judge today said, you know, she was mindful that

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Speaker 2: that had happened, and he obviously alcohol played a big

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Speaker 2: part in both offenses that he clearly needs to address

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Speaker 2: that so it doesn't happen again. But she did point

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Speaker 2: out that the two offenses were very, very different and

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Speaker 2: she had to treat them as such. But she you know,

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Speaker 2: she did acknowledge quite heavily in court that it is

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Speaker 2: not his first time before the courts. It is not

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Speaker 2: his first offense, and it's not his first time he's

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Speaker 2: been there because of his alcohol, and you know that

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Speaker 2: he needs to really really sort himself out.

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Speaker 1: Thanks you, tom Anna, We appreciate it. New Zealand, he'ld

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Speaker 1: porter analysk. The New Zealand Rugby is running an employment

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Speaker 1: process with Sibu Reese and the details and results of

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Speaker 1: that employment process are apparently going to remain confidential, but

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Speaker 1: the support them at the stage. For more from Hither

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Speaker 1: Duplessy Alan Drive, listen live to news talks it'd be

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