• Police officer Morne de Lange was sentenced for careless driving and assault with a weapon.
• Judge Stephen Bonnar ordered 100 hours’ community work and a $1000 emotional harm payment.
• De Lange’s request for a discharge without conviction was denied for the assault charge.

A police patrol officer has been sentenced for a bizarre, unlawful arrest in which he accidentally rammed a motorbike against a petrol station bollard, nearly pinning the frightened rider before chasing him in a bystander’s vehicle and attacking him with pepper spray and a Taser.

Morne de Lange, 42, faced up to five years’ imprisonment today as he returned to Auckland District Court after pleading guilty late last year to careless driving and assault with a weapon.

“It’s not his best day on the job, and he accepts that,” defence lawyer Todd Simmonds KC said as he asked for a discharge without conviction for his client.

A conviction on de Lange’s record could be a major factor regarding whether he kept his job, Simmonds argued.

But Judge Stephen Bonnar disagreed, noting that the serious misconduct itself - not the conviction - would play a greater role in the employment process. He ordered a conviction and a sentence of 100 hours’ community work.

“I am conscious in this case of the importance of police officers not being seen to be treated more leniently than others who offend in a similar way,” he added.

‘No justification’

The constable, who served on the road policing team at the time, approached the victim at a BP station in Hillsborough last April after a member of the public told him that a motorcyclist had been riding through the area without a helmet.

After finding the suspect sitting on his unregistered Yamaha trail bike at a petrol pump, with only a balaclava on his head, de Lange steered his patrol vehicle into the forecourt through the exit lane and approached the man without activating his lights or siren, court documents state.

Morne de Lange pleaded guilty in Auckland District Court today to careless driving and assault with a weapon. Photo / Alex Burton

“Upon approaching [the motorcyclist’s] position at the pump, Mr de Lange pressed the accelerator pedal instead of the brake, causing the police car to lurch forward and crash into [the motorcyclist] and his trail bike, pinning it against the bollards that were protecting the petrol dispenser,” authorities noted in the summary of facts, which de Lange agreed were correct.

“[The motorcyclist’s] leg was briefly caught between his trail bike and the car, but he managed to free himself and immediately ran away from the police car, leaving his phone and shoe behind.”

De Lange, who has a part-time side job as the chief examiner at a driving school, had not given any indication that he wanted to stop or detain the motorcyclist before the crash.

But as the man ran, de Lange gave pursuit, yelling that he was under arrest before jumping in a bystander’s vehicle to catch up with him.

“No justification existed for any arrest at that time,” documents state.

Investigators later obtained CCTV of the incident from the petrol station. The judge, however, said today that he had not watched the footage.

De Lange managed to grab the other man after jumping out of the bystander’s van about 300 metres from the crash site. He used his police-issued OC spray, known as pepper spray, when the other man pulled his arm away and ran across the street.

He then pulled out his Taser, firing twice when the first discharge had no effect. The second shot caused the man to fall to the ground.

Police officer Morne de Lange was charged with careless driving and two counts of assault after accidentally ramming a motorbike at this BP petrol station in Hillsborough, Auckland, in April 2024. Photo / Google

Still on the ground, the victim continuously rubbed his eyes from pepper spray and moved onto his knees after de Lange had instructed him to lie on his stomach. The officer then activated the “arc” function of his Taser, delivering an electric shock to the victim that again caused him to fall to the ground.

The last use of the Taser was the basis of the assault charge.

The victim later reported pain and discomfort but did not require hospital treatment.

‘Abuse of authority’

Crown prosecutor Alex Mackenzie argued that it was more than just a bad day at the office for de Lange. He was not making a legal arrest to begin with, before he added excessive force to the mix.

There were multiple opportunities for the officer to either de-escalate the situation or stop altogether. But he ignored them, even after using pepper spray and the Taser.

By the time he used the Taser arc, “the victim is on the ground defenceless, vulnerable”, Mackenzie said.

De Lange, who has been on restricted duty since the incident, appeared in court today having already paid $1000 in voluntary restitution to the petrol station to cover the insurance excess for the damaged bollard. He had also written an apology.

“Mr de Lange does accept, with the benefit of hindsight, that he was not justified in using the Taser as he did,” his lawyer said. “There is no suggestion of bad faith on his part, but he did get it wrong.”

De Lange told colleagues when being investigated about the incident that he might have accidentally hit the accelerator instead of the brake, but he didn’t realise he had crashed into the bike or its rider.

“He believed that [the victim] had attempted to assault him, justifying his use of the OC spray, and that [he] continuously attempted to avoid arrest, justifying his use of the Taser,” documents state.

To receive a discharge without conviction, a judge has to find that there’s a real and appreciable risk that the consequences of a conviction would be out of all proportion to the gravity of the offence.

De Lange provided an affidavit from the police union suggesting that a conviction might affect his employment with the police, for whom he had worked for about seven years, while the Crown provided an affidavit from the director of employment relations for New Zealand Police stating that the process could not be boiled down to a conviction.

It was also argued by the defence that a conviction could affect his job as a driving instructor, which he has done on a full- or part-time basis since 2009. If he lost his police job, he might want to return to instructing full time, it was noted.

When he was charged, de Lange listed his occupation as driving instructor on publicly available court documents, rather than police officer.

Judge Stephen Bonnar said de Lange's offending "involves an abuse of authority in relation to the victim”. Photo / Sylvie Whinray

Judge Bonnar noted that, like Simmonds, he once did a lot of work for the Police Association before his assignment to the bench. He recalled that some clients lost their jobs even after acquittal, while others who were convicted were allowed to stay with police.

“I’m not particularly persuaded that the mere fact of conviction is the critical feature here,” he said.

He noted that de Lange had no prior conviction history and was assessed as being a low risk of reoffending. The defendant told the court he had no disciplinary history with police either.

But the judge also noted that de Lange was not engaged in a lawful arrest when he resorted to one of the most serious weapons in a police officer’s arsenal.

“The offending involves an abuse of authority in relation to the victim,” he said, before going on to quote from a previous High Court decision stating that such offending “damages the reputation of the police in the eyes of the public”.

The public was entitled to “absolute integrity” from its officers, the judge added.

He denied the request for a discharge without conviction on the assault charge but, in an unusual twist, allowed one on the less serious driving offence. Not having a serious driving offence on his record might help him de Lange his driving instructor job, the judge noted.

In addition to the community work, the judge ordered de Lange to pay $1000 for emotional harm to the victim. Restitution for the victim had not been sought by the Crown before the hearing.

The victim, Mackenzie explained, “probably for understandable reasons has not been super-engaging with the police”.

Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.