Warning: This includes descriptions of extreme violence
For nearly a month, kidnapping victim Kayla Pawa was shuffled among a series of secret locations in Auckland and Northland where she was tortured with a blowtorch, had the barrel of a gun put in her mouth, was forced to sleep on a cold bathroom floor, was kept bound in the boot of a car and at one point instructed to dig her own grave.
The motive behind the prolonged, violent scheme was to break her will - her captors holding out hope she could be persuaded either through fear or force to show them how to raid her partner’s online cryptocurrency stash.
It didn’t work, however, and now one of the captors is awaiting sentencing.
Advertisem*nt
Disturbing new details of the abduction last year have been made public for the first time after the guilty plea of patched Nomads member Carlos Harris, who now admits he was in on the kidnapping scheme.
Harris, otherwise known as C-los Duzit, has been in custody since he was the subject of a high-profile manhunt last July after Pawa’s escape from a car boot in Tikipunga, Whangārei.
An Auckland District Court judge has set a sentencing date for the 34-year-old for September.
Harris was seen in CCTV footage on the night of June 12 last year driving in a convoy towards the Birkenhead home where Pawa stayed with her partner. Days earlier, Harris had been at the same North Shore home with others speaking to Pawa’s partner “about obtaining money” that they believed was owed them, according to court documents provided to the Herald.
Advertisem*nt
“Ms Pawa assisted them with how Binance (an online cryptocurrency exchange) and online cryptocurrency wallets worked,” documents state. “One of the males asked Ms Pawa if she could help them find their money.”
The group left empty-handed but said they would be back, and three nights later they made good on the statement.
‘Finish him’
“It’s locked,” Harris wrote in a text message and similar ones like it in the minutes before Pawa was abducted the following Monday. “Unlock it,” he added just two minutes later, followed by, “Yo, Asap.”
A short time later, a group of men - most of them unidentified but including Harris - entered the couple’s bedroom as they slept. The men had a gun and wore black balaclavas, some imprinted with the Nomads gang name.
The men warned Pawa that if she screamed, they would shoot her.
“Where is it?” one of them asked of the money, according to the alleged facts of the case agreed to by Harris.
The man holding Pawa was then alleged to have gestured towards her boyfriend, Leslie Naidoo, and gave the man holding the gun a brusque instruction: “Finish him.”
“The male with the gun remained while the other males took Ms Pawa downstairs,” the summary of facts states. “The male with the gun told Mr Naidoo to take off his shirt and lie down on the bed. He wrapped a pillow around the gun and told Mr Naidoo he would shoot [him].
“Mr Naidoo was terrified and pleaded with the male not to shoot. After a short period, the male ran from the room and also left the house.”
But the captors were far from done with Pawa, speeding away from the residence with her.
Advertisem*nt
‘Get something to cut a finger off’
Pawa was first taken to an address in Glen Eden, where she was placed in a garage with her eyes covered by a bandana, authorities allege.
“Her kidnappers tied her to a chair with a shower curtain or sheet laid on the ground,” documents state. “There were a large number of people, both males and females, present. They told Ms Pawa to give back their money.”
Harris received an update by way of text hours later, at 2.40am: “She keeps saying she dnt know.”
The victim was given a deadline of 7am to give the captors access to the cryptocurrency before she would have to choose a finger to be cut off.
“Can u get some plyers please ... something that will cut a finger off?” Harris was texted at 6.37am.
The amputation threat was not carried out in the end, but one woman did hit her in the ribs with a baseball bat while multiple men used a hammer on her hands, authorities allege.
While at the West Auckland home, Pawa tried to escape but was captured. If she tried it again, she was warned, they would kill her.
Blowtorches and meat cleavers
After three days, the victim was taken to Harris’ Glen Eden home, where she remained for about two weeks.
“The kidnappers continued to ask her if she was ready to sign over money from a cryptocurrency account,” court documents state. “They also gave her a laptop for a period of time and asked her to transfer money. Ms Pawa was not able to transfer any money.”
For the majority of the time she was held at Harris’ home, Pawa was locked inside what was described as an “extremely cold” bathroom. At one point, her clothes were confiscated and her captors refused to feed her for five days, documents state. She attempted to keep warm by filling empty shampoo bottles with hot water.
Court documents outline in disturbing detail multiple incidents at Harris’ house in which Pawa was tortured and threatened with mutilation at the hands of unidentified males.
“Which side do you want me to take?” one man asked as he held a meat cleaver to her shoulder, after beating her unconscious then returning hours later with the knife and threats of amputating an entire limb.
Advertisem*nt
On another occasion described by the victim, two people held her down while a third person lit a blowtorch, waving it over her legs and face and threatening to “burn her eyeballs out”. The threat wasn’t carried out but the flame was close enough to singe her hair and eyebrows, she later recounted.
The victim was eventually shoved in the boot of a vehicle - warned beforehand that if she screamed she would be shot - and driven to an abandoned house in a rural area of Kohukohu, in the Far North.
“While there, she was told that one of the males had dug a hole for her grave,” court documents state. “Ms Pawa was made to help with the digging.”
Laptop lead
By that point, police had finally been alerted that she was missing. Her partner had not mentioned the kidnapping until June 27, just over two weeks after he watched the kidnappers’ convoy speed off from his home.
Once on the case, investigators made some rapid strides in tracking her down thanks to what was believed to be a major mistake by her captors - having her sign in on a laptop. After obtaining her Google account information, police tracked her IP address to the first West Auckland home she had been held in. They also quickly realised Harris’ home was a location of interest.
Dual search warrants were executed at both homes around 3am on July 4, but Pawa had long since been removed.
Advertisem*nt
Harris wasn’t home at the time of the search but a series of text messages just hours later indicated he was aware of it and was getting nervous.
“Tell the bro ger rid of lapy,” he instructed one person, referring to a laptop
“I’m sketching out now,” he texted another person, adding minutes later: “I’m TRIPPING.”
Freedom
By that time, Pawa had been moved to a fourth location - from the Far North address to a driveway in Whangārei, where she was being kept in the boot of a Volkswagen. She was bound by cable ties, had a bandana around her mouth and was prevented from escaping by a car alarm that was supposed to go off if the boot opened.
On July 6, her 24th day in captivity, she realised the alarm appeared to be off. She saw her opportunity.
“She was subsequently able to escape from the boot of the vehicle,” court documents state. “She ran and flagged down a passing ambulance, and was taken to safety.”
Advertisem*nt
She still had ligature marks on her wrists and ankles during a medical check a short time later, but her injuries weren’t life-threatening.
“She has been subjected to a horrific ordeal,” Detective Senior Sergeant Nick Poland said at the time.
A family member of the victim told the Herald last year their focus was on making sure Pawa was supported in the wake of the traumatic experience.
“Finding her alive was what mattered most,” the family member said. “That is a big relief to us.
“We feared the worst and we didn’t want her to be another statistic.”
Harris will face a sentence of up to 14 years’ imprisonment when he is sentenced later this year. Several others have also been charged with kidnapping. They have pleaded not guilty and await trial.
Advertisem*nt
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.
