A Henty pair has pleaded guilty to a gruesome 24-hour kidnapping incident that left a man in intensive care for five days.
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Nikia Bamblett, 23, and Hunter Green, 28, faced Wagga Local Court this week charged with kidnapping a man and intentionally causing him grievous bodily harm.
Documents tendered to the court revealed a harrowing incident of physical and psychological violence that all began over a few missing toy cars.
Bamblett and Green took their 48-year-old victim in as a lodger at their Railway Parade home halfway through last year.
A few months later, the pair became suspicious that he had stolen the valuable model cars.
When they confronted him on the morning of September 18, he denied stealing the cars, so the pair forced him into a room and repeatedly assaulted him.
“Both offenders bound the victim to a chair using masking tape and ratchet straps. Masking tape was wrapped around the head and face of the victim,” the documents read.
“At one point, a bathtub was filled with water, with both the offenders tipping the victim, whilst the victim was still bound and gagged, towards the full bathtub and threatened to drown him if he did not stop making noises.”
The victim was then left tied up in the bathroom until the following morning, when police received two triple-0 calls about a suspected domestic incident.
When police arrived at the house, Green untied the man and hid him in a bed, threatening to kill him if he alerted the police.
The man remained quiet, and police left the house, unaware of what was occurring.
He had been detained for some 24 hours by the time Green’s brother visited the house and took the victim to Wagga Base Hospital, where he underwent surgery for significant injuries to his face and neck.
His condition was so bad that he had to be airlifted to a Sydney hospital, where he remained in ICU for five days while the entire left side of his face was paralysed.
Wagga Base reported the incident to police, and the duo were arrested on November 15 last year.
On Wednesday, Green and Bamblett were committed to Wagga’s District Court for sentencing by magistrate Imad Abdul-Karim.
The pair will appear in court again on July 27, when their final sentencing date will be decided.
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