Not much of a kernel

Stuff reports:

A teen who avoided jail for the brutal beating of a 78-year-old man is back before the courts charged with aggravated robbery.

It hasn’t been three months since Judge Bridget Mackintosh addressed the teen in the Napier District Court, telling him there were “some kernels of hope” that he and his co-offender would go on to become “much, much better people”.

Media are only permitted to report on Youth Court matters with a judge’s approval. It was granted to Stuff on that occasion.

The youth and his older co-offender had violently assaulted the elderly man in his home and left him for dead in January 2022.

These kernels of hope are paid for by the victims of further crime.