A former Queenstown builder, who went bankrupt owing almost $1 million and was dubbed “completely reckless” by a liquidator, has been jailed for rape.
In Hamilton’s court on Monday, Jaden Arian Melgren was sentenced to prison for six years and four months by Judge Jonathan Down.
The 46-year-old was found guilty of the charge following a jury trial in August.
On a night in December, 2013, Melgren went to a woman’s home where they drank a ‘‘substantial’’ amount of alcohol and took a ‘‘modest’’ amount of LSD.
The woman was so drunk she decided to go to bed and woke some time later to find Melgren having sex with her.
She was shocked and told him to get off — he left the bedroom.
The judge said there was evidence at trial Melgren returned later, but the reason for doing so was ‘‘unclear’’ on the evidence.
Crown prosecutor Jacinda Hamilton pushed for an eight-year start point, while Melgren’s counsel, Richard Barnsdale, suggested a six-year start.
The judge accepted the offending was out of character and, from a start point of seven years and six months, applied a 15% discount for a cultural report, remorse, insight and rehabilitative factors, noting there’s a ‘‘reasonable prospect’’ of Melgren not committing any similar offences on release.
Melgren’s known locally for leaving several contractors tens of thousands of dollars out of pocket after his company, True Line Builders, went into voluntary liquidation on July 25, 2017.
He also had building companies in Auckland and Whitianga.
Melgren was the sole director while his then-wife, Jackie, was the sole shareholder, though she was removed from the company the day before he put it into liquidation.
At the time, he told Mountain Scene he was ‘‘absolutely livid and gutted’’ and described it as ‘‘the crappiest month of my life’’.
Prior to the liquidation, creditors seized some of the company’s assets in Queenstown, and the company’s former liquidator, Imran Kamal, claimed they were being hidden.
Kamal told Scene he was enlisting a private investigator and lawyer to get them back.
On August 1 that year, Melgren incorporated a new company, Melcon Ltd — it was removed by that November.
He was adjudicated bankrupt in 2018, the same year Old School Carpentry was set up by his now ex-wife, Jackie, in Auckland.
She was its sole director, but it went under in April, 2019.
Its latest liquidator’s report shows Inland Revenue’s (IRD) filed a preferential claim for $127,102.79, with four unsecured creditor claims totalling $35,905.01
Kamal told Scene in 2019 Melgren was ‘‘completely reckless’’, because he continued to work for a year without paying any GST or PAYE — more than $793,000 is still outstanding from Trueline’s liquidation.
The latest report for that company, published by Principle Insolvency’s Kevin Davies in June, says Jackie’s defaulted on payments to repay debt owed from an overdrawn shareholder’s account.
‘‘The liquidator is communicating with her accountant to arrange a possible settlement.
‘‘The current liquidator is working with the previous liquidator [Kamal] to understand the current situation of collection of debts from the shareholder.’’
Preferential creditor IRD’s got a claim in for $183,314.26, while unsecured creditors’ claims total $609,901.21.
‘‘Any prospect of a distribution to the creditors depends on the quantum of the recovery from the shareholder’s current account,’’ Davies says.
Between July, 2021 and this past January there were no receipts or payments made, with the company’s account at $0.
— ADDITIONAL REPORTING: NZ HERALD