The former boyfriend of a teen accused of murder leapt to his feet and pointed his finger at her defence lawyer while being questioned about alleged assaults on her.
"What are you trying to say?" Nga Falani demanded in the High Court at Rotorua on Friday.
Justice Geoffrey Venning ordered him to sit down as police in the public gallery moved into the body of the court.
Falani had repeatedly said he couldn't remember, when questioned on various matters by the Crown prosecutor Duncan McWilliam and defence counsel Paul Mabey, QC.
He was the final Crown witness in the trial of Courtney Churchward, 18, and a 15-year-old girl whose name is suppressed.
Both have pleaded not guilty to murdering 78-year-old retired Opotiki teacher John Rowe, who died after being severely beaten in his bed on November 25 last year.
Shortly after Falani appeared on the witness stand Churchward left the dock, accompanied by her Corrections Department escort.
Mabey told the court she had been feeling unwell and did not begin his cross-examination of Falani, until she returned a short while later.
Falani, 25, of Glen Innes, Auckland, admitted he had been interviewed by a detective sergeant after Churchward had arrived at his Auckland home last December.
But he continued to say he was unable to remember details of the interview, though he did accept he had told the officer that Churchward told him she had done something stupid and had to get out of Opotiki.
McWilliam: "She said she had wiped out a nigger - a Black Power member?"
Falani: "I can't remember that."
Shown a written statement he had signed, he agreed he had told the detective he had seen on the news about an `old guy' in
Opotiki, but didn't think that was what Churchward had been talking about.
He accepted the statement and said: "I asked her whether it was the old man she had killed, she told me it had not been her."
Questioned further, Falani said he was unable to remember Churchward saying she was going to get her co-accused out of trouble by saying she had done it (the attack on Rowe).
He agreed with Mabey that Churchward had returned to her mother in Opotiki after their relationship ended in October 2008.
He was unable to remember how it ended.
Asked if he had punched Churchward in the eye and knocked her out when he was drunk, Justice Venning told him he did not have to answer as he could incriminate himself.
When pressed further about hitting her on the head with a golf club or a stubbie, Falani jumped to his feet, demanding to know what Mabey was trying to say.
Shown a video interview with a police officer, Falani acknowledged the man being interviewed could be him.
In the video he said he had hit her (Churchward) in the face and head.
When cross-examination resumed, he told Mabey he couldn't remember if he had been violent to her on other occasions.
The trial will resume on Monday when the defence is due to open its case.
