Joanna Thantu, 11 February, 2026
“It would not have happened but for you.”
That was the blunt message in the New Plymouth District Court after a South Taranaki violent eviction over cats ended with a woman beaten in the street and a rifle fired in the dark.
It started with an offer of help.
Sheryl Louden, 54, invited a homeless woman to stay at her Ōpunake home. The woman arrived with her cats. Arguments followed. Louden told her to leave. The woman said she would go in the morning.
She didn’t get the chance.
At about 2.30am on June 13 last year, three people arrived at the property. During the Ōpunake court case, the New Plymouth District Court heard the victim was dragged outside, punched repeatedly and had her head stomped on.
One of the group carried a rifle.
When the victim’s daughter later tried to recover her mother’s phone and the cats, a shot was fired at her feet. She was not hit.
Louden did not throw the punches. She did not fire the rifle. But the New Plymouth District Court found she helped set the eviction in motion and knew violence was a real possibility.
She pleaded guilty to being a party to injuring with intent to injure in what has become known locally as the assault over cats NZ case.
The victim told the court she now suffers panic attacks, seizures and ongoing fear. She has since left Ōpunake.
Judge Turitea Bolstad said the South Taranaki violent eviction would not have unfolded without Louden’s actions.
Louden was sentenced to nine months’ imprisonment. As a first-time offender, that was converted to four months and two weeks of community detention, along with six months’ supervision.
Two co-accused have pleaded guilty and await sentencing in the New Plymouth District Court. A third has denied the charge and will go to trial.
A row over household cats is now a criminal conviction in South Taranaki — and a reminder of how quickly a domestic dispute can turn into serious violence.
The Paper 