Ben Purua. Photo: Supplied / Kiwibank New Zealander of the Year Awards
After a childhood filled with gang violence and facing imprisonment for manslaughter at 16, a finalist for the KiwiBank Young New Zealander of the Year credits farming, family and forgiveness for allowing him to change his life.
By the time he was 15, Ben Purua knew little outside an upbringing filled with crime and violence.
"To me as a kid, I thought that that was sort of normal with the gangs, the drugs, the parties... this sort of environment meant that eventually, I felt I was going to become a product of that."
This path led Purua, and two teenage friends, to a deadly encounter with Donald Stewart at a Hamilton public toilet in 2010 after the trio demanded the 74-year-old hand over the keys to his car.
When he refused, Stewart was dragged behind an alley and repeatedly punched and kicked, before the teens took his car for a joyride.
The pensioner's body was discovered the next day.
Although the court did not claim Purua joined in the beating that led to Stewart's death, for his part in the crime, he was sentenced to five years and six months imprisonment, with a minimum sentence of half that time.
Over a decade later, he tells Saturday Morning's Mihingarangi Forbes it was hard to imagine breaking that cycle of violence back then.
"In those environments, you see a lot of trauma in, I guess, a lot of broken people.
"You seem to hide a lot of your feelings and pain behind those sort of staunch... facade."
Upon turning 16 he was sent to Waikeria Prison, where he joined other adult inmates.
But it was at there that he was introduced to farming, through the prison's agriculture program, and his mindset began to change.
"It was that alone, the freedom out on the farm... I fell in love with the peace and the connection to the whenua and the love for the animals sort of grew."
Despite an early release for good behaviour, Purua said he faced a few setbacks and was recalled to prison on minor charges.
It was sometime around 2016, he said, that he became determined to put his former life behind him.
He credits the change to the support of his partner and the forgiveness of the victim's family.
"That was huge... just that, their word forgiveness alone is quite powerful.
"Up until then even though I had got released from prison... I was still imprisoned within my own mind, still serving my own sentence."
Today Purua is the manager of a 540-cow farm near Tirau.
He is the winner of the Central Central Plateau Dairy Manager of the Year competition and the 2024 Ahuwhenua Young Māori Farmer of the Year.
The father of three has a large social media following, runs a clothing line Kāmu tō Pāmu, and works as a farm day speaker and mentor at Waikeria Prison.
He said he aims to inspire change in others.
"Coming from a troubled background, coming from adversity... poverty and addictions and rejection. I think many people can relate to that journey.
"It doesn't matter where you are right now, it doesn't matter where you've come from, there is a pathway out if you want it."
The winner of this year's KiwiBank Young New Zealander of the Year award will be announced on 20 March.
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