Noisy neighbour murder: Cold-blood killer jailed for life Wed, 21 Jul 2021, 12:38PM
Tristan Locke was found guilty of murder after a trial at the High Court in Christchurch. (Photo / Kurt Bayer)
Noisy neighbour murder: Cold-blood killer jailed for life Wed, 21 Jul 2021, 12:38PM
An out-of-work barman who stabbed his neighbour to death in cold-blood after an early-morning row over loud music has today been jailed for at least 10 years.
Tristan Ross Locke, 31, was found guilty of murdering neighbour Mark Graham Cowling, 44, on last Father s Day, September 6, 2020, after a trial at the High Court in Christchurch last month.
American-born Locke became so incensed with Cowling phoning noise control, and cutting power to his flat at least twice over a few hours, that he took a knife, went next door, and stabbed him to death, the trial heard.
Marine Lourens05:00, Jun 05 2021
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Listen: The 111 call Tristan Locke made after he fatally stabbed his neighbour Mark Cowling during a dispute over noise.
“If I let go of him right now he s going to die,” Tristan Locke told a 111 operator after a dispute over loud music saw him attack his neighbour. MARINÉ LOURENS reports on the Father’s Day murder. An hour before Tristan Locke stabbed his neighbour to death, he called his grandmother. That’s what he usually did when he was feeling overwhelmed or distressed. It was only his mum and his grandmother who could comfort him when he felt this way. His relationship with them was very close, described by a psychiatrist as “unhealthy”.
Tristan Locke, an autistic man who played loud music at all hours of the night, is charged with murdering his neighbour after he complained about his behaviour.
The pair became embroiled in a dispute soon after Locke moved in a few doors down from Cowling in the same row of houses on June 27, repeatedly arguing over the younger man’s loud music that blasted from his house at all hours of the day and night. On the night of September 5, Cowling turned off the power to Locke’s flat three times in an attempt to get the music to stop.
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Mark Cowling died after an altercation with his neighbour, one which came to a head after a dispute over noise that went on for months. After the third time Locke got a knife from his kitchen, put it in his back pocket, and walked over to Cowling’s flat to confront him.
Tristan Locke played loud music and an electric guitar to ease his mental anguish, jurors were told - but it led to him stabbing his neighbour to death.