A senior Mongrel Mob member who beat his partner to death and then left her body in a bus outside a gang pad claims he has surrendered his patch.

But those who make the call on when he can be released from prison say they want proof.

Quentin Duff was jailed for life with a minimum non-parole period of 14 years and six months in 2009 for the murder of his partner, Bronwyn Aroha Whakaneke.

The 33-year-old’s body was found in an old bus parked outside the Mongrel Mob headquarters in Porirua, Wellington.

Duff pleaded guilty to the charges and accepted the facts of the offending, which stated he hit Whakaneke in the head with a metal pipe before kicking and punching her and then dumping her body.

“... Dog, can you come to the pad? My Mrs is dead,” Duff said in a text message to a gang associate following the fatal beating.

“Dog, I’m looking at a lot of jail now.”

Duff first appeared before the New Zealand Parole Board in July last year when it was heard that, other than being found to be in possession of a cellphone in 2022, he had conducted himself well in prison.

At that hearing, Duff told the board he wanted to leave the Mongrel Mob and they discussed a plan for him to surrender his patch.

But the board made it clear they would need proof.

“We indicated our concern that offering or the possibility of him surrendering his patch would not necessarily convince us he had left the gang. If, in fact, he had left the Mongrel Mob, we wanted certainty,” it stated in the earlier decision.

More recently, Duff made his second appearance before the board and claimed he had since enacted his plan to leave the Mob.

“We would like confirmation,” the authority recorded in its recent decision.

“We invite his case manager to contact the police gang liaison officer in Porirua to see if indeed his patch has been surrendered.”

At that hearing in March this year, 20 members of his whānau appeared in support of Duff.

“It was very reassuring to see the extensive support that they say they can provide to him on release,” the board said.

However, in declining his release, it considered that Duff needed further reintegrative testing and work outside the wire to see how he copes.

They were also concerned by the significant Mongrel Mob presence in the area where it was proposed he would live once out of prison.

The board stated there would need to be a discussion between the gang, Duff and his family to manage his safe release.

Duff will reappear before the board in October this year, when the case manager is expected to report on their findings regarding his claimed exit from the gang.

Jeremy Wilkinson is an Open Justice reporter based in Manawatū covering courts and justice issues with an interest in tribunals. He has been a journalist for nearly a decade and has worked for NZME since 2022.