Sorry, it's hard not to get emotional.
This is The Manor.
That's where Sophia died.
We, like, spent the whole day
getting ready together.
I got my ears pierced.
We like made dinner together.
Yeah, it's weird to
think back to that day and
know what was going to happen, I guess.
We begin tonight
with the tragic death of a young woman in Dunedin
after a student party gone wrong.
My name's Megan Prentice and I studied at Dunedin
for four years.
And in my second year of university
my best friend, Sophia Crestani died at a flat party.
I love you.
I love you more.
It's really unsafe in Dunedin at the moment because
all of the bars over the last ten years have been shut down
in an effort to stamp out the party culture.
Many used to go to Starters Bar, a student owned venue,
but it closed last year due to health and safety concerns.
All that's done has pushed way too many people into flat
parties, and that's what happened the night Sophia died.
And I'm really, really determined to make sure
that doesn't happen again.
There were quite a few nights
before what happened at The Manor where, you know
the next morning we'd all be talking about, 'oh my God
it was so hard to get in and out of the door' and like,
if you can imagine, like hundreds of people
trying to get into that door and like,
the staircase is really thin.
And I think that was just like
one of the warning signs, I guess.
It was the last Manor party before it was being sold.
There was like, definitely a buzz and it was so crowded.
All of a sudden it was just a body pile up.
It was just...
Like, I was being completely crushed.
I don't really remember, you know, being taken out
but you know, next thing was, I was just like sitting on the curb
and all I could think about was, has Sophia got out?
I think like,
the hardest... the hardest part
is like, knowing how I felt...
Sorry I really want to be able to say this.
Like wondering what she was thinking
and like
how scared she must have been.
I don't want this to come across as though I want party culture
to stop and flat parties to stop
because like, flat parties are so much fun.
I'm just saying that there should be options,
but right now the only option is flats.
I feel like
there was an intentional effort to diminish party culture,
and that's made it way worse
and there's been no accountability from anyone.
Shutting down all the bars, like it's just exacerbated
the unsafety of party culture.
What about flat parties was it that you enjoyed in Dunedin?
What's not to enjoy?
You know, heaps of people your age, everyone's obviously
drinking, so that makes people a bit more fun.
Did you ever feel like they were like,
too many people, it was ever overcrowded at times?
Definitely. Yeah, definitely. There's like
definitely been times where it's kind of seemed
pretty unsafe and like, you know, you kind of
have that feeling like, oh this could go kind of wrong.
Have you been to many flat parties or anything like that?
I'm not the biggest fan of them, but my friends do, yeah.
Can I ask why?
I just think,
I find that I get lost a lot and it like, freaks me out.
A lot of people get like, too drunk I feel
and that's just like, scary to be around, you know?
Have you guys ever heard about like, the old student venues
from like, ten years ago,
like Gardies and the Cook and things like that?
No.
If there were student venues and like, bars
other than town, you know, all the way in the Octi,
would you guys go to them?
Definitely.
Yeah definitely, yep.
I heard stories from people's parents of like,
three storey bars that, you know,
could have so many students in them
and after what happened at The Manor,
one of the number one questions I got asked
mainly by adults was, well where was your uni bar?
All we had was these
shitty old flats.
Nice to see you.
From my experience at university this was the Marsh
Study Center where I studied mainly in second year.
What was it to you?
Well, this was the front entrance of the Gardies
It was one of the big four, so there was four main student bars.
It was a good spot.
So was the Cook, so was The Bowler, so was the Ori.
I've heard so much of, you know
the golden age of student venues in Dunedin
and Gardies and the Cook and what was it like?
It could be carnage at night, but it was good carnage.
You know, because it was controlled carnage.
It was in a supervised, controlled environment.
So I'm in there, I've got 500 people there and a young staff,
I knew when things were starting to lose their shape a bit
and so you would do something about it.
That's what we did. We were publicans.
And I think it's the same as it is now.
It's just that back then there was
you guys to kind of oversee everything.
These are young people,
they don't want to sort of sit
around politely and chat and you know,
they want to get up and have a wiggle
and bounce around and just enjoy themselves for God sake.
Okay, so this is the
Gardies limo, our courtesy vehicle.
So why did the student venues go away?
We're not begrudging the supermarkets
but they took the majority of the sales,
so then 80% of that liquor is sold elsewhere.
How do we pay our bills?
And then the varsity offered
good money for this place because they just wanted it.
They thought they were closing down a problem
and absolutely nothing changed on
Castle Street, nothing changed on Hyde Street.
Do you feel like there was a deliberate effort
to minimise party culture and student culture in Dunedin?
Yeah, look there was, the varsity
especially were always keen to have that more campus
style environment, like maybe an American campus.
They thought it reflected badly on north Dunedin
but then look at some of the states of the flats
from these absentee landlords.
I think students are
blamed for so much of what goes on in Dunedin
and what happens and the state of the streets
and the overcrowding of the parties.
But if you imagine, like a super busy intersection
and there's heaps of crashes going on,
everyone's still going to drive so you put up a sign
or you put up traffic lights, like
students are still going to party,
give them a place to party like, put bins on the streets
for them to put their drinks in, like
we're almost set up to fail down here.
This week Megan Prentice should have been
celebrating her friend Sophia Crestani's 22nd birthday.
Instead she's cleaning up Dunedin's Castle Street
in her honour.
In her memory The Sophia Charter was launched
in 2020, designed to improve student safety.
Sophia's parents came down
after they got, you know, the most horrible news
and they were straight away like, right,
how are we going to change this? What are we going to do?
And so that's how The Sophia Charter got set up.
The Sophia Charter is a sort of shared pledge between
some key agencies like
the uni, Fire and Emergency, Police.
It's, how can we make Dunedin
even more fun but safe?
I definitely was frustrated with sort of the lack of student
engagement in the beginning of the charter.
There was a little bit of backlash
when it was launched because it was kind of viewed
as this thing that was going to
stop the fun.
But I'm now a partner of the charter
and we're getting way
more students involved and engaged with the charter.
Yes hi, it's
nice to properly meet you in person.
The uni's major role with students is obviously education,
but I think that a lot of people do come down here for the fun
and the culture and, you know,
there's no other place in New Zealand
where there's everyone living next door to each other
and what role do you think
that you play in terms of protecting the students
and making sure that there are safe spaces?
We are clearly influential in the city.
We are acutely aware of that boundary
and, you know
we can cross that to be interfering into young adults
private lives.
But then we recognize the responsibility,
the fact they're here
because of the university, and that's part of the environment.
So we've invested a lot in trying to support
students and decision making and encouraging safe
parties and safe housing, etcetera.
Could you expand a little bit more on that in terms
of what actions that the uni has taken to address safe
partying and safe flat parties and that kind of thing?
We have invested a lot in our 24/7
Campus Watch and our Proctors office.
How do you see student venues as a way to go forward
in the future? Like, what role
do you think that would play in making flat parties safer?
Socialisation is going to happen, that's important,
and having a variety of options
that are safe is obviously what we want to support.
For me one of the quick wins is, you know,
opening up a student venue and that's going to release
so much of the pressure of flat parties
being the only place for students to go.
I like, don't see myself tapping out of this fight at all
because Sophia died and she was my best friend
and no one else should ever have to lose their best friend
and no other 19-year-old person
should have to die having fun in Dunedin.