‘Arrogant’ porn star leaves trail of outrage across Auckland
Sunday, 19 January 2025
He calls the girls in his videos ‘victims’, drives his $500k Lamborghini at 160kph in built-up city streets and unashamedly takes mobility parking spots. Dayne Williams, or NZ Dan to his followers, says he doesn’t “give a f…” about criticism but that hasn’t stopped him being put under the spotlight by disability advocates and politicians. Jonathan Killick investigates.
Warning: This story contains descriptions of graphic sexual content.
A prolific Kiwi adult entertainer is leaving a trail of controversy across Auckland, becoming notorious not just for boundary-pushing online content but also repeated parking breaches in his Lamborghini.
Dayne Williams, who sells his pornographic videos online under the moniker NZ Dan, says he doesn’t “give a f…” about complaints related to him illegally using disabled car parks - and is leaning into the furore, posting photos online showing his $515,000 vehicle in spots reserved for those with disability parking permits.
It’s not just indignant members of the public protesting Williams; disability advocates, politicians and parking enforcers also labelled him an “arrogant arsehole” in interviews with the Sunday Star-Times.
Williams says the posts were just for entertainment, part of an edgy “persona” he cultivates online, and people were “dumb enough to fall for it”. But, advocate Raewyn Hailes of CCS Disability Action says “it’s not a joke”.
“It’s plain straight out arrogance … I wish [he] would have to use a wheelchair for a month and actually see what it felt like and how hard it is to do very ordinary things.”
She says taking up a disabled park even for the short time it takes to make a video about it could potentially be life-threatening for someone with a genuine disability.
“We get reports every single day of people who can't go to the doctor, because they can't get a park close to the doctors … worst scenario, people just simply die because they don't leave their homes.”
MP Kahurangi Carter, who is the Green Party spokesperson for disability, calls the behaviour “gross and greedy”.
“Anybody who uses a mobility spot without a permit needs some educating,” she says.
Williams, meanwhile, writes online that he likes to park across two disability car parks simply to stop “a disabled person parking next to [the Lambo] and damaging the car”.
A riled-up member of the public responds: “I would have accidentally scratched that car.”
Williams hits back with: “sorry aunty, you’re too poor to live on the North Shore.”
Kaipātiki Local Board chair John Gillon says that’s a “terrible” attitude. He says he has a daughter with a disability and knows how important the parks are.
“It’s extremely arrogant and ‘un-Kiwi’ to abuse mobility parks in this way … NZ Dan should leave his Lamborghini in the garage, if he’s too scared to park it properly.”
So, how can the rules be enforced against some who so blatantly flouts them? Parking enforcer Jake Thomas, who founded Parking Services Ltd, says it’s difficult because private parks, which make up the majority of spaces, aren’t covered under new rules which increased infringement penalties to $750 for council- and government-owned parks.
Private car park owners have to sign up for enforcement, and those caught are only liable for an approximate $100 fine - a drop in the bucket to luxury supercar owners who continue to flout the rules.
“It’s another case of people being arseholes,” says Thomas. “They obviously just don’t realise how disruptive it is to people’s lives.”
The controversy surrounding Williams goes beyond just parking, with his Lamborghini Huracan being driven at 160kph on Ponsonby’s Richmond Road - where the speed limit is 50kph. He’s also had to defend allegations of filming underage girls, which saw involvement of police.
Williams tells the Star-Times those allegations stem from his early career when he wasn’t as professional, and he says he did nothing illegal.
In a post, Williams addresses his detractors saying “nothing I’ve done is wrong, and I’ve got nothing to apologise for … The only reason you hating on ol’ uncle Dan is because he is now winning.”
In a short time, he’s become possibly New Zealand’s highest-selling porn producer, attributing his success to hyper-local content with people buying videos because they might star “a girl they went to school with”.
He often refers to those girls online as his “victims”, and his content has been based around a Mercedes-Benz Sprinter van which he ostensibly drives around South Auckland picking up “aunties”, as he calls them, luring them in with “KFC and Codys”.
Videos feature titles such as “Young Kiwi MILF gets f…ed in NZ Dan’s van at Auckland City Viaduct”, and “gym fit 19 teen Kiwi girl signs up for porn”.
On his social media he declares “exposing sluts and ruining their future has literally paid for my $515,000 Lamborghini”, adding: “my only regret is not wrecking more sluts along the way”.
He justifies his foul-mouthed antics to the Star-Times, saying he’s just “playing along” with society’s expectations of him.
“People have already sold themselves on the idea that I'm a bad person, so I'll just kind of let them have it.”
Yet, there’s one critic the 36-year-old South African, who was raised in New Zealand, does regret getting offside with, and that’s his father. He says his parents “disapprove” of his career choice.
“That’s why I tame it down at times,” he says.
Raided by police
Late last year, Williams returned to New Zealand after spending a stretch in South America, where he claims young women are more relaxed about starring in pornography. He says “NZ is so conservative”, adding that people spread “crazy rumours” about the legitimacy of his videos online.
“I came back [because] pissing off people in NZ is more fun than [filming] Latinas in Colombia every single day,” he wrote in a post announcing his return.
Soon after, he bought the Lamborghini and it has fast become part of his online agitations, which involve posting his car parked on yellow lines, in mobility spots or across multiple car parks, taking up as much room as possible.
Williams invited this reporter for a spin in the Lamborghini, asking for the dashboard to be filmed while he proceeded to accelerate the car to 160kph on Ponsonby’s Richmond Road.
“I could lose my licence for this,” he says, suddenly showing some recognition of the gravity of the situation.
Blatantly committing a crime might seem an odd thing to do with a journalist in the car, but in his own words, Williams simply “doesn’t give a f…”.
“To be honest, nothing drives me. I just wanted to have fun, make money in the process, and have the freedom to do whatever I wanted,” he tells the Star-Times.
“Sometimes I just enjoy expressing that freedom … not many people actually have freedom, in the way they can't say or do what they want without their life falling apart. They can lose their job for saying the wrong thing.”
“I can just jump on a plane, go overseas and then nobody knows who I am … [I’m] willing to sacrifice life in NZ, if needed.”
Williams claims he lost a job as a personal gym trainer at Les Mills for provocative behaviour, although clarifies it was because he dropped a weighted medicine ball on a client, and refused to apologise.
In defence of his parking controversies and the backlash, he points out that he has much worse said about him online.
“I’ve had a couple situations where a couple girls agreed to meet up with me, and then they turned out to be under 18 - they would have been like 17 or 16 - and they told all their friends.”
“I didn’t post anything online … and technically it’s still legal, but with a couple of situations like that, word spreads around and then all of I sudden I’m a paedo, but its like bro, shut the f… up.
“Who builds a business without making a mistake?,” he says defensively.
Williams says he’s also had disputes with girls that saw involvement from police. Some girls feel “cheated” after being paid a couple of hundred dollars while their videos went “viral” as Williams’ notoriety later grew.
Another girl thought her identity would be protected because her video was behind a paywall, but gained a profile after Williams’ customers posted a screenshot of her face online.
Following complaints from girls, police raided Williams’ family home, he says (he was living with his parents at the time).
“I saw three cops coming down the drive and then a knock on the door … I ripped everything out of my computer and hid it behind the cupboard.”
In one of his social media posts, Williams drives past a prison, declaring that he’s “too smooth” for police.
“Chur the bros in Mt Eden. That’s where I should have been, but I’m not… I’m in a Lamborghini motherf…ers,” he says in the video.
But, Williams’ intentionally outrageous ways may finally be catching up with him. He tells the Star-Times he’s sometimes fearful to drive the Lambo out in public because of “negative attention” he now receives.
He admits he may have taken things a step too far when he took to social media following the gang patch ban, encouraging gang members’ girlfriends to leave their man and star in pornography.
He says a member of the Head Hunters called him out online, challenging him to a fight. Williams is a former boxing national champ, and says he’s started retraining. Although, the five-foot-five 36-year-old may find his opponent to be above his weight class.
Fines less costly than dents
Williams’ online profile, and the distinctive Lamborghini, mean he is easily recognised in public. Several young men honk their horns and approach the car window as he drives around Auckland’s CBD with the Star-Times.
It means he has to be extra careful about where he parks, and sometimes that means getting ‘creative’. As he says in one online post: “parking tickets are better than a car door dent.”
The Government recently recently increased the fine for parking in a disability spot without a permit to $750, but it doesn’t appear to have stopped some drivers from abusing the rules.
Both parking enforcer Jake Thomas and disability advocate Raewyn Hailes say for those that can afford them, tickets aren’t a deterrent, and impounding vehicles would be a better solution.
Thomas, meanwhile, fed up with recidivist parking offenders, has released an app that allows other motorists to dob in people in disabled parks with GPS and time-coded images, with a view to ensuring they are fined.
“It’s just a total f…ing arrogance … it doesn’t matter how much money you have, you’re still being a f…wit.”
Williams regularly flaunts his wealth, posting screenshots on his NZ Dan Facebook page showing hundreds of thousands of dollars in sales of his x-rated films.
“Some days I do nothing at all, and my videos still earn me $1000,” he says.
Meanwhile, far from costing him money, pictures of poor parking uploaded online add to his notoriety, translating to increased sales, he claims.
“Thanks to the haters for getting the word out and making me a stack of coin,” he says unrepentantly.
“If you keep it up, I’ll buy another Lambo next year too.”
What do you think? Email sundayletters@stuff.co.nz. Please include your full name and address.