October 30, 2012
Lawyer disappointed about Tame Iti’s appeal rejection
The lawyer for Tame Iti says his client is an important part of the way New Zealand is changing – and so are the courts.
The Court of Appeal this week rejected the appeal by Iti against his 30-month jail sentence on weapons charges arising out of camps in Te Urewera in 2007.
Russell Fairbrother says the decision is a sign of how conservative the court has become, and he expects the Supreme Court will take a different view.
He says the Tuhoe terror trial and pending legal action on Maori water claims are part of a wider debate about national identity.
“I think that the debates that are going on both racial and cultural are really important debates. They antagonise people, they upset some people, but they make us all think. What Tame Iti does particularly is he challenges, he doesn’t provide the answers for you, and you gotta work them out yourself. So if you immediately say that he is a nutter or an extremist, save you thinking about it. But if you do think about what he says, you have your own conversation and your much better person for it.” says Fairbrother.
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