July 06, 2014
Shame the punishment for king’s son
The head of justice lobby group Rethinking Crime and Punishment says the son of the Maori king has a long road ahead to win acceptance back into his tribal community.
Kim Workman says public outrage around the discharge without conviction of Korotangi Paki on theft and drink driving charges misses the point that his circumstances are different.
He says in most cases public shaming has the opposite effect to that intended, because marginalised and powerless offenders end up feeling less ashamed and more comfortable in their role as society’s outsiders.
The exceptions are people who live in tribal societies, white collar criminals and respectable law abiding citizens who fall by the wayside once, and have the resources and resilience to clamber their way back into society.
Mr Workman says Paki’s shame is not just personal thing, as it’s a topic of discussion within Tainui marae.
He will have to prove himself in order to restore dignity and respect to his father and whanau, and nothing else the Court could have done would equal the severity of the sentence of shame he is undergoing.
Copyright © 2014, UMA Broadcasting Ltd