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Summarised by Centrist
Next week, Brenton Harrison Tarrant, convicted for the Christchurch mosque attacks, will appear before the Court of Appeal.
He will argue that his guilty pleas were extracted through coercion and abuse rather than entered freely.
Tarrant was sentenced in August 2020 to life imprisonment without parole after admitting to murdering 51 people, attempting to murder 40 others, and committing a terrorist act during the 15 March 2019 attacks on two Christchurch mosques.
The pleas came abruptly in March 2020, after he had initially prepared to fight the charges at trial.
According to court documents, Tarrant now claims: “I only entered a guilty plea under duress through torture.” He alleges he was “held under illegal and torturous prison conditions,” denied access to legal material, and affected by what he described as “irrationality brought on through prison conditions.”
Those claims sit at the heart of a bid to revive an appeal that is more than two years out of time. Under New Zealand law, the court must first decide whether to grant leave for such a late appeal. That requires Tarrant to explain the delay and show there is at least an arguable case.
The five-day hearing in Wellington is expected to include evidence from Tarrant himself, supported by lawyers whose identities remain permanently suppressed on safety grounds.
The Crown will oppose the application, while a separate court-appointed lawyer will act as an independent adviser to ensure the process is fair.
In his filing, Tarrant described the scope of his appeal as “myriad and far-reaching,” claiming it “implicates many people and is of international significance.”
