Face of the Day

The transgender refugee who poured tomato juice over the head of controversial British activist Posie Parker during a raucous rally at Auckland Central’s Albert Park, had previously been the victim of serious assaults spurred by discrimination.

That traumatic background made it “somewhat more understandable” that Eli Rubashkyn “succumbed to this instance of poor decision-making”, a High Court at Auckland judge has noted in a newly released appeal decision.

But despite his at-times sympathetic tone, Justice David Johnstone said he couldn’t overturn a district court decision denying the 36-year-old pharmacist a discharge without conviction because of the message it would send to others.

“... It is important that those who wish to oppose, by protesting against, views they consider abhorrent, do so without engaging in physical attacks,” he wrote near the conclusion of his 11-page decision.

“The courts should be seen to denounce, and in that way generally to deter, that form of protest, because of the risk it will be copied, perhaps more harmfully, and because of its inherent tendency to undermine rather than facilitate the rule of law.”

Rubashkyn, whose legal name is Eliana Golberstein, arrived at the Albert Park band rotunda on March 25 last year amid a “Let Women Speak” rally by Parker that had drawn a massive, chaotic crowd of protesters and counter-protesters.

[He] was charged with two counts of assault after [he] poured the juice over Parker, whose legal name is Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull, and event organiser Tania Sturt, who was standing next to Parker.

Rubashkyn lost [his] job after the incident, which was filmed and which [he] admitted to in a television interview.

NZ Herald