Brenton Tarrant, perpetrator of the Christchurch massacre that killed 51 people in 2019, claims the conditions of detention were ‘tortuous and inhumane’ and prevented him from making rational decisions when pleading guilty.
The perpetrator of the attack on two mosques in the New Zealand city of Christchurch (east of the South Island) in 2019 today presented an appeal to try to overturn his life sentence for the attack in which 51 people died.
The attack occurred on March 15, 2019, when the man, an Australian national, opened fire with semi-automatic weapons on people gathered in two mosques in Christchurch and broadcast the shots live for several minutes. Before the attack, he published a manifesto on the Internet.
Brenton Tarrant, who acknowledged the facts and was sentenced in August 2020 to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, claimed today, in a video hearing before the Auckland Court of Appeal, that The conditions during the process of his detention were “tortuous and inhumane”, which, according to him, prevented him from making rational decisions when pleading guilty.
Tarrant stated during the hearing that any expression of regret expressed before sentencing was the product of an “irrational” mental state caused, according to the claim, by extreme isolation and the deterioration of his mental health in prison.
“I expressed some remorse, but it was induced by the conditions of confinement,” he told the judges, in statements collected by New Zealand public radio RNZ.
Tarrant claimed he was “forced” to plead guilty in March 2020 and that he feared that he would not be able to adequately defend himself in a possible trial due to tremors, speech impediments and other symptoms of psychological instability.
“If I had another option, I would have chosen it,” he said, acknowledging that, in hindsight, requesting a postponement would have been the right decision.
As explained at the hearing, which Tarrant attended from Auckland prison, psychological assessments carried out before sentencing concluded that he was fit to stand trial and make statements of guilt, and his lawyers at the time raised no doubts about his ability to give legal instructions.
According to a court summary, today’s appeal was filed after the deadline, so the court must first decide whether to grant permission for it to proceed.
If the court confirms the conviction, a separate hearing is scheduled to examine a possible appeal against the sentence imposed.
After the massacre in March 2019, the New Zealand Government tightened gun legislation and promoted measures to combat violent extremism online.
The appeal hearing is being held with strong access restrictions, but the victims’ families were able to watch it via videoconference.
