A self-proclaimed white supremacist who killed 51 Muslim worshipers at two Christchurch mosques in March 2019 has appealed his conviction and life sentence. No date has been set for the hearing, a spokesman for the Court of Appeal in the capital Wellington told several New Zealand media on Tuesday. Brendon Tarrant, then 29, was sentenced in August 2020 to life in prison without parole for killing 51 people and attempting to kill 40 others at two Christchurch mosques, the worst mass killing in New Zealand history. It was the first time a New Zealand court had sentenced someone to life in prison. Judge Cameron Mander said he imposed the harshest sentence given the scale of the crime. “Your crimes are so heinous, that even if you are kept until you die, the demands of punishment and denunciation will not be exhausted,” Mander said at the time. In November 2021, Tarrant’s then-lawyer, Tony Ellis, said the gunman considered appealing the verdict, claiming his guilty plea was made under duress and that he had been subjected to “inhuman and degrading treatment” while held in remands . In an emailed response on Tuesday, Ellis told the Reuters news agency that he was no longer representing Tarrant. The Australian national stormed the mosques armed with military-style semi-automatic weapons, shooting indiscriminately at Muslims gathered for Friday prayers and live-streaming the killings on social media. The youngest of the victims was three-year-old Mucaad Ibrahim, who was born in New Zealand to Somali parents. The oldest was 77-year-old Muse Awale, a retired religious teacher. Temel Atacocugu, who was shot nine times in the attacks, said the attacker just wanted attention. “I would like to say to him, grow up, be a man and die quietly in prison because that’s what you deserve,” Atacocugu told news website Stuff. “I saw him when he shot me. If he thinks he shouldn’t be in prison forever or die in prison, he’s just dreaming.” New Zealand moved quickly to ban the sale of rifles and semi-automatic weapons after the attack. it has also moved to strengthen hate speech laws and increase penalties for incitement to hatred and discrimination. An inquiry into the killings concluded that since intelligence agencies had diverted their efforts away from investigating right-wing threats and instead focused heavily on the “threat of Islamist extremist activity”, they could not have been alerted for imminent attack. Asked about the gunman’s appeal, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern repeated her promise, made shortly after the attacks, not to name him. “It is a story that should not be told and his name is a name that should not be repeated and I will apply the same rule in commenting on his attempt to re-victimize people,” Ardern said. “We shouldn’t give him anything,” he said.
