Press Release

MANA Leader Hone Harawira

Thursday 24th May

Mana Leader Condemns Sentencing of Urewera Four

“Bloody ridiculous” said MANA Leader Hone Harawira in condemning the prison sentences handed down today in the case of the Urewera Four.

“The judge simply picked the worst bits out of 67,000 pages of evidence to justify the most extreme interpretation of events and give him the grounds for the heavy sentence of 2½ years”.

Harawira said the judge had ignored the recent trial where jurors couldn’t reach a verdict and decided on his own authority that the Urewera Four did in fact belong to a criminal group and sentenced accordingly.

“Waste of time having a jury trial if the judge can retry the case at sentencing” said Harawira. “In fact I hear he went further than what the Crown actually claimed in their original case”.

Harawira also said that the police would be happy with the decision “because the judge had given them what the jury wouldn’t”.

“But by jailing Tame Iti and Te Rangikaiwhiria Kemara simply to vindicate the actions of the police, the state had made political prisoners out of them both”.

Harawira said that MANA would oppose the sentences and support any appeal that the defendants decided to pursue. “We will also be putting in a call to Amnesty International to look into their unjust sentencing”.

ENDS

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