New Zealand’s mosque gunman jailed for life with no parole
THE MAN responsible for New Zealand’s deadliest mass shooting has been sentenced to life imprisonment without parole.
Brenton Tarrant, 29, an Australian national, is the first person in New Zealand’s history to receive the maximum possible penalty for murder.
At the Christchurch High Court yesterday, Tarrant offered no opposition to the sentence.
Tarrant stormed into two Christchurch mosques on March 15 last year aiming to kill as many people as possi- ble with military-style firearms.
He live-streamed the meticulously planned slaughter on social media. Fifty-one Muslims died and 40 were wounded.
Tarrant, 29, who moved to New Zealand in 2017, pleaded guilty to multiple murder charges, attempted murders, and one charge of terrorism.
He attacked Al Noor Mosque and the
Linwood Islamic Centre during Friday prayers, when they are at their busiest.
After his arrest, Tarrant told police he regretted not killing more people.
Mark Zarifeh, the crown prosecutor, revealed Tarrant had expressed regret for his actions while in prison and claimed to no longer be xenophobic or anti-islam.
Mr Zarifeh told the court that psychologists had found Tarrant to have “cognitive distortions” around his offending but no psychological disorders. Tarrant accepted responsibility for the attacks, acknowledging they were “abhorrent and irrational”, said
Mr Zarifeh. Justice Cameron Mander called Tarrant’s admission of regret “self-serving”.
Tarrant spent the three days before sentencing listening as 91 of his victims addressed the judge and himself. Survivors and family of the dead voiced their despair, anger, and defiance.
Overwhelmingly, Tarrant’s victims told him he had failed to divide the country or crack their faith. They spoke of compassion shown to them in the attacks’ aftermath and their heightened feeling of acceptance in New Zealand.
Sheikh Rubel, 35, said he would never forget lying in a pile of bodies as Tarrant returned to the room.
“I was thinking about my mother, my daughter, my pregnant wife. Thinking about who would pick my daughter up from school that day,” he said.
“I was hit by bullet after bullet, just waiting to get one in my head or chest. I was waiting to die.”
But he told Tarrant directly: “You failed. We win.”