Judge Gerard Lynch, black gown flowing raven-esque, strides onto the bench at 9.59am, one minute early, startling the pattering eloquence of lawyers; an indication that today he is in no mood for antics.
Half an hour earlier, the registrar of Courtroom 8 – a Ministry of Justice staff member who is one of the most important people in the building, liaising between judges, lawyers, defendants, witnesses, police officers, and other professionals - ventures out of the then-locked door.
“Have you seen a prosecutor?” she asks around. It is bustling with members of the public and duty solicitors with files tucked under their arms like rugby balls.
“No prosecutor, no duty [lawyer] in the cells,” sighs the registry officer. “It’s going to be one of those days.”
A Mongrel Mob gang member – red cap, red sweatshirt, white trackies, red Nikes - leans proprietorially at the bail counter. A teen hiding in a hoodie plays tinny music from a phone with a cracked screen. Security staff watch on.
A Ministry of Justice survey is being carried out with people waiting for court to open.
“Have you been to court before?” the questionnaire poses.
“Yeah.”
“Roughly how many times in your lifetime have you been to court?”
“Oh, ‘bout 15?”
It’s a busy Monday on the first floor of the Christchurch Justice Precinct, a $300m glass building in the heart of the Garden City that opened in 2017 and which houses 19 courtrooms for the District Court, High Court, Youth Court, and Maori Land Court, all in one place beside the largest combined justice and emergency services facility in Australasia.
In its short history, the court building has already witnessed some major New Zealand judicial moments, including the mosque attack terrorist’s sentencing, double killer and rapist Paul Wilson, and the Mama Hooch rapists.
Three jury trials are scheduled to begin today. A long line of prospective jurors, who are looking lost and a little anxious, angles down Lichfield St in the crisp morning air.
On the first floor, overlooking the sun-filled ground floor atrium in what feels a little like a mid-tier hotel, a woman in pink fluffy slippers and poor posture is slumped on a seat, vividly telling an associate of a weekend fracas.
“I said, ‘F*** you motherf****** and pulled down my pants and showed them f****** everything’.”
At 9.31am, a police prosecutor, a sergeant in uniform, arrives in District Courtroom 8, wheeling a long-haul suitcase of files. She lugs it to the front of three benches in the body of the wood-panelled room. The prosecutor sits at the front, beside a probation officer, with the next two rows dedicated to defence lawyers, duty solicitors, barristers, and the odd King’s Counsel (KC). At the side are places for bail support services, Restorative Justice, and a psychiatric nurse.
Lawyers are already queuing to speak with the police representative who is taking thick files out of the suitcase and arranging them in alphabetical order. Spreading over the table, they hold information on each of the 28 people arrested over the weekend and overnight and who will appear in court this morning.
The lawyers want to discuss their cases. Often, they are needing to know if the police will oppose their client’s bid for bail.
The charges for this morning’s cases include domestic violence, methamphetamine, burglary, assault, shoplifting and other thefts, wilful damage, drink-driving, resisting arrest, breaching bail and protection orders, and trespassing.
Of the 28 morning cases, 10 of them are women. The ages range from 18 to 50, with a seemingly disproportionate number of men in their 40s.
Judge Lynch gets the first case called: a 27-year-old man from Aranui accused of assaulting a woman he is in a family relationship with.
As well as the domestic violence charge, he faces a breach of prison release conditions, by consuming alcohol and failing to report to his probation officer.
The man appears on TV screen. Rather than being brought into the dock, he is in police custody downstairs. The audio-visual link (AVL) system means he can see the judge and his lawyer, and other players inside the room.
Judge Lynch gets him to confirm his identity and checks that he can hear him.
The man’s lawyer wants to make a bail application later in the day. The judge allows it but says: “Sure, but he’s got some problems hasn’t he.”
He’ll reappear later in the morning.
Case two’s lawyer wants it adjourned until the afternoon, saying they need to check out a bail address.
But Judge Lynch isn’t having it. “I’m not standing anything down today.”
He wants to crack on. The man is remanded in custody until tomorrow when he can try to get out on bail.
A 27-year-old woman wearing a pink dressing gown and facing a serious charge of doing grievous bodily harm is quickly granted bail – which was not opposed by police.
The fourth case inside eight minutes is a young mum on a bunch of shoplifting charges, including stealing shoes from a mall.
She looks bored.
Judge Lynch is surprised that police aren’t challenging her release on bail.
He holds up a thick stack of yellow paper, highlighting how many charges she faces.
“Are there no pleas on these charges?” the judge asks.
Annoyed, he stands the case down to 11.45am.
“I’m not going to rubber stamp [bail],” he says, wanting more information.
Concrete workers, fishermen, cleaners, contractors, shop assistants, a manager. Radford. Yardley. Pomare. Faasao. Kazakos. Shaw. They are called one after another to answer the accusations. Mini dramas that decide people’s lives, for the short and long term.
Whether or not they are released on bail, or sent back to prison until their next court appearance, is a big deal for them.
Sometimes there are family or friends in the public gallery to support them, wave and blow kisses. Crossed fingers and coded signals. The defendants become emotional, often sobbing, weeping as they hear which way the judge is swinging.
They beg for mercy.
“I really do love my family,” says the first defendant, the one facing a domestic violence charge, desperate for bail. He swears off the booze.
One cheeky woman proposes pleading guilty today if she gets bail to her dad’s place.
When it goes against them though, they can explode.
A 46-year-old sporting a black eye said to have assaulted a man using a metal pole as a weapon interjects as Judge Lynch reads out the charges.
“It was a broomstick, your honour,” he complains tiredly. And when he keeps butting in, getting angrier, Judge Lynch cuts the video feed and asks the case to call later. Let him calm down.
An alleged recidivist banned driver also starts arguing with the judge and is placed on mute.
He’s seen on screen, leaping up from his chair, pointing at the screen and banging on the custody suite door.
The judge notes wryly the man appears to be “giving me my pedigree”.
Bail is declined. He is remanded in custody. The screen goes blank.
Two women are accused of pinching mail out of letterboxes.
Another admits wilful damage, explained as a “neighbourhood matter” arising from her cat being killed.
A homeless man allegedly caught with a knife on Cambridge Terrace needs to provide a suitable address before he can apply for bail.
Narrow windows behind the judge’s bench show a high blue sky and spindly trees sans leaves. Workers clamber over a quake-damaged high-rise building.
The lawyer benches empty out as the prosecutor’s desk thins of files.
Police say a 50-year-old man stole 103 litres of 91-grade petrol valued at $248 from an Ashburton petrol station and drove south, allegedly using someone else’s bank card to buy stuff at a Dunedin dairy, another petrol station and shop, and buy a $16.49 feed at KFC.
Several of the women have suffered abusive or broken relationships. Other defendants have mental health issues. One man of no fixed abode faces meth charges but is too unwell to appear in court today.
“He’s not in a good state this morning,” his lawyer explains. “He’s not fit to look after himself ... he has no family or anything.”
When another man is asked to confirm his name, he replies: “I deny that ... but if you want me to be I can be him.” He jabbers on, making bizarre gestures at the screen.
“Stop talking now,” the judge warns.
“Okay. Just for you,” he says before burying himself inside his brown hoodie.
There are just a handful of cases for the afternoon session before Judge Kevin Phillips.
A 32-year-old homeless man appears on charges of disorderly conduct at a city supermarket earlier this morning.
He refused to talk to a duty lawyer inside the police cells and is remanded in custody to appear again on Friday.
A labourer, 48, appears, accused of stealing hundreds of dollars worth of goods, including Asics shoes, bed sheets, and other items from Farmers, Briscoes, Platypus, The Warehouse, and $271 of groceries from New World.
The court hears he’s fallen out with his lawyer.
He is remanded in custody for a fortnight.
The angry defendant mumbles something and turns away from the camera before the feed is axed.
“That’s us for the day, sir,” the registrar tells the judge who nods and starts packing up his papers. The courtroom stands in respect as he leaves.
Outside, the low winter sun is already setting behind the snow-capped Southern Alps in the far western distance. Riverside Market is bustling with late afternoon trade, with most civilians oblivious to the trials and tribulations going on inside the modern glass building just across the road.
Kurt Bayer is a South Island correspondent based in Christchurch. He is a senior journalist who joined the Herald in 2011.
