Iraqi appeals passport ruling

An Iraqi man is seeking to have his conviction for passport fraud overturned because he says he was not properly advised by his lawyer about the likely outcome of pleading guilty.

Salam Mansoor Abdelabbas Al-Bawi, 34, was sentenced to six months' home detention in 2008 for lying to authorities to obtain a passport.

He came to New Zealand in 2000 on a false Danish passport and applied for a New Zealand passport and citizenship under the fake name of John Jacob Abraham Joseph.

He is now appealing against his conviction because it could threaten his ability to live and work in New Zealand, where he has a young son.

Al-Bawi told a Court of Appeal hearing in Auckland that the fake identity, John Joseph, was obtained by his father in Iraq who paid a civil servant to change his records.

Under questioning from Crown prosecutor David Johnstone, Al-Bawi said the name and his date of birth were wrong on the statutory declaration he provided to authorities to obtain the passport.

He said he needed the New Zealand passport so he could re-enter Iraq and retrieve his old details. He told the court he was tortured in an Iraqi jail and feared for his life, and the lives of his family, if he returned to his homeland under his real name.

But he denied knowing the identity was obtained illegally, saying it had been changed legally under the Iraqi system. "I was not in Iraq, I did not question the matter whatsoever."

Al-Bawi told the hearing he pleaded guilty because he thought he would be discharged without conviction after his lawyer, David Ryken, gave him a "concrete" belief this would be so.

He said he had not been told before sentencing of options available to him, such as vacating his guilty plea, and was shocked to hear the Crown wanted a sentence starting point of three years' jail.

Mr Ryken said he agreed to make submissions about a discharge without conviction but never stated it would be a reasonable outcome.

"I never encouraged such a focus or belief and never made any such promise."

The judges reserved their decision.