Students treated more harshly than pros, says lawyer

Sean Fitzpatrick's infamous bloody ear earned Johan Le Roux a trip through the judicial system. Photo / Getty Images

The lawyer who represented South African Johan Le Roux over his ear-biting of Sean Fitzpatrick says students banned over the schoolboy rugby brawl have been given tougher sentences than All Blacks would face.

Garth Gallaway, who took Le Roux's case to a judicial review, said the extensive bans for the Kelston players were "extraordinary and unsustainable".

And he urged the West Auckland school to appeal against the "over-reaction".

"The players, as I understand it, co-operated fully with the investigation," said Mr Gallaway, a partner at law firm Duncan Cotterill.

"If they were given credit for doing so, and having regard to other mitigating factors that would have been advanced on their behalf, then the starting point must have been in the order of three years, which seems absurd."

Mr Gallaway, who represents the Silver Ferns and has extensive experience in sports dispute resolution and mediation, said the brawl was reprehensible and the students had let themselves down.

However, it was difficult to imagine a scenario where NPC, Super 14 or test players would be banned for a similar period, he said.

"Having regard to penalties handed down to players who are punished by the NZRU's judicial committees, the penalties of between 10 and 16 months for these players are extraordinary and, in my opinion, unsustainable. The decisions should be appealed and I would expect an appellate tribunal to reduce the penalties considerably."

Former All Black Richard Loe agreed the penalties were harsh but said a message had to be sent to schoolboys that the behaviour was not acceptable.

"I've never seen a scrap like that before in a game and I've been involved in a few tough games in my time. It was brutal."

Loe was banned for nine months in 1992 for eye-gouging fellow All Black Greg Cooper.

He said the punishments to the Kelston students were harsh by comparison to bans handed down to professional rugby players, but that had to take into account that any ban took away the professionals' livelihoods.

"The images we all saw this week were horrific for schoolboy rugby.

"I struggle to see how they [the disciplinary committee] have hand-picked nine or 10 players but obviously they have studied footage and probably seen more than us. It's harsh but it has to send the right message."

Meanwhile, the Auckland Secondary Schools Rugby Union backed the bans. The union would usually deal with disciplinary matters in school games, but this one was deemed so serious it went straight to the Auckland Rugby Union.

Jim Lonergan, chairman of the ASSRU, said the brawl had "tainted the image of our premier schools' rugby competition".

He admitted the punishments were severe, but said the fight was compounded by the length of time it went on.

And he said the bans were not unprecedented.

A student was banned from rugby for four years in the early 1990s for grabbing a referee at the end of a game.

Mr Lonergan, who served on the union's disciplinary committee for several years during the 1980s and 1990s, said these bans were "up there" with the longest he knew of, but said the incident was also one of the worst he had seen.

"Punching and subsequent retaliation has no part in schoolboy rugby; in fact in any level of rugby."