(birds chirping)
I never take for granted that I live here.
There's trees and there's birds.
Being stuck for two years in prison cells,
we had nothing but...concrete.
It definitely takes its toll.
(melancholy rock music)
(birds chirping)
I was totally anti-meth,
then I experienced a series of, losses.
(slow guitar music)
Dad died, my job that was really important to me terminated,
and then, three days later, my mother died.
There are things from my childhood
like childhood sexual abuse,
the experiences with the police in our family.
In some ways, it's more accessible
to go and get drugs than it is
to get a freaking counselling appointment.
But it didn't take long.
Within a two-year period, it definitely spiralled.
In graphic terms, I guess I was,
dealing and selling methamphetamine, predominantly.
So, I ended up
on a four-year sentence for drug charges.
(gentle music)
I've never worn this in a real capacity
except for my admission to the bar.
But, that's the wig, so that's what a lawyer looks like.
So I think when I was younger I would've thought that,
a criminal, was someone very bad and very scary.
Someone who had chosen to do wrong.
Now, as I'm an adult but also working in
this field I try really hard not to even label
people as criminals.
I think that's really, really unhelpful, because,
people aren't criminals.
There are people that have a tonne of criminal convictions,
but more often than not
that's because of a whole variety of things
that have happened in their lives.
(birds chirping)
(upbeat guitar music)
Kia ora! Kia ora!
Charlotte. Yeah.
Awatea.
Yeah!
So good to meet you!
I'm Awatea, yeah, nice to meet you too!
What was your experience with police like
when you were growing up?
It was really hard,
because, my mother was an activist.
She was targeted.
So, my mum is Merata Mita, the first Māori woman
to write and direct a feature film.
She's considered the godmother of indigenous cinema.
We went from being a pretty happy-go-lucky household
to a family that had to hold a lot of trauma
from our experiences with the police.
My brother was beaten,
by the police on our front doorstep more than once.
In a normal family, I'd like to think
that people are brought up to believe
that the police are there to protect you,
to protect your rights,
and to serve your community, and instead,
our experience of them were the opposite.
The police when I was growing up were like,
nothing but a protective force.
I don't think I have ever been stopped by police.
(slow piano music)
May it please the court, counsel's name is Shade.
I appear today for this defendant.
Ma'am, this matter is scheduled
for a section 106 application
for discharge without conviction.
We have this over representation of Māori people
in the prison system itself,
and certainly I do see that reflected
in the people that come through my door.
They are just more likely to be investigated,
because their car is not a very nice car,
and it's the kind of car that the police
kinda have on their radar,
or they live in a bad part of town where the police have
quite of a strong presence in the area.
It doesn't necessarily mean that there's
not a whole lot of other people doing the same things,
but they're not getting caught.
(slow piano music)
As a statistic, as a number, I thought yeah, that's bad,
but when I got into prison
and actually saw what that looks like,
all these women had children, you know?
Who are all doing hard time too.
Like the most favourite photo of mine
is the photo of my son here, Lance Tikitere Fitzgerald.
This is the picture that was used at his funeral.
I got to bring it back into the prison,
and I got to, have this in my cell.
11 months into my sentence, it was the last day of school.
He was playing with his friends, it was hot,
they'd been diving and swimming all day,
he ended up,
hitting his head, and he drowned.
It was definitely,
the worst day of my life,
and I never thought, when my mum died, that felt,
and when I lost my job actually,
that felt like the worst day of my life,
and then when mum died,
that felt like the worst day of my life,
and then my relationship broke up,
and I thought that was,
the worst thing that could happen.
And then being sentenced to prison and being in prison
and missing my son so much, I thought,
well this is the fucking,
this is the worst.
Like, it doesn't get worse than this.
But then when my son passed away,
it's like, there's just so many levels
to descend down into, so many depths.
I was entitled to a three-day unescorted leave,
but he only applied for a 12 hour escorted visit for me.
I got to spend 10 minutes sitting on the paepae of my son,
and then the lid went on, and we took the walk up
to our urupā and buried him there,
and then straight back into the car,
straight back to Gisborne airport,
to Auckland, straight back to the prison.
And at least I got to bring the photograph in.
Yeah, that was a humane thing they did.
(slow piano music)
Our laws come from, from England.
Traditionally sentences were, about punishment.
I think we can totally question that.
It's been a fundamental in all of the Western world.
Kaupapa Māori approach, to me,
wouldn't start in a courthouse,
wouldn't even start in the back of a police car.
From a Māori perspective, it's not about,
there's a crime, we've got a victim, we've got an offender.
It's more like, about,
who caused the harm,
who experienced the harm, and how can we all collectively
take responsibility for healing that harm?
Are we as a society gonna choose punishment or treatment?
Health or handcuffs? It's really up to us.
I really believe if we're serious about
reducing harm and making our community safer
that we would have rehab available
wherever there's a district court.
You definitely see in the justice system
the difference between what people's lives are worth.
For instance, a Pākehā person going through sentencing,
will actually be treated differently to,
a Māori person, a person with face tattoos,
a person with gang affiliations.
(upbeat guitar music)
I don't have to let my past define who I am today,
and that I can be proud of the person that I am today
and proud of the changes that I've made in my life.
(speaking Māori)
This is my workspace,
and I'm the Creative Tech Hub manager here.
Having a criminal conviction has been extremely difficult
in terms of looking at the issue of employment.
I'd served my time, but I felt like
I was continued to be punished back out in community.
It's hard to be in a situation where people feel ashamed
of you because of what you've done and your past,
and that you're not being judged
on your current actions and behaviours.
The previous person who held my role
invited me to come down and check out
what was going on here.
Like, I was impressed, like I felt relaxed
because it was a Māori environment in a way
that I felt like, had that permission
to just be myself, to just be Māori,
that I didn't have to put on an act.
(gentle guitar music)
I think, for me, as a Pākehā,
we need to get better at listening,
to the needs of the communities
that are most affected by the justice system,
and who spend the most time going through it.
What I would like to see in the future
is for this system, this current system,
to be dismantled, and for the power to deal with harms
in our community given back to the community.
I don't think tinkering around with this broken system
is gonna solve anything.
Can I see a world where the Pākehā system
would give up their power and hand justice
back to communities? (sighs)
I mean, I think we have to dream about that world.
More than that though, I think that the Māori way
of doing justice would benefit all New Zealanders.
Yeah, that's the only way
I personally can see any way forward.
(melancholy rock music)