Jonathan Krebs, who with wife Kathryn and other family were at Friday's Admission to the Bar before president of the Court of Appeal, Justice Stephen Kos, and Hawke's Bay courts fixture Judge Geoff Rea in the High Court in Napier, had seen earlier signs Harriet would also follow the pathway into law as a career.
"She was always ready to offer an opinion at the kitchen table," he said. "And she would defend it, which was the good part."
She recalls an early challenge, arguing for some equality in the household after her sister came home with a larger teddy than she had .
A first XI hockey player at Napier Girls High School, she headed south thinking initially she might study to become a physiotherapist, but switched focus at the last minute, and has barely looked back. Her own study path follows almost the same timeline as that of her father in pursuit of the freedom of Teina Pora, who had been wrongfully convicted of murder in Auckland more than 20 years ago.
She put that mission to good work, helping with some of the research, even if the exam results might have suffered a little about the time she would get up in the middle the night to watch live-streaming of the case's Privy Council hearing in England.
She continued the hockey in Dunedin, captaining the Kings United premier team and sitting on the club's board, but developed a business on the side making and selling cakes — Hattie's Kitchen being spawned after a friend was so impressed by an offering for a special occasion that there was some definite potential for helping the hopeful from Napier in her days through law school.
Adding to the family legal team is sister Victoria, now in her first year doing law at Otago, but youngest sister Madeline "likes animals" and wants to be a vet.
