The man had a history of violence against women on both sides of the Tasman Sea. Photo / 123RF
WARNING: This article deals with the subject of family violence and may be distressing for some people.
A New Zealander with a “persistently abhorrent” history of domestic violence against women on both sides of the Tasman Sea is being shut out of Australia, where he lived for 13 years, and his family remain.
The man returned voluntarily to New Zealand in November last year after being imprisoned and then sent to an immigration detention centre after assaulting his Australian wife.
He now wants to go back and resume his life in Australia, where his wife and several step-children still reside.
But he cannot because his visa was revoked under Section 501 of the Australian Migration Act while he was in custody.
This section of the act gives its name to the thousands of “501” criminal deportees who have been sent back to New Zealand in recent years.
The revocation of the man’s visa is being allowed to stand, despite his wife saying she was struggling with her health and financial worries, and suffering from depression without him.
“I just don’t know how to function without my husband,” she told a tribunal reviewing an immigration officer’s decision to cancel his visa.
She said the children had various serious health issues and required fulltime care.
“[The applicant] had begun building my trust and respect again and the children’s. He was present in every aspect of the word,” she told the Australian Administrative Review Tribunal, which looked at the man’s case.
The man also wrote to the tribunal, saying he considered his step-children, aged 6 to 18, “as if they were my biological children”.
Before he was imprisoned, he worked from home and was their “stay-at-home dad”.
In his written statement, the man, whose name was redacted from the tribunal decision, said he felt guilty about his behaviour towards his wife and previous partners, and was committed to changing his ways.
“I know that apologies aren’t enough, and I need to ensure that I do not reoffend,” he said.
“I have stopped drinking alcohol on a regular basis after I was arrested in February 2024.
“I realise that I have inflicted harm on my past partners and now [my wife] as well as our children, through [my] behaviour.
“I would previously lash out when I felt disrespected, and previously thought I had a right to respond with aggression or hostility.
“I now understand that these beliefs were wrong and harmful and led to my offending. The rehabilitation programmes I have participated in have challenged and helped reshape my thinking.”
According to the tribunal’s decision, the man, 37, moved to Australia in 2012.
He already had a New Zealand criminal record, which included two family violence counts of “male assaults female” and wilful damage in a family violence context. He also had convictions for driving offences and fighting in a public place.
He received fines and community work for his New Zealand offences.
In Australia, he clocked up 15 convictions for five offending incidents between December 2020 and March 2024.
The charges included six breaches of domestic violence orders, four bail breaches, common assault in a domestic violence context, three wilful damage convictions, also involving domestic violence, and finally an assault against his wife, causing actual bodily harm.
He was sentenced to imprisonment for 27 months in March 2024.
“The applicant’s domestically violent conduct has been persistently abhorrent,” review tribunal member Theodore Tavoularis said.
“He has physically and psychologically harmed victims. He has caused them material harm by wilfully damaging their property while so offending.
“His conduct has consumed more than its fair share of the community’s policing, judicial sentencing and custodial resources,” Tavoularis said.
“My finding will be that if the applicant were to reoffend, the resulting harm would range from psychological, physical and financial harm.
“It is not beyond the realms of possibility for such conduct to result in a catastrophic outcome.”
Tavoularis found that the man’s conduct weighed very heavily against restoring his visa to be in Australia.
Ric Stevens spent many years working for the former New Zealand Press Association news agency, including as a political reporter at Parliament, before holding senior positions at various daily newspapers. He joined NZME’s Open Justice team in 2022 and is based in Hawke’s Bay. His writing in the crime and justice sphere is informed by four years of frontline experience as a probation officer.