Warahi v Department of Corrections
[2020] NZHC 2917
•4 November 2020
IN THE HIGH COURT OF NEW ZEALAND AUCKLAND REGISTRY
I TE KŌTI MATUA O AOTEAROA TĀMAKI MAKAURAU ROHE
CIV-2020-404-2319
[2020] NZHC 2917
UNDER The Habeas Corpus Act 2001 IN THE MATTER
Of application for writ of Habeas Corpus
BETWEEN
MAUI WARAHI
Applicant
AND
DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS
Respondent
Hearing: 4 November 2020 Appearances:
Applicant in person
M Mortimer for Respondent
Judgment:
4 November 2020
Reasons:
5 November 2020
REASONS JUDGMENT OF MUIR J
This judgment was delivered by me on 5 November 2020 at 3.00 pm Pursuant to Rule 11.5 of the High Court Rules.
Registrar/Deputy Registrar Date:…………………………
Solicitors: Crown Law
Copy to: Applicant
WARAHI v DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS [2020] NZHC 2917 [4 November 2020]
Introduction
[1] Maui Wallace, whose legal name is, I am satisfied, Jay Maui Wallace, applies for a writ of habeas corpus. He is currently detained in the Mt Eden Corrections Facility. This is his fifth application for a writ of habeas corpus made in the Auckland High Court this year.
[2] At the conclusion of the hearing, I issued a Results Judgment declining his application. My reasons now follow.
Background
[3] There are currently a number of active charges in the Manukau District Court relating to Jay Maui Wallace. These are broadly divided into three categories.
[4]The first are older Police charges and comprise:
(a)Obtaining by deception (over $1,000) (CRN 20055000313);
(b)Assaults a person in execution of process (CRN 19092015943);
(c)Failure to answer District Court bail (CRN 20092003028).
[5] Three other Police charges relating to obtaining by deception (over $1,000) were withdrawn on 1 September 2020.
[6] The next category comprises a single charge of breach of an intensive supervision order (CRN 19092501966). The prosecution is brought by the Department of Corrections.
[7] The third category relates to events on either 27 October 2020 (the date specified on the Department of Corrections Active Charges Sheet) or 26 October 2020 (the date stated by the applicant). These comprise:
(a)Assault on Police (CRN 20092013830);
(b)Resisting Police (CRN 20092013831);
(c)Escape from Police custody (CRN 20092013832);
(d)Procure/possess cannabis plant (CRN 20092013833).
[8] In the time available before hearing of the application, the Crown has not been able to identify every call and adjournment date in respect of the first four charges. In respect of some mentions, the applicant's non-attendance has been excused on account of Covid-19 restrictions. It is clear, however, that in response to non-attendance on a scheduled date for the breach of supervision charge, a warrant for his arrest was issued on 31 August 2020. The applicant was subsequently arrested, resulting in his fourth application for a writ of habeas corpus.
[9] This came before Gault J (initially by telephone conference on the morning of 11 September 2020). In the final analysis it was unnecessary for his Honour to decide the application because the applicant was granted bail by the Whangarei District Court later the same day. I assume that the grant of bail was made in respect of each of the three initial charges and the breach of supervision charge.
[10] The applicant says that all matters were adjourned to 27 October 2020, at the Papakura District Court. I have sighted an email from the Papakura District Court dated 19 August 2020 which refers to this date, but it is not linked to specific CRN numbers.
[11] At the hearing today Mr Mortimer, for the respondent, was unable to confirm the adjournment position, but invited me to proceed on the basis that all such charges had indeed been adjourned to that date.
[12] On either 26 or 27 October 2020 (I refer to the discrepancy above) the applicant says that he was stopped by Police officers at the Browns Road Shopping Centre while ordering a takeaway meal. He says that the officers claimed they had a warrant for his arrest. A disturbance broke out, which is the genesis of the latest charges involving
assault, resistance and escape. It is alleged that the applicant was also in possession of cannabis.
[13] If the District Court charge sheet is correct in identifying these offences as having occurred on 27 October 2020 (and there is no reason to believe it is not, apart from what the applicant says), then the likely position appears to be that a warrant for arrest was issued for non-attendance on 27 October 2020, which was then executed later that day. I have not, however, been provided with a copy of the warrant for arrest at this stage.
The authority under which the applicant is currently held
[14] The Crown produces two warrants to detain Jay Maui Wallace, both issued by Judge Recordon in the District Court at Manukau on 28 October 2020.
[15] The first relates to the three earlier Police charges and the breach of intensive supervision charge. It identifies that the hearing of such charges, "has been adjourned, and the defendant has been remanded in custody for the period of the adjournment." It is addressed to every Constable and to the Manager of the Mt Eden Corrections Facility and directs “the said Constable(s) to deliver the defendant to the Prison at Mt Eden Correction Facility.” It directs the Manager of that facility “to receive the defendant into your control” for the period of the adjournment and for Mr Wallace to be brought back to the Manukau District Court on 2 December 2020 at 11.45 am to further answer the charges.
[16] The second warrant (identified as “AVL Warrant to Detain Defendant”), addresses the four most recent charges. It is in similar terms providing for Mr Wallace’s detention at the Mt Eden Corrections Facility until 18 November 2020 at 12.15 pm.
[17] I am satisfied that both warrants are correct in form, duly signed, and that they provide sufficient authority to legally detain the person named in them at the Mt Eden Corrections Facility until the dates specified therein.
The bail position
[18] As Duffy J observed in a judgment relating to the same applicant,1 a warrant to remand in custody:
implicitly involves a ruling as to bail in the sense that a decision to remand in custody indicates that either the prospects of bail will have been considered and rejected by the District Court Judge, or else the Judge erroneously failed to consider bail before deciding to remand in custody.
[19] In either of the circumstances postulated by Her Honour, the remedy for a defendant dissatisfied with the remand decision, is appeal on the grounds it was made contrary to s 7(5) of the Bail Act 2000. Alternatively, there may be circumstances in which a fresh application for bail may be available.
[20] For present purposes, however, the crucial point is that under s 14(2)(b) of the Habeas Corpus Act 2001, no Court hearing a habeas corpus application has jurisdiction to call into question a ruling as to bail by a Court of competent jurisdiction. That precludes inquiry into the District Court’s decision not to grant bail and to remand the applicant in custody.
Is Jay Maui Wallace now “Dead in the Law’?
[21] The application is based on the proposition that the applicant is a separate and distinct legal person from the Jay Maui Wallace identified in the warrants to detain.
[22] This is an issue which the applicant first raised in his habeas corpus application before Duffy J. She noted:2
[5] The applicant then advised me that the Jay Maui Wallace identified in the warrants was separate and different from the Maui Warahi who was making the application for habeas corpus before me. At that point I advised the applicant that he had not provided any basis on which identification contained in the warrants could be challenged. Absent such, I was satisfied that Maui Warahi and the Jay Maui Wallace named in the warrants were one and the same persons. In this regard I noted that the applicant had appeared in the District Court on more than one occasion which would have given him ample opportunity to raise any issue about being wrongly identified. There is nothing to suggest he had done so.
1 Warahi (TM), Beneficiary, Sole Flesh N blood of Jay Wallace. Naturel Person v Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections [2020] NZHC 585 at [9].
2 At [5].
[23] In support of the current application the applicant produces an “Affidavit of Identity” and a purported certificate under the heading:
AOTEAROA
Certified Copy of Birth Entry
In the Maori Chief Registrar Office
Registration at: Ngati Hine, Taitokerau O Aotearoa (NZ)
[24] The purported certificate is stated to be given under the seal of the Maori Chief Registrar of Maunga Hikurangi Koporeihana Maori at Ngatihine, Taitokerau, Aotearoa (NZ) on 7 July 2016. I contrast this with the lawful procedure relating to applications for registration of name change under ss 21A and 21B of the Births, Deaths, Marriages and Relationships Registration Act 1995.
[25] The Affidavit of Identity, (with a photograph of a person whom I identify as the applicant), records:
1.That My Christian name is Jay Maui: with the initial letters capitalised as required by the Rules of English Grammar for the writing of names of sovereign soul flesh and blood people. My patronymic or family name of Wallace with the initial letters capitalised.
2.That the name JAY MAUI WALLACE or any other drivitation [sic] of that name is a dead fictitious foreign situs trust or quasi corporation/legal entity not the sovereign soul flesh and blood Mari [sic] that I am.
3.That I am a free will flesh and blood Suri Juris sovereign man and as such I am private, non resident, non domestic, non person, non citizen, non individual and not subject to real or imaginary statutory acts, rules, regulations or quasi laws.
4.That I am who I say that I am NOT who the overt or covert agents of the State say that I am.
5.That I do not knowingly, willingly, intentionally, or voluntarily surrender my sovereign inalienable rights according to the law of nature.
6.That the state has no legal jurisdiction or sovereign authority justified in origin to hear this matter.
7.That it is the responsibility of the complainant to bring the correct parties before the courts.
[26] At the hearing on 4 November 2020, the applicant acknowledged that his birth (and he says former) name was Jay Maui Wallace, but he says that such person is now “dead in the law”. I note that the birth date details associated with Jay Maui Wallace in the records of the Court and the warrants to detain correspond with the birth date appearing in the “Aotearoa” certificate.
[27] I am satisfied that the person identifying himself as Maui Warahi, currently held at the Mt Eden Corrections Facility, is one and the same person as the Jay Maui Wallace referred to in the respective warrants. The proposition that “JAY MAUI WALLACE… is a dead fictitious foreign situs trust or quasi corporation/legal entity” cannot be rationally engaged with.3 As Toogood J observed in Martin v Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections:4
Incomprehensible statements about birthright and being a natural person not susceptible to the laws of this country are regularly and properly rejected by the Courts ...
[28] To similar effect, the Court of Appeal observed in Smith v Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections:5
[13] Second, and an overlapping point, an application for a writ of habeas corpus is not the appropriate procedure for consideration of the "identity" argument advanced in the applications both to Toogood J and to Brewer J. We have already explained our understanding of this argument: the person seeking the writ of habeas corpus is not the prisoner. Although, unsurprisingly, courts have struggled to elucidate these arguments, they have been uniformly dismissed.
[29] The applicant’s apparent position is that he can assume a new identity, consign his old identity to a “legal death” and thereby act with impunity with respect to the criminal law. He is mistaken.
3 To the extent the applicant raises issues about capitalisation and English grammar, I note that the warrants to detain contain no such capitalisation other than the initial letter of each given name. The submission is, in any event, untenable.
4 Martin v Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections [2016] NZHC 2811 at [20].
5 Smith v Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections [2017] NZCA 362 at [13].
[30] For these reasons I am satisfied that the person currently detained at the Mt Eden Corrections Facility is one and the same person as Jay Maui Wallace, that the applicant is lawfully detained and that the application for writ of habeas corpus must, therefore, be dismissed.
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Muir J
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