By Stefica Nicol Bikes and James Redmayne
SYDNEY, Feb 8 (Reuters) – A white supremacist who killed 51 Muslim worshippers and injured dozens at two mosques in New Zealand will begin an appeal hearing against his sentence on Monday.
Brenton Tarrant, 35, opened fire on two mosques in Christchurch in March 2019, in the worst mass shooting in the country’s history.
He was convicted of 51 charges of murder, 40 counts of attempted murder and one charge of committing a terrorist act and is serving a life sentence in prison without parole.
It was the first time a New Zealand court had sentenced a person to prison for the rest of their life.
Tarrant, an Australian national, released a racist manifesto shortly before storming the mosques armed with military-style semi-automatics, indiscriminately shooting at Muslims gathered for Friday prayers and livestreaming the killings on Facebook using a head-mounted camera.
New Zealand’s worst peacetime killing shocked the country and prompted the government to quickly tighten gun laws.
(Reporting by Stefica Bikes and James Redmayne in Sydney; Editing by Alasdair Pal and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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