The Australian suspect arrested after dozens of worshippers were shot in two mosques appeared unrepentant in court in New Zealand on Saturday, staring down media members with a smirk on his face.
Brenton Tarrant, 28, appeared in a Christchurch District Court and was charged with murder. He was remanded without a plea until his next appearance in the South Island city’s High Court on April 5.
Handcuffed, shoeless, and wearing a white prison suit, Tarrant did not speak. His court-appointed lawyer made no application for bail or name suppression.
He flashed an upside-down “okay” signal, a symbol used by white power groups across the globe.
Al Jazeera’s Andrew Thomas, reporting from Christchurch, said the suspect locked eyes intensely with journalists.
“He came into court, he didn’t say anything at all. He stood there looking directly at the media in the courtroom and was smirking throughout his appearance,” Thomas reported.
Judge Paul Kellar allowed photos to be taken but ordered that the face of the former fitness instructor be blurred to preserve fair-trial rights.
Two other suspects were taken into custody while police tried to determine what role, if any, they played in the cold-blooded attack that stunned New Zealand – a country so peaceful that police officers rarely carry guns.
None of those arrested had a criminal history or was on any watchlist in New Zealand or Australia.
With 49 people killed in the mosque attacks, it was by far the deadliest shooting in modern New Zealand history. Funerals were held on Saturday for some of the victims.
Medical staff said 39 wounded people were being treated in hospitals, 11 in critical condition including a four-year-old girl.
Victims were from across the Muslim world, including Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Jordan, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Malaysia. The dead included women and children.
Calling it a well-planned “terrorist attack”, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the main suspect was a licensed gun owner who used five weapons during his rampage, including two semiautomatic weapons and two shotguns.
The weapons had been modified to allow the quicker discharge of rounds, she said.
“I can tell you one thing right now, our gun laws will change,” Ardern told reporters, saying a ban on semiautomatic weapons would be considered.
She said the suspect intended to continue the rampage before he was caught by police.
“The offender was mobile, there were two other firearms in the vehicle that the offender was in, and it absolutely was his intention to continue with his attack,” Ardern said.
“I’m not privileged to a full breakdown at this point but it is clear that young children have been caught up in this horrific attack,” she added.
New Zealand, with a population of five million, has relatively loose gun laws and an estimated 1.5 million firearms, or roughly one for every three people. But it has one of the lowest gun homicide rates in the world. In 2015, it had just eight gun homicides.
Tarrant posted a jumbled, 74-page manifesto on social media in which he identified himself by name and said he was a white supremacist who was out to avenge attacks in Europe perpetrated by Muslims.
The gunman also livestreamed in graphic detail 17 minutes of his rampage at Al Noor mosque, where he sprayed worshippers with bullets, killing at least 41 people. Several more people were killed in an attack on a second mosque in the city a short time later. Police also defused explosive devices in a car.
Authorities did not say whether the same person was responsible for both shootings.
Tarrant’s relatives in the Australian town of Grafton, in New South Wales, contacted police after learning of the shooting and were helping with the investigation, authorities said.
Tarrant has spent little time in Australia in the past four years and only had minor traffic infractions on his record.
