Naitasiri High Chief Ratu Inoke Takiveikata

Appeals Court Judge William Calanchini has issued a stern warning against lawyers to not waste taxpayer’s funds.

This comes as an appeal hearing date for Naitasiri High Chief Ratu Inoke Takiveikata was set before the Suva High Court this morning.

Justice Calanchini told Defense Counsel, Akuila Naco that a great deal of money is spent in bringing over sitting appeal court judges into the country.

He said that lawyers need to be prepared when coming to court and not to make a last-minute decision of not being ready.

The comments came as Naco informed the court that he did not have all of Takiveikata’s documents as the trial counsel was different.

Justice Calanchini also addressed the fact that the case is a 2012 appeal matter and needed to be cleared from the court.

The court noted that the trial judge’s notes were available and that the matter was ready for an appeal hearing on its sentence and conviction.

Ratu Inoke was sentenced to life imprisonment after a retrial for inciting the 2000 mutiny at Queen Elizabeth Barrack.

He was sentenced to life imprisonment on March 4th 2011 and the High court had fixed a non-parole period for 8-years.

The court had ordered that Ratu Inoke will only be released from prison after March 4th 2019 which would be on recall to continue serving life imprisonment if he breached any conditions of his release.

Ratu Inoke has appeared in court earlier this week- not knowing who had filed his appeal matter, today it was established that his lawyer had filed the matter in 2012, however, the case was only called for a follow-up.

Defense counsel has been given 14 days to file their submissions and prosecution has been instructed to submit their documents 14 days thereafter.

An appeal hearing on the matter will be held on May 23rd.