The man, who is 21, appeared for sentencing in the High Court in Auckland. Photo: RNZ
An Auckland man, who as a teenager self-radicalised online and came close to a violent attack targeting non-Muslims, has been sentenced to two years and five months' imprisonment.
The man, now 21 years old, appeared in the High Court at Auckland on Wednesday before Justice Rebecca Edwards who declined his lawyer's request for home detention.
He continues to have interim name suppression.
At the time of the man's arrest in September 2021, police found he had stored hundreds of videos related to ISIS and documents including the Christchurch terrorist's manifesto.
Police also found diary entries in which he outlined his plans for a terror attack and his intent to kill multiple people in Auckland.
Justice Edwards told the court the material the defendant kept showed "the taking of human life in the most brutal and cruel ways".
The man was sentenced at Auckland High Court. Photo: justice.govt.nz
"The fact that it was connected to a terrorist organisation makes it even worse. The nature of the material was of the worst type."
She said it showed the defendant's active involvement.
"Although you did not, thank goodness, carry out your plans that does not mean your offending did not cause harm," Justice Edwards said.
"The distribution of materials glorifying violence and terrorism causes ruptures in our society. It sows fear and terror and it risks persuading others to join in attacks.
"Downloading and storing this material creates demand for the generation of more material like it and that ensures that the harm is ongoing."
On the eve of his trial last November, the defendant admitted threatening to kill, two charges of distributing objectionable publications and six counts of possessing objectionable material.
The defendant was arrested a week after the unrelated LynnMall terror attack in September 2021, after which he told an undercover police officer online that he wished to bring his own plans for an attack forward.
The police officer was posing as an ISIS sympathiser.
Court documents show the defendant had also told the undercover officer in a message online that he wished to kill between 20 to 30 non-Muslims, and that carrying out an attack in Auckland was plan B if he could not travel overseas to Syria.
The documents state the man believed that recent terror attacks on non-Muslims were justified and he had started planning an attack in Auckland targeting and killing non-Muslims.
Crown prosecutor Henry Steele supported a jail sentence and told the court the man planned to carry out an attack.
"He clearly took some very deliberate steps for an attack," Steele said.
"It's obvious that he actually came frighteningly close to committing an act of extreme violence for no reason other than that he had been self-radicalised online."
He said the large volume of material the defendant had stored was the "worst of its kind" and included instructions on making homemade explosives.
"We're at the extreme end of that spectrum where [he] was sharing this material with the police operative intending that it be used to enable an attack of extreme violence."
Alongside the diary entries and videos, police found a list of 80 Auckland locations the man had scouted for a possible attack - shopping malls, the airport, and cafes and restaurants.
Police also found a "terror kit" the man had started to put together to commit the attack, containing camouflage clothing and two knives.
The court heard how the defendant's diary entries showed on three occasions he set out with the intention of committing an attack but did not go through with it.
Justice Edwards said this included taking a kitchen knife to an ice hockey game in Auckland.
She said his diary entry described catching a train to the game "to carry out an attack designed to cause panic, chaos, terror and fear" in the name of ISIS.
"But people were nice to you, someone gave you a free ticket to get in," she said.
"You became absorbed in the game and got distracted from what you were there to do. It was the kindness of strangers that stopped you that day but if your diary entry are to be believed, you were well down the track to acting on your plan."
Justice Edwards acknowledged the defendant's difficult upbringing, that he was "born into hardship, neglect and a life of violence" and left school at the age of 14 after being bullied.
She said he was alienated, felt lonely and abandoned and developed a deep seated anger towards the world.
"It was at this point you became absorbed in the online world and radicalised by ISIS."
Court documents show as a teenager, the defendant had developed an interest in conflict in the Middle East and by 2018 had started researching the Islamic State extensively online.
He came to police's attention in 2021 after following several ISIS supporters on social media, and has been in custody since his arrest.
Justice Edwards said his time in prison had helped him to get back on track and on eventual release he hoped to live a normal life with a job.
"These are all good thoughts and positive goals, they show you have some knowledge about what made you offend and they show a shift away from your negative ways of thinking."
She said he had expressed a willingness to meet a victim of the Christchurch terror attack.
"What all this tells me is that there is real hope for you and you are on the right path. There is a long way to go yet and you will need constant support at each step but you are heading in the right direction."
The defendant's lawyer, Annabel Cresswell, sought permanent name suppression because of his complex conditions.
She also said the man had made a lot of progress.