Australia to deport 'gentle Kiwi giant'

Updated on: 10 January,2012 10:01 AM IST |
Agencies |

A New Zealander who stands 2.1 metres tall and is described as a 'gentle man' will be deported from Australia because his size makes him a risk to 'the national interest'

A New Zealander who stands 2.1 metres tall and is described as a 'gentle man' will be deported from Australia because his size makes him a risk to 'the national interest'.

Hayden Harlem Tewao, who weighs 200 kg is known to friends as Tiny.

He left New Zealand for Australia to take advantage of job opportunities and avoid family ties to crime and gangs, but a drunk and drug-fuelled night in 2010 saw him jailed for an aggravated robbery, which left the victim with horrendous facial injuries.

Tewao's Australian visa was cancelled, but that decision was overturned by Australia's Administrative Appeals Tribunal, which described a gentle giant at low risk.

"He is a huge man... with shoulders like buttresses and legs like pylons. His hands, as fists, resemble demolition balls", the tribunal said.

"Yet Tewao, or Tiny as he is known, seems for all his mountainous bulk a gentle man."

However, Austrlia's Immigration Minister Chris Bowen used his ministerial powers to overrule the tribunal, saying Tewao was "an exceptionally large man whose role was to be the 'enforcer' in the offence". "I found that I could not be confident that he would not re-offend ... He represents an unacceptable risk of harm to the Australian community," saidu00a0 Bowen.