Tim Selwyn

rdf:langString Tim Selwyn

rdf:langString Tim Selwyn (born 1974, Takapuna) is a New Zealand political activist who was found guilty of sedition on 8 June 2006, the first person charged with sedition in New Zealand for more than 30 years. He is also editor of Tumeke! magazine, and has a blog with the same name. He was sentenced to two months imprisonment for sedition and for conspiracy to commit wilful damage on 19 July 2006. Letters he wrote from prison were posted on his blog, prompting criticism and questions in Parliament from National's Corrections spokesman Simon Power. Selwyn was also investigated by other government agencies after his initial arrest and was sentenced to a further 15 months for dishonesty offences against various government departments involving his theft of the identity of a dead baby and several other dead people, among other offences, - and a further 25 months for tax offences (on 14 February 2007). He was released from prison in October 2007. Selwyn has previously attracted controversy. In 1996, he was imprisoned (but then released on appeal of sentence) for falsifying nomination signatures and was forced to resign as a member of the Glenfield Community Board, to which he had been elected unopposed the previous year. He also wrote articles in Craccum criticising suicide prevention workers and explaining how to rip off the student loan system; the former being condemned by the New Zealand Press Council in a ruling as "consistently irresponsible and malicious." - a decision Selwyn later criticised as "ill-considered and hypocritical." Selwyn has previously been a member of the ACT Party, but more recently has supported the Māori Party.