The deputy Solicitor General says a rapist's sentence of nine months' home detention is manifestly inadequate and there has been a miscarriage of justice.
An appeal against Jayden Meyer's sentence was heard in the Rotorua District Court yesterday, with victims and their families joined by video link.
The deputy Solicitor General Madeleine Laracy lodged the appeal last week, submitting important public interest factors have not been accommodated by the sentencing process.
She told the court it was a "substantial departure from ordinary sentencing practice".
Laracy told the court a minimum three year jail sentence should be imposed. Meyer, who is now 18, raped four 15 year old girls and sexually violated another between 2020 and 2021.
His lawyer Rachael Adams said the home detention conditions are extensive and onerous and Meyer has complied with them.
She told the court the appeal should not be a response to "extreme public sensationalist reaction".
To which deputy Solicitor General Madeleine Laracy said that was not the case.
She told the court the crux of the matter is two fold - the inadequate sentence and concerns about how it was imposed.
The judge has reserved her decision.
