Mitchell East,28,who was educated at Harvard Law School and worked at Sydney firm Arnold Bloch Leibler,was found bleeding heavily on Fletcher Street about 4am. East died at the scene shortly after paramedics and police arrived.
Police have charged a man in relation to the suspected hit-and-run death of Mitch East in Tamarama.Edwina Pickles,Supplied
Following extensive inquiries,Kokotatsios was arrested after attending Granville Police Station just after 11am on Friday.
He was charged with fail to stop and assist after vehicle impact causing death;dangerous driving occasioning death – drive manner dangerous;negligent driving (occasioning death);and driver use mobile phone when not permitted.
Kokotatsios was refused bail to appear at Parramatta Bail Court on Saturday.
East’s mother spoke of her unbearable pain after her son died on the street.
“He was my only child,my reason for living,” the unnamed woman New Zealand publication Stuff.co.nz.
Mitchell East died on Fletcher Street,Tamarama early on Sunday.Supplied
“I died when he did. The pain is unbearable. So I just can’t think straight to talk sorry.”
His mother described Mitchell as “a good person with a good heart”.
The young lawyer received first-class honours at Otago University and further studied at Harvard.
Justice William Young,who worked closely with East in New Zealand for about three years,said he was hard-working,insightful,and empathetic.
East worked as Young’s clerk in New Zealand’s Supreme Court,and as adviser to a royal commission chaired by Young that examined the March 2019 terrorist attacks in Christchurch.
“After the royal commission wound up,Mitch worked at Meredith Connell and then studied,with great success,at Harvard University,obtaining an LLM and Deans’ Scholar Prizes in two of his subjects. These prizes were for being top of two extremely competitive classes,” Young said.
“As this indicates,Mitch was seriously intelligent. He was also hard-working,insightful,and empathetic. He was a remarkable man with the most extraordinary,infectious,and often self-deprecating sense of humour.”
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