Three New Zealand-based Judges have been appointed to the High Court of the Cook Islands.

The appointments are all part-time and the Judges will sit in Rarotonga. The total number of Judges sitting in the High Court of the Cook Islands is now ten.

Justice Craig Coxhead is a Judge of the Maori Land Court in New Zealand.  He will sit in the Land Division of the High Court of the Cook Islands.  Justice Coxhead has been a Judge of the Maori Land Court since 2008.  In 2011 he was appointed a Judge in Niue.

Justice Patrick Keane has recently retired as a Judge of the High Court of New Zealand having sat in such a capacity since 2003.  Prior to that he was a District Court Judge based in Wellington.  He was a member of the New Zealand Law Commission 2001-2003. 

Justice Jane Lovell-Smith, as with Justice Keane, has been appointed a Judge in the General Division of the High Court of the Cook Islands.  Justice Lovell-Smith is a District Court Judge based in Manukau where she is the Executive Judge.  She has been a District Court Judge since 1994.  The Judge has had a lengthy association with the Cook Islands in relation to a mentoring programme that has enabled lay magistrates from the Cook Islands to sit in the District Court at Manukau as observers.