Ngarimu Simpkins’ Redemption Story and New Legal Mission
Rotorua’s Ngarimu Simpkins has traded the bruising collisions of professional rugby for the sharper contest of the courtroom and he’s bringing a hard-won perspective that few new admits can match.
The 46-year-old was admitted to the bar just last month after completing his law degree. He has joined forces with his first cousin and mentor, senior barrister Max Simpkins, at the family firm Simpkins Legal in Rotorua.
Simpkins’ playing résumé is impressive by any measure: 75 first-class appearances, including solid stints with the Bay of Plenty Steamers (2002–2007), a brief spell at North Harbour, and time with Poverty Bay and Ngāti Porou East Coast.
He later stepped into coaching, transforming Ngāti Porou East Coast from strugglers to Meads Cup champions in 2012 and earning Coach of the Year honours in 2013. Back in Rotorua, he rebuilt the rugby programme at Rotorua Boys’ High School and led Whakarewarewa to Baywide premier success as recently as 2025.
Yet behind the glittering sports CV lies a well-publicised low point. In 2016, Simpkins was convicted on four counts of assault after confronting teenagers who had stolen from his family home in Ngongotaha. He pleaded guilty, received a sentence that drew media attention, and saw his appeal for a discharge without conviction dismissed.
Far from burying the episode, Simpkins confronts it head-on. “When I look back at it I go ‘what could I have done better?’” he told the Rotorua Daily Post. “It’s all part of growth, and I’m just grateful for the opportunity to move on with your life.”
That moment of reckoning, he says, could have sent him in either direction. Instead, living with cousin Max and surrounded by strong mentors (including former Rotorua Boys’ High principal Chris Grinter), he chose self-reflection and a law degree. He managed the firm, worked as a private investigator, and disclosed his full history during the New Zealand Law Society’s Certificate of Character process.
Now fully qualified, Simpkins is eyeing a broad practice – Māori land law, family law, and especially criminal law – with a clear mission: helping people, particularly young Māori men, navigate their worst day in court and avoid returning to the dock.
