The mother of Kiwi lawyer Mitch East, 28, who died in a suspected hit-and-run in Sydney over the weekend, said he was her reason for living.
East, was found critically injured on Fletcher Street in Tamarama, near Bondi, just metres from his home that he shared with his partner early on Sunday morning.
Despite attempts to resuscitate him, he was unable to be revived.
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"I died when he did. The pain is unbearable. So I just can't think straight to talk sorry."
His mother described her only child as "a good person with a good heart".
East studied at the University of Otago and received first class honours, before going on to complete a Master of Laws at Harvard Law School.
Justice William Young, who worked closely with East for about three years, said he was hard-working, insightful, and empathetic.
East worked as Young's clerk in the Supreme Court and as adviser to the Royal Commission into the March 15 2019 terrorist attacks in Christchurch, which was chaired by Young.
"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," Young said.
"These prizes were for being top of two extremely competitive classes.
"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.
"He was huge fun to work with – an all-round great guy. Mitch's death in Sydney is a shocking tragedy, particularly for his parents and his partner and a terrible waste of a life that held so much promise."
A GoFundMe page was set up to relieve some of the financial pressures and stress for East's family and had received over $87,000 in under 24 hours.
"He was known and will always be remembered for his hilarious yet kind nature and his incredible ability to befriend everyone he met," the page reads.
"At 28 years of age, Mitch's time was far from up and he had so much life left and love to give."
NSW Police on Monday established a strike force to investigate the unidentified driver and released CCTV footage of a white SUV to the public as a renewed appeal for information.
