Australia v New Zealand and United Kingdom – The Royal Commission v The Art of Cover-up

New Zealand likes to pride itself on being a first world country, at least that’s the spin the Country’s authorities put on things, especially when using that same spin to appease the locals. Frankly whether the locals know it or not the New Zealand’s reputation Internationally as a “world leader” lost it’s luster many years ago.

But that has not stopped New Zealand’s mainstream media, working in an almost predictable and formulaic way, from lying to the great unwashed. For them, the fourth estate, in this day and age it just comes down to revenue, the almighty dollar that’s attached to Rugby, Middle Earth, and the clean green myth.

The worst offenders are of course state-owned broadcaster TVNZ, followed closely by APN owned The New Zealand Herald, with Fairfax New Zealand’s mast-head coming in a close third.

This is of course not an unusual phenomena but it is one that can normally be associated only with very small countries, in particular tin-pot dictatorships.

Now on the face of it New Zealand is not a tin-pot dictatorship but it is indeed a very very small country, and importantly it’s also a rather insignificant group of isolated south pacific islands. Not that you would know that if you happened to read any of the aforementioned local news outlets who much prefer painting the place as bigger than Ben Hur.

For them gone are the days when the role of the media was to serve the community in which they had a stake. The era when ensuring financial viability and survival depended exclusively on exposing the shonk’s, corrupt politicians and the injustices.

In fact it’s in that very area, the exposing of injustice, where New Zealand as a country, as a society, has badly failed the citizenry.

Serious injustice is prevalent, some would argue endemic. Certainly police corruption is systemic and the country’s Courts are, whether they would like the criticism, extremely political and thus often loathed themselves to criticize the government, individual politicians, civil servants or in fact inferior courts such as tribunal, no matter how egregious the wrong committed.

A state of affairs which in it’s self is enough for the courts themselves to be viewed with suspicion; as being either seriously incompetent or worse, corruptible.

LF of course have many archived cases of clear judicial corruption within New Zealand’s courts, in particular the lower jurisdictions, at Tribunal and District Court level.

One might, at least at first, be inclined to view these instances and the apparent incompetence as rare, perhaps as apparitions, one off’s,  small glitches. When a pattern becomes the prevailing reality, and over a substantial period of time, then the questioning of jurists competence and the possibility of human error must fall by the wayside, as must the growing implausibility of the argument that the regularity with which these injustices, large and small, occur is down to just coincidence, merely a numbers game.

This often cited numbers game is an excuse which local Kiwi media outlets are particularly fond of using when attempting to spin the issue of corruption.

More often than not referring readers and viewers to the work of the local chapter of Transparency International, an institution which, more especially in New Zealand, has a few serious limitations.

The New Zealand chapter of Transparency International has a long history and a quite sordid reputation for manipulation, in particular for “tweaking” the figures, the statistics used to build their reports, by design, to avoid the obvious, overlooking or dismissing very clear evidence of government, judicial, police and political wrong doing.

So it is with that brief background of the political realities in New Zealand, that we now turn to a recent newspaper article which was published in one of Fairfax NZ’s mastheads. We will however be returning to canvass a little more of New Zealand’s sordid history, in particular the issue of child abuse and a few of the skeletons, thought by local authorities, long-buried;

Generation of children brutalised in state care won’t get public apology

STACEY KIRK

Last updated 07:32, August 25 2015

The Government will not offer a formal public apology to all children who were in state care during a 50 year period of brutal abuse.

The final report of the Confidential Listening and Assistance Service has detailed the harrowing experiences of children at the hands of people who were meant to keep them safe.

The report, which heard evidence from more than 1100 people, is still under consideration by the Government.

The abuse detailed in the report covers foster homes, institutions, asylums, health camps and borstals from the early 1940s up to 1992.

Social Development Minister Anne Tolley said it would inform a separate panel overseeing the overhaul of Child, Youth and Family. But asked if the Government would apologise to the children of these institutions, she said: “No”.

“But I do acknowledge that some people in the care of government institutions were failed and let down badly, and that they still suffer the trauma from that experience.

“That is why we now have two processes in place to offer an apology and a financial settlement to claimants.”

Judge Carolyn Henwood, who headed the panel that has been hearing grievances since 2008, said:  “Foster caregivers and extended families, social workers and staff, teachers, the clergy, cooks, gardeners, night watchmen,  even other children and patients, all took part in abuse.

“We heard of people using their fists and their feet, as well as weapons and other instruments on occasion, to attack children,” she says in the report.

“When we asked people why they had come, they said they wanted to be heard, they wanted an apology and accountability, and they wanted to improve state care for children, for the next generation.”  

Even now, New Zealand had no official “duty of care” towards children written into its law, Henwood said.

The report finds as many boys as girls suffered sexual abuse. In boys’ homes, cell-like units were often used for prolonged isolation, while in girls’ homes, “assumptions were made of promiscuity”.

In foster care situations, the panel describes stories of mothers who were “street angels, house devils”.

“There was often violence by the foster parents, beatings and housework and kitchen tasks, and verbal abuse. Lack of affection was almost standard,” the report says.

“We heard many accounts of foster fathers who came in the child’s bedroom at night to abuse that child, even when the bedroom was shared by other children.”

Cabinet documents obtained show a backlog of 921 historic claims has built up. The Government is aiming to settle them by 2020.

To date, 307 payments have been made, totalling $5.78 million. It’s understood that payouts vary between $6000 and $60,000.

Wellington lawyer Sonja Cooper,  who is acting for about 500 claimants, has renewed calls for a public inquiry into the abuse.

Judge Carolyn Henwood, who headed the panel that has been hearing grievances since 2008, said:  “Foster caregivers and extended families, social workers and staff, teachers, the clergy, cooks, gardeners, night watchmen,  even other children and patients, all took part in abuse.

“We heard of people using their fists and their feet, as well as weapons and other instruments on occasion, to attack children,” she says in the report.

“When we asked people why they had come, they said they wanted to be heard, they wanted an apology and accountability, and they wanted to improve state care for children, for the next generation.”  

Even now, New Zealand had no official “duty of care” towards children written into its law, Henwood said.

The report finds as many boys as girls suffered sexual abuse. In boys’ homes, cell-like units were often used for prolonged isolation, while in girls’ homes, “assumptions were made of promiscuity”.

In foster care situations, the panel describes stories of mothers who were “street angels, house devils”.

“There was often violence by the foster parents, beatings and housework and kitchen tasks, and verbal abuse. Lack of affection was almost standard,” the report says.

“We heard many accounts of foster fathers who came in the child’s bedroom at night to abuse that child, even when the bedroom was shared by other children.”

Cabinet documents obtained show a backlog of 921 historic claims has built up. The Government is aiming to settle them by 2020.

To date, 307 payments have been made, totalling $5.78 million. It’s understood that payouts vary between $6000 and $60,000.

Wellington lawyer Sonja Cooper,  who is acting for about 500 claimants, has renewed calls for a public inquiry into the abuse.

The Office of the Children’s Commissioner is already mandated to monitor CYF, and will also be extending its monitoring to include non-government residential care services and foster care services. 

PANEL MAKES 89 REFERRALS TO POLICE

Through the work of the panel, police have been able to connect alleged offenders to several victims and some prosecutions have followed, the report says.

A police spokesperson said the majority of referrals were for requests for information only.

“Often records could not be located or had been destroyed due to filing practices that existed at the time of investigation.”

If victims wished to make a complaint, that was dealt with at a district level.  

“It would be difficult to say how many of these complaints resulted in convictions as each complaint was sent to the appropriate district [where the victim was based] for further investigation.

“Police have been limited by old recording, filing and investigation techniques that are not the practice of today.”

Source; stuff.co.nz (Fairfax, url; http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/71388571/generation-of-children-brutalised-in-state-care-wont-get-public-apology) 

The article is of course reporting on the recent release of a Government report on child abuse committed in government licensed or controlled institutions over a 50 year period.

Again the New Zealand government, or at least one of its so-called inquiries, a rather toothless affair, complete with politically appointed members to the panel and the all-important Chairperson.

Now there are a couple of points that journalist, Stacy Kirke, makes wherein she clearly expects her readers to heave a sight of relief, perhaps believing that the best that could be done has been done.

This ploy by the journalist is a classic example of the spin and gloss that MSM outlets employ to reassure Kiwi readers, in a “balanced way” of course, that all is in hand. Stacy in her peice notes, in fact complete with it’s own subsection, that cases had been referred to the New Zealand police.

“PANEL MAKES 89 REFERRALS TO POLICE”

But hang on a minute! Aren’t the New Zealand Police very much a large part of the problem in New Zealand? Of course, as is pretty much par for the course in New Zealand, the fact that the police have been complicit in concealing child sexual abuse is completely ignored, no real detail is provided, nor are any names of significance. But what is perhaps more important for the reader to know is that the information that Stacy has left out, information that she was not in fact permitted to include, for if she had she would now be facing criminal prosecution for breaching one or more of the myriad of NSO’s that the government and vested interests, including police, have sought over the years, just to conceal their own past criminal and abusive behaviour, particularly as in their abuse, sexual, physical and emotional, relates to children, adolescents and young persons.

To understand the extent of the problem in New Zealand, and perhaps the context, a little better one actually needs to look at at least two of the New Zealand Governments very cleverly hobbled opportunistic “Inquiries” and the heavily redacted reports and or the government’s refusal to conduct investigations that have resulted.

These inquiries are the final report of an inquiry conducted by the Confidential Listening and Assistance Service, the Commission of Inquiry into Police Conduct, and a request for an investigation that was, again very strangely, declined by New Zealand’s “Independent Police Conduct Authority” (IPCA) back in May 2007, just two of months after the release of the Bazley report in April of the same year. These three events are in fact very interrelated and knowledge of them is essential if one is to understand this issue completely.

These events also have a relationship, of sorts, to the current British inquiry into Child Sexual abuse, or rather the Kiwi judge Lowall Goddard, who was for some strange reason thought suitable and subsequently selected to chair the inquiry when Baroness Butler-Sloss thought it wise to recuse herself. As online British tabloid the Express reported at the time:

Child sex probe ‘shambles’ as Baroness Butler-Sloss quits as head of the inquiry

THERESA May was accused of presiding over a “shambolic” Home Office yesterday after the former judge appointed to head a child abuse cover-up inquiry sensationally quit.

The Home Secretary was forced to defend her judgment in hiring Baroness Butler-Sloss after victims groups and MPs criticised the peer for being too close to the Establishment she was being asked to scrutinise.

She had come under fire after it emerged her late brother Sir Michael Havers was Attorney General in the 1980s when some of the alleged paedophile crimes took place.

Sir Michael – father of the actor Nigel Havers – publicly defended a decision not to prosecute senior diplomat Sir Peter Hayman for allegedly possessing child abuse images.

Grilled yesterday at the Home Affairs Committee, a sometimes angry- sounding Mrs May insisted she did not regret choosing the inquiry chief.

Labour MP and committee chairman Keith Vaz said the resignation was the latest example in a “shambolic” few weeks for the Home Office where things seemed to be “unravelling”.

Mrs May said she was “very sorry (and) disappointed” that the former president of the High Court’s Family Division and chairman of the inquiry into the 1987 Cleveland child sex abuse scandal had quit.

She added: “I reject entirely any suggestion she wasn’t the right person to do the job. I continue to believe that she would have done an excellent job, given her experience, expertise and absolute integrity.”

Mr Vaz said: “We are all fans of her integrity. It’s not her integrity which is at issue. It’s your judgment in appointing her in the first place. No one’s questioning her integrity. It’s your judgment we’re questioning.”

Source: The Express.co.uk

LF readers may well soon begin to once again question the wisdom of British Home Secretary Theresa May – for having selected the flightless Dodo bird, Kiwi Lowell Goddard, as the replacement for Baroness Butler-Sloss. Labour MP Mr Keith Vaz’s criticism of May could equally be levelled at her for the second choice of Goddard.

There were many far more competent Australian jurists that May could have selected as a replacement, if it was in fact an arm’s length antipodian she wanted. Far better qualified too, rather than appointing a judge from a legal and human rights backwater like New Zealand, a country with some pretty serious form when it comes to Judges and Courts being tainted by political agenda’s.

The New Zealand Royal Commission into Police Conduct

We will start with New Zealand’s Royal Commission into Police Conduct. Dame Margaret Bazley, a retired New Zealand civil servant, conducted that particular “Inquiry”. Commonly now referred to as the Bazley report, the inquiry was convened at a time when there had been a serious public backlash when police corruption had been exposed, police corruption which had occurred in the late 1980’s to the mid 1990’s. The person who very much became the public face of that corruption was Louise Nicholas, some would say to the detriment of justice, now a media darling and minor celebrity, who in an almost Machiavellian twist has recently been recruited and used to continue the ongoing spin that the government is determined to field with of course the cooperation of the local mainstream media.

The corrupt behaviour in the case of Nicholas and a number of other complainants had been employed by senior police officers in order to bury a large parcel of rape complaints against police officers themselves, the allegation in general, that there had been a large group of serial rapists active within the New Zealand police and that they had over a number of years been targeting young girls and women, using their inherent authority, with the intention of gang raping the victims.

Following a series of exposes the public call for an investigation that had come about was however much broader than just the Nicholas case, with most justice and human rights interest groups, at the time, in fact calling for a full inquiry into alleged systemic corruption within the New Zealand police force.

In fact such was the degree of the institutionalized police corruption that senior officers, including the Commissioner, and the Government of the day, with the assistance of a complicit heritage media, steered and manipulated the public disquiet and opinion by actively working to narrow down the focus of a proposed inquiry, in time completely watering-down the terms of reference that were ultimately applied, thus the Bazley inquiry came into existence.

Now in terms of this LF post it would be far too complicated to use Margaret Bazley’s report in its entirety. At least as in it relates to the recent “inquiry” into child sexual abuse, chaired by another New Zealand Judge, Carolyn Henwood.

For the purposes of this post, which aims to evidence the complete waste of time and the serious jeopardy that continues to exist by making such referrals, a recounted by Stacy Kirke, to New Zealand’s police force.

Of course these so-called “police referrals” make for good newspaper propaganda and copy but they absolutely do not assist the victims, nor do they take account of the suffering the victims, all children, endured; at least the suffering where criminal behaviour could in fact be established, or where the alleged perpetrator had subsequently died.

Many of these cases are after all “historic”, with the victims themselves now having reached middle-age, never having obtained anything even close to resembling justice.

The Bazley Commission looked at many cases of police abuse, sexual and otherwise, although the inquiry was for some reason, somewhat strangely, focused on women only.

The specific case that we are going to use, as an example, is referred to at Section 3.130, entitled “The investigation of Submitter B’s allegations”, of the Commission’s final report.

It deals with a young adolescent female victim, under 16 years of age at the time, who had been manipulated into a sexual relationship by a Christchurch police officer, under circumstances that should have been made public but weren’t.

Instead, the first order of business for the Bazley Commission was immediately set about concealing the identities of everyone involved, of the victims who gave evidence and the police perpetrators.

It must also be said that the victims had absolutely no choice in the matter, many were outraged by the fact that this serious police offending had again been concealed behind a veil of sham NSO’s, undoubtedly all to protect the New Zealand police as an institution.

Of course the Bazley Commission was not the only occasion where New Zealand’s civil servants, police included, had gone to quite extraordinary lengths to conceal the extent of the sexual abuse and corruption involved in the police’s offending and subsequent cover-up’s. We will be looking at another of these occasions in due course.

Margaret Bazley was never cut out to be the chair of a commission that was ever going to get to the truth. A life long career civil servant with no legal qualification she was undoubtedly a political appointment, as were the rest of the commissions members, specialist bullshit artists who were strategically placed only to ensure everything went smoothly for the Government, the solicitor General and the police, in particular the Commissioner and his close associates.

There is another sickening aspect to this case in particular. The Christchurch police officer concerned obviously escaped prosecution, not once, but on two occasions, another complaint was filed some time after the Commission had concluded its business, that complaint also allegedly being covered up by police.

That however is not the worst of it. The officer in question left the New Zealand police force. He then qualified as a lawyer and was granted admission to the bar at Christchurch, where he continues to practice law as a solicitor of New Zealand’s High Court.

This fact is almost certainly common knowledge amongst New Zealand legal fraternity, especially in the very small city of Christchurch, no doubt including the Judges, those retired from the bench and those still serving. The Bazley report is interesting in a number of respects in the way it deals with child sexual abuse by police officers. There has been no other international jurisdiction that has obfuscated to the extent that New Zealand has.

We will start with Para 6.115, Pg 249. Bazley opines;

In other files the complainant was particularly vulnerable because of his or her youth or disability, or because of difficult personal circumstances. The case of Submitter B (discussed at paragraphs 3.130–3.135 and 3.191–3.198) involved a young woman who in 1982 was placed in the home of a police officer, who subsequently had a sexual relationship with her over a period of some years. The young woman complained of sexual abuse and sexual assault which began when she was a teenager living in the police officer’s house in his care. The officer was investigated but never faced disciplinary charges in relation to the sexual relationship he had with her. The police now accept that the complainant’s complaints were handled inadequately at the time, the police having failed to pursue internal charges arising from the complaints of ongoing abuse and having failed to give closer consideration to criminal charges arising from the allegations of indecent assault before the complainant turned 16. The police also accept that it was unfortunate that no proper consideration was given to bringing charges when it became clear that the police officer had lied about the sexual relationship. The police have said that the police officer’s conduct in the 1980s should have resulted in his facing serious charges before the disciplinary tribunal.

At para 6.122, Pg 251 Bazley even touches on the effects that this type of abuse has on the victims, in fact Bazley singles out Submitter “B” for special mention;

Effects of such conduct

6.122 I found these cases, and others like them, very disturbing. I saw evidence of the devastating effect on the people involved from the officers’ conduct. For instance, Submitter E said,

My primary complaint was that I was abused by [police officer] at a

time when I was in a vulnerable state, emotionally unstable and in need

of support. I had regarded [police officer] as a senior member of the police and I had understood that he was helping me.

…..Because of his role and seniority I had trusted him.

My mental and physical health was seriously affected … for some time afterwards.

Submitter B said that a doctor told her that she was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Another complainant said that she has “fearful and petrifying flashback

memories which make me worked up, tense and stressed out, often every few days”.

The complainant who was a schoolgirl on work experience said that after having sex with the officer she no longer wanted to join the police. Looking back at the impact of the incident she observed,

I didn’t really give a shit about school after this happened to me. I went to eat my lunch and see my friends and play sport. I remained an average student.

I no longer held the police in high regard. I have never stressed to my children that going to a policeman is a safe option if they were in trouble, which is something that every parent would like to be able to do.

I never told any one at home about what happened to me – I was too embarrassed and ashamed about what had happened. I was also shocked about what they had done to me, I didn’t go there with the intention of anything like this happening.

Of course Bazley is full of praise for the police and their many “admissions” of “policy failure”, being a civil servant, policy failures were obviously the flavour of the moment. The problem is that these particular admissions were all a complete load of horsehit. The crimes that were committed had nothing whatsoever to do with police policy at the time. It was out and out corruption, and the ongoing cover-up still is.

Anyone having had anything to do with dealing with or investigating historic child abuse reading this, especially those outside New Zealand, will be beginning to cringe. It does however get worse, much worse.

The above excerpt from the Bazley report is in fact a brief summary of the events and the way in which Bazley would like readers to believe Christchurch police dealt with the issue back in the mid 1980’s

Earlier in the report Bazley had in fact referred to the case of Submitter “B” in more detail:

The investigation of Submitter B’s allegations

3.130 The allegation in Submitter B’s case was that the police officer in question had abused a position of trust in relation to a young woman who was placed in his foster care and who later bore his child.

3.131 The alleged abuse began when the complainant was 15, and included allegations of indecent and other forms of sexual assault. After her child was born, the subject of the complaint repeatedly denied paternity, but eventually admitted it. Although an apparently consensual relationship continued between the complainant and the subject of the complaint for a number of years, there was a regular pattern of complaints including allegations of assault and threats.

3.132 The initial investigation undertaken in 1985 when Submitter B was 17 years old and was the result of Submitter B’s lawyer contacting the police on her behalf complaining of intimidation. A statement was taken from Submitter B, which included indecent assault allegations and details of the sexual nature of the relationship before she turned 16. I was concerned at the initial response of the inspector assigned to this investigation, who told the alleged offender that if the paternity issue which brought the complaint to the attention of the police “was rectified the complaint could be satisfactorily resolved without the [complainant’s] statement becoming official.” The police were unable to ascertain who authorised this statement, but offered the following suggestion:

a likely explanation arises from the nature of [Submitter B’s lawyer’s] original complaint on [Submitter B’s] behalf. [Submitter B’s lawyer] sought Police intervention to prevent [the alleged offender] from intimidating [Submitter B]….

3.133 I note in this respect that general instruction J80, in force at the time, directed police members to make every reasonable effort to resolve complaints as soon as practicable and a generous interpretation of the inspector’s actions would suggest that this is what he was attempting to achieve.

3.134 Nevertheless, when it became apparent that the alleged offender would not admit to paternity, the inspector initiated a criminal investigation after a subsequent interview with Submitter B. The police submitted to the Commission of Inquiry into Police Conduct that the investigation was an exceptionally thorough one. In the course of the investigation, the investigators (although based in the district in which the complaint originated) “interviewed well over 30 witnesses” and “examined a large number of documents and established covert surveillance” of the police officer complained about.

3.135 As far as can be ascertained the investigation, although flawed, complied with applicable police standards and procedures. (However, see my comments on the exercise of the discretion to prosecute in relation to this case at paragraphs 3.191 to 3.198.)

Bazley continues…..

Actions after the investigation of Submitter B’s allegations 3.191 In 1985, it was determined that there was not enough evidence to sustain a criminal charge against the officer who was the subject of Submitter B’s complaint (see paragraphs 3.130 to 3.135).

Although there was no direction in the police policy documents that a charge should be laid only where there was a greater than 50 percent chance of conviction, I was informed that this represented good practice in 1985 as it does now. The investigating officer summed up the position:

1.3.1 I am quite satisfied with respect to [Submitter B’s] credibility and that she is telling the truth in respect to this offence. I believe it is relevant that she was not aware that the circumstances constituted a criminal offence. …

1.3.3 Throughout this entire enquiry I have found [Submitter B’s] statements to be consistent and in many circumstances corroborated. As can be appreciated, with the passage of time, the recollection of dates and times has been difficult. 1.3.4 [Submitter B’s] credibility however, would be a crucial issue and considering her delinquent and truant behaviour prevailing at the time, a reasonable doubt would not be difficult to create in [the alleged offender’s] favour. 1.3.5 I therefore believe that a prosecution in all probability would fail and accordingly recommend that no prosecution be undertaken in respect of this crime.

3.192 As counsel for the police acknowledged,

Viewed by today’s standards, the decision not to prosecute [the alleged offender] in 1985 for indecently assaulting [Submitter B] was a conservative one.

That said, there can be no doubt that the decision was made in good faith following a very thorough inquiry, on the recommendation of an officer who was most sympathetic to [the complainant]. At that time, Judges were required to warn juries of the danger of convicting on the uncorroborated word of the complainant, and the decision, which was reviewed by the local legal officer, was an unremarkable one in that context.

3.193 Although I understand the reasoning behind the decision not to prosecute the subject of Submitter B’s allegations in a criminal court, I was concerned that the 1985 investigation did not result in disciplinary charges relating to the sexual relationship with Submitter B. (I do note, however, that the alleged offender faced other disciplinary charges.) The police addressed this issue in submissions to me and acknowledged, “The failure to pursue disciplinary charges arising from the sexual relationship, either in 1985 or [later], was unfortunate. The Police do not seek to defend it.”

3.194 Submitter B’s complaint was reconsidered in the early 1990s. I was concerned that the inspector who undertook this task believed that the “intervention of a Tribunal Hearing in 1985 precludes my reconsideration of acts occurring before 1985”. Counsel for New Zealand Police informed me, [This decision] … was wrong. The inspector appears to have been under the misapprehension that [the alleged offender] was formally warned as result of his sexual association with [Submitter B] up to and including 1985. In fact, the 1985 warning related only to a specific incident of assault.

3.195 The inspector did, however, consider whether charges based on the post-1985 sexual relationship could be the subject of criminal or disciplinary charge. He concluded that consensual activity while the alleged offender was off duty had “little to do with [the officer’s] employer”, namely the police, and that the police would struggle to prove, beyond reasonable doubt, Submitter B’s allegation that some of the activity occurred while the alleged offender was on duty. As counsel for the police told me, The basis for this decision was similar to the basis of the 1985 decision: while the Police had no doubt about the accuracy of [Submitter B’s] account, it was unlikely that they could prove the allegation to the required level.

3.196 Submitter B’s complaint was brought to police attention again in 1996. The police considered whether it was possible to bring charges against the officer concerned under section 131 of the Crimes Act 1961 (sexual intercourse with a girl under care and protection) but found that “There was no evidence capable of supporting such a charge;”.

3.197 This review did not, however, give detailed consideration to a charge of indecent assault, and the police do not dispute that a more careful consideration of a charge of indecent assault should have been undertaken. As the police told me, In 1996, the need for a corroboration warning had been removed (though the fact that such a warning would have been given was not among [the original investigating officer’s] main reason for recommending that [the alleged offender] not be charged). It would have been preferable for the Police to re-examine the evidence that might have supported a charge of indecent assault and formed their own assessment in light of the more “complainant friendly” environment that followed the 1986 reforms. The reference in the report to delay, and the public interest, indicates that the outcome may have been the same, but this exercise should nonetheless have been undertaken.

3.198 I agree with these comments. Moreover, the consequences of police inaction and wrong decisions may have contributed to (or at least failed to mitigate) Submitter B’s ongoing difficulties.

Note: Margaret Bazley in the report refers to a “local legal advisor” based in Christchurch. Whilst not specifically named, this person is more than likely to be Ian MacArthur, a civilian police employee who along with the corrupt Christchurch Crown prosecutor Brent Stanaway has built an entire 30+ year legal career on the back of handling the legal aspects and challenges presented by police cover-ups, false prosecutions and outright corruption, including both the Peter Ellis and George Gwaze case’s.

As we have said, Bazley was not legally qualified, nor was she in our view in any way competent to be chairing the inquiry. She has made a number of observations and findings, apparently built on legal advice she had received, all of which are  illconceived and legally questionable, some of which even fly in the face of common-sense, many of which no evidence in support was presented.

The Bazley Commission was in effect a complete white-wash. What’s more it was a hatchet job, a betrayal, of the women who had the courage to stand up and give evidence against an all powerful police force that has, as an institution, continued to offend. That reality is to be seen in the fact that Bazley, who remember is not a lawyers arsehole, is seen making recommendations that resulted in the obstruction of prosecutions; amongst them the recommendation that no charges be brought against the bent ex-cop turned barrister.

The bad cop turned Barrister is Christchurch legal practitioner Paul Johnson. The two parties who came forward after the Royal Commission, making further damning allegations against Johnson, were his wife and her younger sibling, Paul Johnson’s sister in law, who had apparently also been sexually harassed and abused by Johnson as a girl. Again police allegedly buried the complaint

Everyone that was anyone in New Zealand legal circles knew about Paul Johnson’s offending and the ongoing cover-up, not just the white-wash executed by the New Zealand police, but the ongoing silence of New Zealand lawyers, judges, the country’s law society, politicians on both sides of Parliament and those who held office’s in Government, including Margaret Bazley and the other members of the Commission.

These same powerful people also knew that Johnson had not been alone in the offending alleged in the Commissions final report. Every single one of them also knew that the Police’s Canterbury and Otago area commands had and continued to have serious problems with corrupt officers, not limited to just the junior ranks either.

No sooner had Margaret Bazley’s report been made public in March 2007 the shit had again hit the fan for the New Zealand police.

At exactly the same time that Bazley was putting the finishing touches on her precious glossy fucking report, Kiwi investigative Journalist Ian Wishart was also putting the finishing touches on an investigation that had taken him two years, a police corruption story that he was to publish just two months later, in the May of 2007.

To Serve and Protect – Police Commissioner Howard Broad and the official response

Wishart’s investigation was published in Investigate Magazine over a period of two months. It was an exceptionally thorough piece of investigative journalism and included many interviews, with victims, witnesses and ex police officers, some of whom had resigned from their positions in disgust at the behaviour of their senior officers and the Commissioner and level of corruption present in the Christchurch and Dunedin districts.

Wishart’s last article was entitled “To Serve and Protect – The devastating truth about police corruption in New Zealand”. Last published 12th June 2007, and still available online, it was an in-depth and scathing expose of the corrupt methods employed by New Zealand police officers in Dunedin and Christchurch, police methods that went as far as corrupt officers allegedly threatening to kill witnesses or associates who dared speak out.

Wishart opined;

TO SERVE AND PROTECT – The devastating truth about police corruption in New Zealand

May 2007

Explosive new allegations of widespread police sexual misconduct reaching as high as current police commissioner Howard Broad have emerged in a major Investigate magazine inquiry into police corruption, along with evidence of a political cover-up by senior Labour politicians including the current Attorney-General Michael Cullen, and CYFS Minister David Benson-Pope.

Source:

Wishart’s interviews included several with a twenty year veteran of the New Zealand police force, a man who had in fact resigned as a result of the corruption, ex-cop Detective Sergeant Tom Lewis, the man responsible for the tell all book, “Coverups and Copouts” on the subject of New Zealand’s infamously corrupt police force.

“New Zealand police officers are not used to public scrutiny and , in fact, resent it.To be fair to them, however, neither are politicians, the judiciary , the legal profession or public servants. As New Zealand police have made a ‘art form’ out of writing off complaints over the years , the Police Complaints Authority is a toothless tiger. Standing up for your rights is never easy, it may risk losing your job or being threatened , it can cause family turmoil. Almost always it results in emotional upset. However anyone who has felt stuck or trapped in a corrupt system knows the sweet rewards of exercising PERSONAL POWER.” – Tom Lewis (Coverups and Copouts ISBN-10: 1869586433 ISBN-13: 978-1869586430)

Tom Lewis’s recollections are damning, as is the fact that the New Zealand police worked tirelessly to prevent the publication of his 1998 book, buying up copies of the first print and eventually intimidating the publisher, so as to prevent a second print run. As Lewis himself, now an Australian resident, recalled for Wishart back in 2007;

“Just as an aside to show you how the police work, when I was going around NZ doing the book tour [in 1998], I ended up in Christchurch in a little bar in Merivale, and [Superintendent Paul] Fitzharris who was then the head of the South Island police district asked me to join him at his table. I said no thanks, so then he came over to me and said, ‘Look, I’ll just give you a bit of information. You are not going to have your book reprinted, you will not get any more publicity after this week on your book. It’s virtually sold out now and that’s going to be the end of it. And there will not be a reprint, even though it has sold. You can believe me or not believe me, but that’s what’s going to happen.’

“And that’s exactly what did happen. My book editor at the publishing company resigned in disgust over it. And the funny thing is many of the copies of my book were actually bought by the police department!” – Tom Lewis

Source:

Wishart’s article was a complete revelation for most New Zealanders, coming, as it did on the back of the publicity around Bazley’s report. Not that many Kiwi’s actually got to know about Wishart’s investigation. At the time larger players in New Zealand’s mainstream media played down Wisharts comprehensive expose, they succeeded in doing this by focusing on one narrow aspect, the allegation against Howard Broad, whether or not he had been at a party where a porn movie, featuring bestiality, had been screened. The mainstream media had, wittingly or not, hooked into the angle police spin doctors wanted and their related strategy of discrediting two of the minor players, thus hosing down the whole story. One of New Zaland’s most corrupt cops denied having provided the porn movie as alleged. That’s all it took.

In Sumary Wisharts article alleged and produced evidence to support several serious allegations;

1. That current Police Commissioner Howard Broad had, and was watching, bestiality videos at his going away party from the Dunedin CIB at 19 Arawa St.
2. That current Police Commissioner Howard Broad fondled junior staff whilst stationed at the Dunedin CIB
3. That Howard Broad, when he stated that only a “few” officers were involved in sexual misconduct, either knew or should have known of the extensive sexual misconduct in the Dunedin CIB
4. That Police National Headquarters, Dunedin Police and the Labour Government helped quash an investigation into a child sex, bondage and bestiality ring operating in Dunedin in 1984 run by the father of a police officer and attended by at least one Labour cabinet minister
5. That current Attorney-General Michael Cullen and the current Minister responsible for CYFS, David Benson-Pope, helped run damage control over the child sex, bondage and bestiality case in 1985
6. That current Labour coalition MPs Pete Hodgson, Tim Barnett, George Hawkins and Matt Robson were aware of major allegations of police misconduct from 2000 onwards, including the existence of videotapes of police rapes and bestiality involving police officers
7. That by failing to rein in police corruption brought to their attention in the eighties and again in 2000, the Labour government has permitted the culture of corruption to widen in that time, wrecking more lives
8. That former Wellington District Commander and current Police National Headquarters officer, Superintendent John Kelly indecently assaulted a number of women, including the daughter of a previous police commissioner
9. That Dunedin and Christchurch Police had arrangements to turn a blind eye to organised crime – including underage sex and drug dealing – in return for sexual favours from brothels
10. That police have maintained files on key politicians and public figures capable of being used to blackmail the government, judges, lobby groups and even police association members into supporting the status quo
11. That Dunedin police officers, former and current, have been involved in multiple rapes of junior female police staff, prostitutes and civilians, drug deals, and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, including falsifying charges
12. That several of the top officers in the David Bain case, including Milton Weir, were allegedly corrupt police officers
13. That the officer involved in the alleged rape of a court worker, detailed in our last issue and cleared by Police National Headquarters last month, is also a corrupt officer
14. That the culture of police corruption, far from being localised to the Bay of Plenty or historic, extends to a large number of jurisdictions because of staff movements, and continues to the present day,   power to bring change

Wishart himself, at the end of his expose, concluding;

“The only way to weed the bad cops out of the force is a Royal Commission, because the Old Boys Network within the police is currently looking after its own interests and bringing discredit to the many hardworking honest police who do not have the institutional power to bring change” – Ian Wishart

The fact is that Detective Wayne Idour, the fly in the ointment for Wishart and his sources, in denying allegations of his involvement, had already been used by the New Zealand Media, grabbing headlines with another of his bent ex cop mates Detective Senior Sergeant Lew Proctor less than 12 months earlier, in September/October 2006.

The problem is that both of these bent ex cops had very little credibility, having been dismissed from the police force. Proctor for the now infamous and vicious assault on fellow police officers whilst on the piss in one of New Zealand’s unique “Police bars”, for which he claimed “temporary insanity”, thus avoiding a much harsher sentence.

Ex-cop denies having supplied porn movie (New Zealand Herald, Tuesday May 15th 2007).

Brethren’s investigator went berserk at station (New Zealand Herald, 

The far more important aspects of Wishart’s investigation and the allegations raised where numerous, including of course the allegedly well organized sexual abuse of children by police officers, their adult relatives, associates and a number of very well connected senior politicians. Despite the allegations having never been dealt with the New Zealand government appointed the recently retired police commissioner Howard Broad to head up another  “Inquiry”, this one into Child, Youth and Family Services (CYF’s) At stake, the issue of “Child abuse” and “Neglect”:

Ex police commissioner to head CYF inquiry

October 12th, 2012

Former Police Commissioner Howard Broad has been chosen to lead a new independent inquiry into Child, Youth and Family’s complaints process.

Social Development Minister Paula Bennett made the announcement at Rotorua today, in the first of a series of talks on the newly-released White Paper to address child abuse and neglect.

Mrs Bennett said the review would look at whether complaints regarding cases – which are currently handled by Child, Youth and Family – could be handled independently outside of the agency.

She told a public meeting she was “concerned enough” about the process to order the review and was keen to get “the right advice” on whether it should be changed.

“I am confident Mr Broad will bring all of his skill and experience to bear when undertaking this independent review and I look forward to his findings.”

Source: NZ Herald

Following a surprisingly brief media cycle, largely thanks to the level of co-operation between police and the country’s more than compliant “friendly” media, all that was left for police to deal with was the matter of Wishart’s investigation having automatically triggered a referral to the Independent Police Conduct Authority by the Commissioner, at the time Howard Broad, who had been one of those inveigled by Wishart’s informants.

Now this is where it starts to get really sick, not in relation to New Zealand’s dealing with Wishart’s investigation or his allegations of child sexual abuse, that was only to be expected. Rather the conduct of the person that the British Home Secretary, Theresa May, selected as the replacement for Baroness Butler-Slot; assuring British victims that the foreigner would be up to the job – independent, uncompromised and incorruptible. New Zealand, it seems to us here at Lauda Finem, is now attempting to export it’s very special take on justice.

Enter Kiwi Justice Lowell Goddard. Now for the life of us we can’t figure out how it was that Theresa May, with the British intelligence agencies at her disposal, thought Goddard squeaky clean, or even remotely suitable, Goddard is in our opinion a New Zealand cover-up specialist, not too dissimilar to many other lawyers New Zealand has produced since the class of 1980. Government go to girls and boys such Kristy McDonald QC.

In May 2007, at the time that Howard Broad had referred Wishart’s allegations, which included allegations of child sexual abuse, child prostitution and organized pedophile groups, the Chair of the IPCA was none other than New Zealand’s Justice Lowell Goddard.

Goddard dealt with these extremely serious allegations with just one sentence “I have determined that none of the allegations are matters contemplated by the Police Complaints Authority Act 1988 as requiring investigation or other action by the Authority”

The full statement, still available on the IPCA website, was not that much longer:

* Statement on Investigate magazine allegations

Following notification by the Commissioner of Police of numerous allegations of alleged offending by serving and past police officers in the Investigate magazine article “To Serve and Protect – The Devastating Truth about Police Corruption in New Zealand” I have determined that none of the allegations are matters contemplated by the Police Complaints Authority Act 1988 as requiring investigation or other action by the Authority.

None are presently the subject of complaint to the Authority. Nor has there been a request by the Commissioner under section 22(2) of the Police Complaints Authority Act for the Authority to undertake an investigation into any particular matter. The Act does not contemplate that the Authority should act as, essentially, a Commission of Inquiry into 15 or so years of alleged miscellaneous serious wrongdoing without any specific reference to it.

In my opinion the allegations in their present form are not matters contemplated by the Act as a basis for a Police Complaints Authority inquiry. It is for the Police in the first instance to make such inquiries as they see fit. It will then be a matter for the Commissioner as to whether or not he invokes section 22(2) of the Act and requests the Authority to undertake an investigation into any particular matter.

Justice Lowell Goddard

Police Complaints Authority

28 May 2007

Source: http://www.ipca.govt.nz/Site/media/2007/2007-May28-Investigate-magazine.aspx

New Zealand’s courts, including judges of that country’s High Court have some pretty serious form when it comes to concealing corruption and criminal offending, especially when it’s politically expedient to do so. The latest case where this has almost certainly occurred, in LF’s opinion, is that of ex National party member of Parliament Mike Sabin, who New Zealand’s Prime Minister John Key has also lied about, particularly on the facts surrounding Sabin’s selection and candidacy at the last New Zealand general election. As fellow Australian Derryn Hinch reported:

A Kiwi Conspiracy

27th March, 2015

“Sabin appeared in court in February and had his name suppressed. In news reports over there he is referred to euphemistically as a ‘prominent New Zealander’. The way the former All Black sex offender Graham Thorne is always protected.

That interim suppression order was due to expire and Sabin would have then been publicly identified but at an urgent Auckland hearing in the High Court, Justice Raynor Asher continued the suppression until Sabin’s trial starts on April 20″

Source; The Human Healine Note: LF have of course also posted numerous articles on the Sabin sexual assault coverup allegations and the likely government corruption involved.

For the United Kingdom’s Home Secretary, Theresa May. to not have been fully appraised of Judge Lowell Goddard’s earlier fiddling with justice, in particular Goddard’s part in dismissing, out of hand, convincing evidence of police child sexual abuse amongst other alleged crimes in 2007, without so much as a preliminary inquiry, is frankly damning.

New Zealand’s handling of every single case of organized or institutional child abuse is frankly abhorrent, albeit expected from a country with a low-life political elite, an executive and judiciary that continues to harbor and protect the perverts in their own ranks.

The only model worth following in the footsteps of is the Australian Royal Commission into the Institutional response to child sexual abuse. Built on sound and flexible terms of reference, integrity and openness, including public hearings, live webcast’s of the hearings and no name suppressions, the Australian Commission stands streets ahead of both New Zealand and the United Kingdom in this area of law and the pursuit of justice for the Australian victims.

The reasons for the Australian Royal Commission’s existence, just how it came to be, should not be forgotten either – flowing from the inadequacies of the country’s multi jurisdictional police forces and allegations of police complicity in concealing or fudging child sexual abuse complaints, particularly complaints that were historic;

Gillard launches royal commission into child abuse

12th November 2012

Prime Minister Julia Gillard has announced the creation of a national royal commission into institutional responses to instances of child sexual abuse.

The decision was taken at a meeting of federal cabinet this afternoon.

Ms Gillard had been under pressure to act following growing calls for a national inquiry into explosive allegations by a senior New South Wales police investigator that the Catholic Church covered up evidence involving paedophile priests.

Source: Australian Broadcasting Corporation

The success of the Australian model cannot be denied. It has manged to get to the bottom of the cover-ups and the inadequacies of State and Territory police forces in dealing with historic cases, both in the distant and more recent past.

Perhaps it was the fact that this very success was all but inevitable with an Australian Royal Commission that at the time of Julia Gillard’s decision and announcement had the New Zealand Government very much on edge.

When confronted with the news the New Zealand Minister at the time responsible, Paula Bennet, made quick work of down-playing any chance that New Zealand government would be following Australia’s lead. Bennett was clearly acutely aware of the skeleton’s and knew that a proper Commission of enquiry, headed up by a jurist of the calibre of Australian Peter McClellan, a former Supreme Court judge, would be political suicide;

NZ govt sees no need for sex abuse inquiry

November 13, 2012

The New Zealand government says it doesn’t see a need to follow Australia’s lead and launch an inquiry into historical child sex abuse.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard agreed on Monday to calls from federal Labor, Green and independent MPs for a royal commission into child sexual abuse in all religious institutions, state-based organisations, schools and not-for-profit groups such as scouts and sporting clubs.

It follows allegations of abuse by members of the Catholic church.

However, the New Zealand government has no plans to follow suit, with Social Development Minister Paula Bennett saying enough is already being done.

“I think the fact that we have been addressing historical abuse cases in this country, we have been doing it faster than it’s ever been done, we’ve been fronting up to some of the liability around that and settling a number of cases,” Ms Bennett said.

That includes the confidential listening and assistance service, through which people can raise allegations of abuse or neglect, or who have concerns relating to their time in state care before 1992.

“I think we’ve got other things in place that are addressing what, without a doubt, is cases of historical abuse.”

Source: lauda Finem Alternative source: Yahoo:NZ Newswire

Of course this news, in particular Paula Bennett’s views on behalf of the New Zealand government, was not widely reported in New Zealand at the time, but the Australian media did pick up on the hypocrisy.  The fact is New Zealand has had very little in place to ensure justice and compensation for the victims of institutional sexual abuse. It has over the years done more to subvert justice that it has to ensure it.

The views of New Zealand’s current Social Development Minister, Anne Tolley, as expressed above, therefore come as little surprise, in fact they were only ever to be expected.

Successive New Zealand Governments, of all political persuasion’s, have always bent over backwards to conceal the level of child abuse in the country, historic or not, in particular any institutionalized child abuse that the Government itself may have moral responsibility for, and perhaps more tellingly, through the governments obvious negligence, an extensive legal culpability for.

As the superior Australian inquiry enters it’s latest phase, New Zealand’s government and perhaps more particularly the country’s Attorney General and police hierarchy should pay attention. There may well be a storm brewing for senior Kiwi beauracrats and police officers who have actively concealed historic child sexual abuse, this may in turn open up new avenues for redress for New Zealand’s victims, particularly at an international human rights level:

The Royal Commission is examining the criminal justice system in relation to child sexual abuse in institutions.

This includes:

police investigation of allegations of institutional child sexual abuse
decision making processes regarding the prosecution of institutional child sexual abuse matters
evidence given by complainants
joint and separate trials with multiple allegations of institutional child sexual abuse
sentencing of offenders convicted of child sexual abuse occurring in institutional contexts
The Royal Commission’s Terms of Reference require us to examine what institutions and governments should do to address the impacts of child sexual abuse in institutional contexts. This includes ensuring justice for victims through the processes for referral for investigation and prosecution.

Source:

In the opinion of Lauda Finem New Zealand Justice Lowell Goddard must immediately vacate the chair of the United Kingdom’s Inquiry into institutional child sexual abuse, Goddard is, by her own past inaction, seriously compromised. In fact, again in our opinion, to a far greater extent than the United Kingdom’s Baroness Butler–Slot ever was.

The Australian Royal Commission will undoubtedly maintain its track record to date, continuing towards reconciliation, prosecution where warranted, reform and of course compensation for Australia’s many victims.

The New Zealand governments so-called “Commissions” and “Inquiries” are always a pale reflection of the Australian efforts, in fact they’ve been little more than a bad joke, sadly at the expense of the many victims, judicial jokes which will undoubtedly go down in history, to New Zealand’s everlasting lasting shame.

New Zealand is already a laughing stock amongst jurists, at least at an international level, and the global legal community. It is expected that things will only get progressively worse, at least until the government is finally perhaps held accountable for it’s ongoing corruption and abuse, by using human rights law, the various treaties New Zealand is a party too and the international Courts.

 

References/Bibliography

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http://www.parliament.nz/resource/0000055162

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Payout for abuse victims ‘deeply flawed’

MSD ‘answerable to no one’ in payout process, says lawyer

http://www.humanheadline.com.au/hinch-says/a-kiwi-conspiracy

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Ex police commissioner to head CYF inquiry