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A member of the jury that
convicted The alleged disclosure by the
juror in an interview with an author might not be investigated at appeal
because crucial evidence was not being made available, The Dominion newspaper
reported today. Concerns about the juror's
admission that he was sexually aroused by some of the evidence at the 1993
trial are raised in correspondence between Ellis' lawyer Judith Ablett Kerr
and Justice Ministry chief legal counsel Val Sim. According to the correspondence,
leaked to The Dominion, the author of a forthcoming book on Ellis, Lynley
Hood, has refused to issue a taped interview with the juror because of an
undertaking made to him. Included in Ms Ablett Kerr's
correspondence is an affidavit signed by barrister Simon Barr of what he was
told by Hood of interview details. These include that the juror found
something about one of the child complainants "sexual" and that he
could imagine how Peter Ellis could find aspects of the assault
"exciting". The affidavit further says the
juror had to go to counselling because of his feelings -- and that he had had
a counselling role in a church before the trial. Through his counselling
work, the affidavit says, he knew Dr Karen Zelas, the expert
psychiatrist called on behalf of the prosecution and had invited her as a
speaker to his clinic. The revelations led Ms Ablett Kerr
to urge that a commission of inquiry be urgently appointed to investigate
"if necessary, only this issue". She also asks that Hood be
interviewed and ordered to produce the tape. She urges as a matter "of
the utmost importance" that the issue is addressed by the minister of
justice and the Court of Appeal. A letter from Ms Sim to Mrs Ablett Kerr says
there may not be enough evidence of jurors' misconduct to justify
consideration by the Court of Appeal. |
