The Christchurch Civic Creche Case
	News Reports Index
	1999 Jan-June
	Casualties of Sexual Allegations COSA Newsletter Vol 6 No 3 May/June 1999 Update on Peter Ellis by Felicity Goodyear-Smith Peter Ellis has been much in the news in the past few months. Alan Samson from the Dominion wrote a story summarising Prof Mike Hill’s paper ‘Satan’s Excellent Adventure in the Antipodes’ (see COSA Newsletter Oct 1998). The NZ Listener (New evidence in the fight to clear Peter Ellis, 9 Mar 99, by Bruce Ansley, Vol. 168. No 3073, Pages 18 – 23) ran a review story of the Crèche case. About the beginning of this year Peter Ellis was moved into self-care accommodation at Christchurch's Paparua Prison, where prisoners go before their release. These are like little motel units, where prisoners are able to do more for themselves, such as their own cooking. Peter had a further parole board hearing on 11 March. This time he attended the hearing, and made the following statement: "I would like to thank the Board for the opportunity to appear here today and in particular for allowing both my mother and my counsel to be present. There are two reasons why I think it is important for me to be present today. Firstly, because I wish to show my respect for the Board by personally explaining my position regarding parole and secondly, because it gives me the opportunity to say myself that which I have had to rely on others to say for me for the last six years. I cannot accept any Parole that you could offer me because the Board can only release me as a guilty man. I am a human being and of course I very much want my freedom, but I simply cannot accept it, if it is to be given, on the basis that I am a guilty man. I am not a guilty man. I am an innocent man." Signed: "Peter Hugh McGregor Ellis" On the basis of Ellis's declaration of innocence, the parole board said that it had "no option but to decline parole". Ellis's second appeal has been set down for May. At the very latest, he must be freed by next February, when he will have served two-thirds of his sentence and parole is automatic. There is also a petition that the inquiry be widened and "new and complex material" be considered. Justice Minister Tony Ryall has appointed a former High Court judge, Sir Thomas Thorp, to investigate this. As well as all this, further new evidence has some to light. Dunedin author Lynley Hood has been writing a book on the Ellis case for several years (it is nearing completion). She apparently has a tape of an interview with a juror on the case. This man told Hood that he found something about one of the child complainants "sexual'' and that he could imagine how Peter Ellis could find aspects of the assault "exciting''. He said that he had to go to counselling because of his feelings. He had had a counselling role in a church before the trial, and he also knew Dr Karen Zelas, the expert psychiatrist called on behalf of the prosecution, and had invited her as a speaker to his counselling clinic. Ms Hood will not release the tape to Ellis’s lawyer Judith Ablett-Kerr, QC because the juror spoke to her on the condition the material would be used only in her book. Mrs Ablett-Kerr is asking the Ministry of Justice legal counsel, who are examining the Ellis case, to find a way to obtain the tape. (Sunday Star-Times (Auckland), 7 Mar 99; The Press Christchurch,18 Mar 99, Innocence Stance Costs Ellis Parole by John Kenzell; The Press Christchurch,30 Apr 99, Page 3, Ellis Lawyer Wants Juror Tape Studied by Martin van Beynen; Dominion 29 Apr 99, Leaked Letter Raises Questions On Ellis Trial Juror.)