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Claims by Ellis has been in jail since he
was convicted on 13 charges of sexual abuse in 1993. His second appeal began
in Ellis' lawyer, Judith Ablett-Kerr,
QC, said the main area of contamination of children's evidence was parents. Many of the parents talked to
their children who attended the Civic Creche Child Care Centre where Ellis
worked and where some of the events allegedly took place. "The main thrust of the
argument is that parental contamination and contamination from support people
makes this case so unreliable," Mrs Ablett-Kerr said. "It affects the reliability
of children if information is fed from parents or they have material that affects
the way children saw their contact with Ellis." She said research now showed that
mass allegation cases were extremely high risk. Interviewers who spoke to the
children should have investigated possible areas of contamination, including
what was happening in their homes. "It is a remarkable
coincidence that three children who reported having baths with Ellis had
bathed with their parents," Mrs Ablett-Kerr said. In her submission she said she
could show that all the children gave contaminated evidence because parents
gave them the information, they had repeated interviews, and were open to
suggestion. She also said experts at the
six-week trial failed to address the issues of suggestibility as it related
to children. Repeated interviewing led the children
to accept the allegations they were making. "One child was (formally)
interviewed six times. I say that is a travesty," Mrs Ablett-Kerr said.
"They allowed the child to come to accept allegations she was making. "The more you ask, the more (children)
accept the information." Children should only have been
interviewed once, as it was generally accepted now that information from the
first interview was more reliable. "Despite the fact that
(formal) interviewing revealed children had extensive interviews with their
parents, there was no follow-up to see if there was contamination," Mrs
Ablett-Kerr said. "Nothing or little was done to stop parental
interviewing." Some of the allegations that
eventually led to convictions came from second, third and fourth interviews
with the children. Experts at the 1993 trial said they could distinguish
between false and true allegations through language, grammar and phraseology
used by the children. Mrs Ablett-Kerr said this was
untrue, as even experts themselves could not always determine the difference.
"The jury was given incorrect
information by the expert." One of the children used words
that Mrs Ablett-Kerr said were unusual for a child of her age. The girl spoke
of the clitoris and vulva. The girl had access to a book
about touching and had seen diagrams of boys' private parts. Mrs Ablett-Kerr
said her language indicated the child was suggestible. The hearing is before the full
five-judge bench. (Proceeding) |
