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Convicted child-abuser Peter
Ellis' lawyer, Judith Ablett Kerr QC, has vowed to battle on to clear him
after Governor-General Sir Michael Hardie Boys' decision to decline his
application for a pardon. She said possible options now
included taking the case to the Privy Council in Ellis was convicted in 1993 of
abusing seven children in his care at the Christchurch Civic Crèche between
1986 and 1991. He was released in February last
year after serving two-thirds of a 10-year sentence, having previously
refused early parole because that would have required him to acknowledge
guilt. Justice Minister Phil Goff
announced yesterday that he had advised the Governor-General to decline
Ellis' application for a pardon after a lengthy investigation by former Chief
Justice Sir Thomas Eichelbaum. Mrs Ablett Kerr called for Mr Goff to
acknowledge the Ministerial inquiry was too narrow. But Mr Goff said the inquiry was
comprehensive and detailed and he was confident that it dealt with all the
issues that warranted further investigation to protect against the
possibility of a miscarriage of justice. Sir Thomas spent more than 400
hours studying tapes, trial transcripts, Court of Appeal decisions and other
material relevant to Ellis' conviction, Mr Goff said. He was advised by two
international experts on child abuse and child testimony, Professor Graham Davies
from Mrs Ablett Kerr said she would have
to think about the next step, but options included taking the case to the
Privy Council or the Court of Human Rights. "The report is naturally disappointing
and to some extent has taken us by surprise," Mrs
Ablett Kerr said. "Although we never felt that
the inquiry could provide the answers because it just didn't have enough
material, we tried to assist the inquiry as much as we could." That preliminary view was further
endorsed when Professor Stephen Ceci, arguably the
world's leading authority on the contamination of evidence of children, was
not appointed to assist the inquiry, she said. However, Mrs
Ablett Kerr said she accepted Prof Davies as an international expert and in
his report, she said he formed the same view as her that there needed to be a
wider inquiry to judge whether the evidence of the children was contaminated.
Prof Davies appeared to be of the view that a wider inquiry was under way,
which was not the case, she said. |
