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Stuff
July 22 2002
Hood suspicious of police 'harassing' Ellis
NZPA
Award-winning author Lynley Hood says she is suspicious of police
"harassing and intimidating" former Christchurch Civic Crèche
worker Peter Ellis.
Ellis said police knocked on his door last Wednesday night regarding an
historic abuse allegation. He said today he felt harassed and intimidated.
Ellis, who has always protested his innocence, was paroled from prison in
February 2000 after serving 6½ years for abusing seven children in his care
at the crèche.
A book about the crèche case -- A City
Possessed -- won the Montana New Zealand Book Award's top prize in Auckland on Saturday
night.
Speaking from Auckland
today, Hood told NZPA she was "absolutely suspicious" of the latest
police inquiry into Ellis.
"This is the same thing as what happened on the eve of the publication
of the book. There was a supposed new allegation. The same story keeps
getting recycled.
"There needs to be a commission of inquiry. We have a slow-burning fuse here
and it is getting shorter and brighter. The Government can't ignore this
book."
Hood said the police visit was "par for the course" and their
actions showed their "huge power". She spoke to Ellis on the phone
after police had gone to see him. Police would not comment on the case today.
Hood said legal authorities "up and down the country" concurred
with her view that Ellis should not have been jailed. "It's not just the
crèche. I am deeply concerned about false allegations of sex abuse, which is
really ripping at the fabric of society. "The system can't distinguish
reliably between true and false allegations," she said.
Ellis said he wanted Prime Minister Helen Clark and Justice Minister Phil
Goff to read the book, rather than rely on Crown Law Office advice on whether
to review the case.
Former crèche supervisor Gaye Davidson has been asked to contact police.
Business cards from two Christchurch
detectives were left at her front door last week.
Ms Davidson and three other female co-workers -- Marie Keys, Jan Buckingham,
and Debbie Gillespie -- had indecent assault and sexual violation charges
dropped in 1992-93.
Ms Davidson told NZPA an inquiry would take away any lingering doubts over
the crèche workers' role.
She was one of 13 civic crèche workers awarded $1 million in total
compensation by the Employment Court in 1995 for unjustified dismissal,
following the civic crèche case child abuse allegations in 1992.
Most of the money was stripped from them by the Court of Appeal the following
year.
Ellis was found guilty of sexually abusing children at the crèche between
1986 and 1992, and was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
The case has been to the Court of Appeal twice.
Australian barrister Ian Freckelton said Hood's book would ensure that the
fallout from the saga did not end prematurely.
"It should focus our attentions upon necessary reforms," he said in
the New Zealand Law Journal last year.
"A City Possessed is a gripping and controversial analysis of a legal
and social phenomenon that has the potential to confront all of us.
"It is likely to be devoured within the general community, still trying
to come to grips with the legacy of a decade of headlines about (Peter) Ellis
and the Christchurch Crèche," Mr Freckelton said.
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