The Dominion Post
CYF fails to stop Ellis testimony
by Leah Haines
Child,
Youth and Family has failed to stop a businessman from publishing never-before-exposed
children's testimonies he says will exonerate convicted paedophile Peter Ellis.
The department received advice on options to stop the word-for-word testimonies
of children as young as toddler age from being printed tomorrow but said yesterday
it was powerless to stop publication.
Children's Commissioner Roger McClay confirmed he
also wanted the transcripts, due to fill a double-page advertisement in Sunday
papers, stopped.
Both Mr McClay and chief social worker Shannon Pakura said they were concerned that publication could
deter other children from giving evidence in future cases if they knew their
interviews could be dredged up later.
Publisher Barry Colman has paid up to $25,000 for the two-page spread, headed
"Toddler Testimonies", that will run verbatim interviews conducted
during the Christchurch Civic Creche sex abuse investigation 10 years ago.
Several of the interviews were never heard by the jury that convicted Ellis in
1993 of molesting children he supervised at the creche.
Mr Colman, who has never met Ellis or any of the children, says the interviews
will show Ellis was an innocent victim of a hysterical witch hunt and he wants
a commission of inquiry to prove it.
"You can see (from the transcripts) how these children became more and
more refined, from having no complaint against Ellis whatsoever to be talking
in fantasy terms," he said.
"The public will see how much gibberish these toddlers of three or four
trying to remember things. It's crazy stuff. They talk of trapdoors in the
houses that don't exist, of being pulled up in cages by Peter's mother."
The transcripts would show that some children were interviewed up to six times,
and they would show that the jury heard interviews that suited the prosecution,
he said.
However, Mr McClay and Ms Pakura
said they felt it was not fair on the children interviewed.
"I have met many of the children in the creche and some of them have
already said to me that, had they known about the ongoing hassle and constant
reminders of this, then they might never have been willing to proceed," Mr
McClay said.
Parents of one girl Ellis was convicted of abusing said they were stunned by Mr
Colman's "bizarre" advertisement, which they said undermined the
judicial process.
"For this to be published after it has been thoroughly scrutinised by the
Crown and social welfare and the police is deeply, deeply, wrong," the
girl's father said.
His wife said: "I do not want to have to keep on justifying and explaining
what happened in our lives. I would like him (Mr Colman) to hear what my
daughter is still saying about Peter Ellis."
Mr Colman became convinced of Ellis' innocence after reading A City Possessed,
by Lynley Hood. He has offered $100,000 to anyone who provides new evidence in
the case. No one had yet claimed it, he said.
National MP Katherine Rich asked what opponents of Mr Colman's advertisement
were frightened of.
When the public saw some of the testimonies they would see how crazy some of
the allegations were, she said.