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The Dominion Post
September 23, 2003
Ellis book distorts case, say academics
Linley Boniface
Two distinguished academics have launched an attack in The New Zealand Law
Journal on author Lynley Hood's book about the Peter Ellis child abuse case.
In the hard-hitting 3000-word article, Emma Davies and Jeffrey Masson said Ms
Hood had misrepresented some of the research into child sex abuse and
suggested her analysis of the issues involved could not be trusted.
"Her ability to stereotype, distort and denigrate groups of people and
bodies of scientific research undermines her credibility," the article
said.
"Her tendency to vilify those she doesn't respect as members of the
`sex-abuse industry', `zealots', `lesbian radical feminists' or inhabitants
of a particular city seems to mirror the witch-hunt she appears to have
sought and found."
Dr Davies and Dr Masson published an abridged version of the article in two
newspapers, but the full Law Journal version contains new criticisms of Ms
Hood's interpretation of recovered memory research and of laws that enable
children to give evidence on video rather than in open court.
In her book, A City Possessed: The Christchurch Civic Creche Case, Ms Hood
said the Evidence Amendment Act 1989 meant children no longer had to deliver
their evidence-in-chief without leading or coaxing. She also said they were
interviewed by evidential interviewers trained in the "beliefs and
methods of the child protection movement".
The two academics said Ms Hood had failed to mention the advantages of
videotaped evidence. They said videos provided a record of what the child said
much closer to when the child had talked about the abuse, rather than at the
trial -- which could be more than a year later.
Dr Davies, whose doctorate in psychology was on children in the sexual abuse
investigation and criminal court process, said her own research had found
that evidential interviewers asked more neutral, age-appropriate questions
than prosecutors or lawyers. Other research had found that children who gave
evidence live via closed-circuit TV were more comprehensive, more fluent and more
resistant to leading questions than if they were giving evidence in open
court.
"Hood's supposedly balanced book has been used to steer public attention
to one case, from which we are encouraged to draw all sorts of spurious
generalisations," said the article, which is published in the September
issue of the Law Journal.
Dr Davies is a senior researcher at the Institute of Public
Policy at Auckland University of Technology,
working with former children's commissioner Ian Hassall on projects to prevent
child abuse and neglect. Dr Masson is a United States author now living in
New Zealand -- his books include Assault on Truth and Against Therapy.
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