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Allegations
of Abuse in Institutions |
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A constable found
guilty of smacking a 17-year-old schoolboy to the floor in a police interview
room has been ordered to pay him $1500 and do community work. Suppression of the
man’s name was lifted by Judge Barry Lovegrove in the Wellington District Court
yesterday but it will stay in place until an appeal has been heard. The Wellington
constable has been suspended on full pay since shortly after October 26,
2003, when an investigation into his assault on Porirua schoolboy Maululu
Vaoese began. The judge found him
guilty of assault with intent to injure. Maululu Vaoese had been
picked up in Brooklyn along with his cousin Lusama Eli who later admitted
breaking into the car of an off-duty policeman. At Wellington central
police station Maululu Vaoese agreed to a video interview. During the interview Maululu
Vaoese accused the constable and another officer of assaulting him
and calling him a "lying nigger". Judge Lovegrove said
the victim was a softly spoken, clean-cut young man caught up in compromising
events. Denied a right to have a lawyer present and faced with the
constable’s persistence that he give a statement, Maululu Vaoese changed
tack, the judge said, and began making allegations. Judge Lovegrove said
the constable had had enough, got up, switched the video off and using a palm
strike designed not to leave marks, hit him, "propelling him clean out
of his chair some one or two metres to the floor where he lay in a crumpled
heap". The constable’s actions
were seen. He later denied them, even asking a police officer if he should
destroy the videotape. The judge said the
highest standard of behaviour was expected and the constable’s behaviour fell
well short. Judge Lovegrove said he
could not discharge the constable without conviction even if the consequences
were the constable lost his job. He ordered him to do
200 hours’ community work and pay $1500 to Maululu Vaoese. Defence lawyer Noel
Sainsbury said the constable had suffered the loss of a friend the day before
and should not have been on duty. |
