NZ Herald
February 5, 2004
Claims shattering, says former Rotorua officer
NZPA
A former senior
Rotorua policeman is shattered by the resurfacing of pack-rape allegations
involving men he commanded.
Former senior sergeant Max Jones, who served in Rotorua for all but one year
between 1985 and 2000, says he thought the subject had been put to rest many
years ago.
A reopening of the police investigation and an independent inquiry have been
announced after Rotorua woman Louise Nicholas said she was violated with a
police baton and pack-raped by three police officers, Clint Rickards, Bob
Schollum and Brad Shipton, in 1986.
All three strenuously deny the allegations.
"To my mind and memory a complete, proper and fair inquiry based on
consensual sex was conducted," Mr Jones said. "I am shattered it has
resurfaced. I feel for the members concerned and I also feel for the
complainant in a lot of ways.
"She has obviously got a reason for what she is doing and that is her
right."
Mr Jones, who has left the region, said he was saddened that the reputation of
Rotorua police was being sullied by the furore.
He recalls the station being "full-on and happy" in the mid-80s, when
the rape was alleged to have occurred. He agreed officers had worked hard and
played hard.
"We had a lot of work. Staff used to exhaust themselves physically out on
the street. There was a lot of goodwill to keep the town as clean as possible
for tourism."
Rotorua had not been a station where a weak policeman, who could not cope with
the stress of the job, could work.
Mr Jones described his time in the city as his best in 40 years' police
service.
"I am very proud to have been part of it in those days. Rotorua was known
as a no-nonsense policing city where we asked for no quarter and didn't expect
any."
Rotorua had a reputation of making more arrests per head of population than any
other police district, including Auckland Central.
Mr Jones said this indicated staff were working
harder, yet there were very few complaints laid with the Police Complaints
Authority.
But, compared with Rotorua, morale at Murupara was a
different story, he said.
Murupara was a difficult station to staff and, at one
stage, there was a roster of Rotorua constables who were sent there.
"It caused a hell of a lot of trouble among the street cops.
"It was a very bad bit of administration and destroyed goodwill. Some good
staff went out there, but there was the odd loose
cannon."
Referring to the police inquiry which saw no charges laid against the officers
Mrs Nicholas claims raped her, Mr Jones said it was
hard work for a policeman to investigate another policeman.
"You can make enemies within the police by investigating your own,"
he said.
Meanwhile, the Police Association's Rotorua branch chairman, Detective
Constable Scott Thompson, said none of the police now at the Rotorua station
had any connection with the rape allegations.
Mr Thompson said his colleagues felt they were being looked at "sideways"
since the allegations were made public six days ago.
He said the public could have every confidence in Rotorua police officers, they were doing their best to make the city a
better place to live.