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Allegations
of Sexual Abuse |
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The husband and
mother-in-law of Rotorua woman Louise Nicholas yesterday told a hearing into
allegations of historic pack-rape by three police officers they were
suspicious of visits by the accused to the then 18-year-old woman's house. Mrs Nicholas, now a
38-year-old mother of three, claims she was sexually abused by one of New
Zealand's highest ranking police officers and two former policemen in 1986
when they were all stationed in Rotorua. Assistant Commissioner
Clinton John Tukotahi Rickards (44), Bradley Keith Shipton (47) and Robert
Francis Schollum (53) are facing a total of 20 charges of rape, indecent
assault and unlawful sexual violation. There are extensive
suppression orders around the case. Judge Chris McGuire
opened a depositions hearing at the Rotorua District Court yesterday by
relaxing an earlier suppression order which prevented the publication of any
details about Mrs Nicholas' allegations. Phyllis Nicholas met
Mrs Nicholas in 1985 shortly after she started dating her son Ross Nicholas.
The couple were introduced by Mr Nicholas' aunt whom she worked with at the
Bank of New Zealand and married in 1988. "She seemed to be
off work quite a lot of time," Mrs Phyllis Nicholas told the court. Mrs Nicholas had phoned
her future mother-in-law on two or three occasions when she had been off work
and had asked her to pick her up from her Corlett
St flat. On one occasion Mrs
Phyllis Nicholas saw two men in a marked police car leave the address, she
told the court. On another occasion,
Mrs Nicholas phoned her early one morning very upset. "I went straight
around. She was very ill, she was doubled up in
pain." Mrs Phyllis Nicholas
offered to take her to an emergency medical centre. "But she wouldn't
let me." Although she was
curious about the visiting police officers, Mrs Phyllis Nicholas said she
felt her relationship with Mrs Nicholas was too recent to ask her what was
wrong. Mr Nicholas was working
as a livestock driver in 1986 and spent his six-day working week out of
Rotorua, the court was told. However, one day he was
home alone at the Corlett St house, off work with a
back injury. Shipton and Rickards arrived at the flat in uniform without
their hats, he said. When Mr Nicholas answered the door they asked if fellow
police officer and family friend Trevor Clayton was there. "They seemed
surprised I was there." Crown prosecutor Mark
Zarifeh told the court Mrs Nicholas had met Schollum years earlier through Mr
Clayton and he had introduced her to Rickards and Shipton. "Mrs Nicholas
didn't consider Rickards and Shipton to be friends." |
