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Allegations
of Sexual Abuse |
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Someone is lying - now, it's truth time As the trial of three
police officers accused of rape nears its end, Steve Braunias reports on the drama
which continued last week at the High Court. Twenty years ago, two
police officers aged 24 and 27 went to a three-bedroom home rented by an
18-year-old secretary at the Bank of New Zealand, and had sex with her. They
said she had phoned to invite them over. Their visit was brief, perhaps an
hour. But what they described as an appointment is only now about to end,
this week at the High Court of Auckland, when the allegations of rape and
sexual assault made by Louise Nicholas against Clint Rickards and Brad
Shipton, and a third policeman, Bob Schollum, will go to a jury to decide who
has told the truth and who has told the most appalling lies. The third and final
week of the trial begins tomorrow. Justice Tony Randerson has advised the
jury it could expect to be sent out on Wednesday. Throughout the trial,
prosecution and defence lawyers, as well as the judge, have expressed
surprise at its speed; the jury was asked to knock off early on two
occasions, because lawyers were caught on the hop, not thinking their next
witness would be called so quickly. A trial that has progressed at a great
rate of knots to examine the intimacies of a past which has lasted as a
nightmare for everyone concerned. Rickards, Shipton and
Schollum have pleaded not guilty to a variety of charges. Nicholas alleges
she was raped between six and 12 times in 1985-86 at her flat. She also gave
evidence that the three men raped her at another address, in Rutland St - the
nice term that has been used in court to refer to that day is "the
Rutland Street incident" - and indecently assaulted her with a police
baton. During her day in court, the public were removed, and blinds put over
the courtroom window. Her testimony was graphic, explicit, hideous. Since
then, Rickards has been the only accused man to give evidence - Shipton chose
not to, Schollum's lawyer has yet to open his defence. Rickards denied
"the Rutland St incident". But he told the court he and Shipton did
meet Nicholas, twice, both times for sex, the second occasion at her flat. Nicholas told the court
that they just showed up, that it was sex against her will, that they ignored
her constant plea -"I don't want you to do this". They were bigger,
they were stronger, they were cops. Rickards told the court five times: "It
was a happy, jovial occasion." He said it in the abnormal voice all
police use when presenting evidence in court - a voice that strips words of
their weight, that recites words like a telephone number. A simpler way of
describing it is that it has the sound of fact. That same tone was heard when
he said Nicholas was "lying", was a "liar", told
"lies", had "lied"; by my count, he said those words 29
times. Rickards' evidence was a lesson in the importance of the three R's:
repetition, repetition, repetition. He gave his evidence on
Wednesday. A story in the morning paper announcing he would take the witness
stand had the impact of an advertisement. For the first time in the trial,
courtroom 12 was full, standing room only. They included the expected herd of
law students with their pens and notebooks, an Auckland novelist, an unshaved
visitor from Brisbane who wore an offensively skintight lycra bicycling
outfit, and a man who used the adjournments to consult his racing guide for
the field at Avondale. Yes, no doubt they were drawn out of curiosity, for
the spectacle, but there is something else involved. The moral integrity of
the New Zealand police is on trial, though not before the jury: it's before
the public. The spouses of the
three accused men have attended court every day of the trial. They have shown
flashes of anger, and their continued presence tells you about loyalty and
support. But they also exhibit something that will always remain about this
trial - a terrible sadness. It showed in the faces of the Nicholas family,
too. Lives have been warped and seriously damaged. What did happen in
Rotorua 20 years ago? Someone is lying. Nicholas, Rickards and Shipton at
least agree that there was a visit to her flat. Nicholas said it was during
the day, and she recalls them wearing police uniforms. Rickards said it was
six or seven at night, and that as an officer with the CIB at the time of the
alleged incidents, he never wore a uniform. Nicholas said she was
home alone. Rickards said he also had sex with her flatmate. Evidence
presented showed that the flatmate said he and Shipton visited for sex
"three or four times". Rickards said it was just the once. "My heart would
sink," said Nicholas. "There was laughing and giggling," said
Rickards. Back and forth, conflicting
testimony swirling around in an upstairs courtroom in the High Court of
Auckland in the autumn of 2006, as the jury was presented with the shreds of
a nightmare that began in a three-bedroom home in Rotorua in 1986. When
Rickards and Shipton walked into Nicholas's house that day, they never really
left. The prosecution rested
on Tuesday. Its chief witness had been Louise Nicholas. Her brother,
mother-in-law and husband had also given evidence. Once they finished, they
didn't return to court. Their absence has added to the sometimes eerie
atmosphere of courtroom 12 in the past fortnight. All courts are bleak little
offices, with their bare walls, their lack of personal effects. But there has
been a particular kind of emptiness at this trial. It's like the main
participants have been sidelined. There was the
disappearance of the Nicholas family, as well as the silence of Shipton and,
until tomorrow, Schollum, although he may not give evidence. Rickards has
filled the void. There was his spectacular appearance on the first day of the
trial; despite the fact he is suspended, he showed up in full police uniform.
You could say that made him stand out from the crowd. Shipton and Schollum
sit together; an empty chair separates them from Rickards, who sits at the
end of the row, far away from his former friends in the force. It gives the
impression of a pecking order. Authority always occupies its own zone. When he took the
witness stand, Rickards was immediately asked to remind the court of his
position - assistant commissioner of police. He spoke about a brilliant
career. Police cadet, 1979. Undercover drug cop, serving in Rotorua, Kawerau,
Christchurch, Invercargill, Wellington and Auckland until 1983, when he was
awarded the gold merit badge: "That's the highest award you can get in
the New Zealand police." Qualified as a detective, 1987. Later,
appointed district commander of Gisborne, then Waikato, then metropolitan
Auckland, responsible for more than 2500 officers. Asked why he had worn his
uniform to court, he said: "I'm proud to be a police officer and serve
my community... I am the assistant commissioner of police... I've always been
proud to be a police officer." That was almost exactly the same answer
he gave when asked in cross-examination whether he had worn it to intimidate
Louise Nicholas and to remind people of his position of power. This was more
than a matter of repetition. Throughout his cross-examination, Rickards
observed a basic law of how to respond to an aggressive interviewer: you
don't answer the questions you hear, you answer the questions you want to
hear. There were times when
he talked too fast, and his words tumbled over each other in a heap. He
looked crown prosecutor Brent Stanaway straight in the eye. He blinked
rapidly. Writer Paul Theroux once said that a bald man expresses emotions
with his entire head, but the only thing happening on Rickards' hard, shaved
bonce was the gleam of a ceiling light. He wasn't there to entertain. There
was laughter, but they were the knowing laughs that came from the public
gallery when Rickards said a policeman's salary wasn't great. He was
resolute, unswerving; and when it was finished, and he took his seat in the
row, his right leg pumped up and down under the desk. It was his day in court
to clear his name. But it was also Stanaway's day in court to chase down his
opponent. It became a fascinating conflict. Rickards stuck to his scripture;
Stanaway avoided the futile tactic of trying to get water from a stone, and
held up the credibility of his witness. Rickards said he had sex with
Nicholas while Shipton was present. Stanaway asked what Shipton was doing.
Was he masturbating? Or was Nicholas performing oral sex on him? Rickards
replied: "I have no idea." He said Shipton had his clothes on and
was "somewhere in the room". To which Stanaway, after another of
his beautiful pauses, said: "Oh, come on." Court was adjourned for
the week as soon as Rickards finished giving his evidence on Wednesday. It
was another warm, gorgeous day in autumn. For everyone concerned, the past
fortnight may as well have been in the middle of grim winter, may as well
have been 3am. A final darkness approaches. |
