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Sunday
Star Times
September 3, 2000
Landmark payout for years in hell
by Donna Chisholm
A man wrongly convicted of sexually abusing his son has won a landmark
$570,000 government compensation package.
He is the first to be paid under new guidelines to compensate the wrongly
convicted, which demand innocence be proven beyond reasonable doubt.
Police Commissioner Rob Robinson has also unreservedly apologised to him for
a "serious error in judgement" when police failed to disclose to
his defence counsel before his 1995 trial that his son had retracted the
abuse allegations.
Justice Minister Phil Goff says the award is deservedly generous to the man
who spent 14 months in jail for a crime he did not commit - but he warns
future payouts will be smaller.
The package accepted by cabinet on the recommendation of Queen's Counsel
David Williams pays $400,000 compensation and $170,000 expenses including
legal bills. It means the man will receive comparatively more for the time he
spent in jail than did Arthur Allan Thomas, who won $1 million in 1980 after
spending 10 years in jail before he was pardoned of the Crewe
murders.
"In my mind there has never been any doubt about his innocence,"
Goff said of the man whose cause he championed while in opposition. "I'm
very happy I have a case like this where I know the guy has an unblemished
character.
"As a father I can only imagine the appalling experience that this man
has gone through. There can be nothing worse than a parent to be wrongly
convicted of sexually abusing his own children."
Goff said the payment showed the government's commitment to putting right serious
mistakes in the criminal justice system.
"An individual's right to liberty is the core of the system. When a
person is wrongly convicted and deprived of that liberty as a society we
should make good the losses incurred by that person."
The man, a former storeman who lives in Auckland
with the two sons he was once accused of molesting, is celebrating the end of
"seven years in hell".
The police apology, he said, was more important than the money.
"You don't know what this means to me. It finally means I have been
proven innocent. You don't get a letter like this unless they are 100% sure
you are innocent."
The money would allow him to restart his life, he said.
The man said he would probably always be bitter and would never lose his
distrust of the justice system. "But when I got the letter, life seemed
better. I can go out with my head held high".
In jail, he was told he would be lucky to live long because he was a child
molester. Another inmate told him unless he paid $1500, "his mates in
Black Power would deal to me. I cannot describe the fear I lived under . . .
after this threat was made".
Goff said the man's parents, who sold their home to raise money for his
defence, had died before the wrong to their son was put right. At 67, the man's
mother had had to go to work in an apple packing shed to make ends meet.
But, he said, future compensation payouts would be "somewhat less
generous". At present, Queen's Counsel use their discretion to decide
the figure but cabinet has already accepted a new scale for future cases. The
base sum - $100,000 for each year spent in jail - could be increased if there
was culpability by state authorities.
"But if you happen to be convicted four times of armed robbery and the
police get it wrong the fifth time, you probably won't get as much for loss
of reputation."
If the new scale had been applied in this case, the man would have received a
total of $350,000-$400,000 including costs.
The man's lawyer Rob Harrison questioned whether $570,000 was in fact
"generous".
"What value do you place on 14 months of your life? Some people would
say you could never adequately compensate someone for the sort of losses and
pain and suffering he went through."
The man had been separated from his children from the time the allegations
were made until he was freed from jail nearly three years later - and he had
been branded a pedophile.
Harrison is reviewing the trial notes of three
other inmates who say they are innocent - two on rape charges, and one
convicted of sexually abusing his daughters.
Goff said the reduced payment scale would not apply until after consideration
of David Dougherty's claim for the 3½ years he spent in jail for a
rape of which he was later acquitted. Stuart Grieve QC's
report is expected later this year.
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