Allegations of Sexual Abuse
	False Allegations
	Nick Wills
	The Press July 15 2000 The accused by Diana Dekker Prisons are full of people who say they are innocent. Sometimes they are. Diana Dekker reports. Lawyer Nick Wills sometimes wakes up in a sweat after nightmares in which police are at the door. Five years ago he was falsely accused of rape. He was 22, had been head boy at his high school, was popular, and had, as his mother, Viv d'Or says, "lived a pretty blessed life". When the accusation was made, he was "chucked in the cells and treated like a common criminal". It took three months for his name to be cleared and for the woman who made his life, and the life of his family a misery, to be put in the dock. "She has no idea of what she put us through," says d'Or, who tries to be charitable and remember the woman had a history of psychiatric problems. "It was a nightmare for a lot of people." Nick Wills is one of the unsuspecting people going about minding their business when they're suddenly charged with rape, or murder, or sexual molestation, and become outcasts. People always wonder if disproved accusations of a sexual nature might still be true -- the "where-there's-smoke-there's-fire" theory of moral condemnation. A murder is black and white. If there is no body, there was no murder. Wills qualified as a lawyer three years ago, worked as a patent attorney in Hamilton and then Auckland, and recently left for London. The rape accusation was made when he was a student at Waikato University by a woman who lived in the same hostel. She told variations of her story to police, to Rape Crisis, and to friends. She also spread the rumour he had committed other rapes. The inconsistencies took three months to surface and she finally confessed she had lied. The woman's name is suppressed. The anguish of Wills' mother can hardly be imagined. She had put decades of energy into a fine young man and there he was accused of rape. "In my heart I didn't believe he had done it," she says. "But we didn't have all the facts and I certainly wasn't going to say 100 per cent. You would always hope your son was not a rapist." She is often rung by parents who believe they are in the same situation as she, their children wrongly accused. There is, she says, no handbook for people wrongly accused. Forensic psychiatrist Nigel Fairley says there is little research in the area and little literature. He believes people wrongly accused of serious crime probably suffer some form of post-traumatic stress disorder similar to that suffered by victims. They could become depressed, withdrawn, uncommunicative and irritable, and have problems with sleep and mood swings -- up when they are in fighting mood, then down again. He agrees the stigma from being wrongly accused of serious sexual crime sticks in a way being accused of murder does not. Roger Laybourn, the lawyer who acted for Hamilton teacher John Edgar two years ago when Edgar was accused of indecency involving pupils at Hukanui Primary School, confirms this. Laybourn says Edgar's teaching career -- "and he was considered a remarkable teacher" -- was destroyed. "He didn't have a chance to get his name suppressed, and under pressure he resigned from his job. He had to wait 12 months for trial and during the trial -- two weeks -- he was kept in custody one or two nights. It was just so traumatic. After the first night in prison he came out an absolute wreck. "It just shows you can have two or three children saying something and the system doesn't have the screening process any more." Police once felt confident to disbelieve allegations, says Laybourn. Now there's such pressure from organisations such as Rape Crisis, that even cases with no foundation, like that of Edgar, go to court. "It blighted his life and the lives of so many close to him." After his trial, Edgar described his ordeal as "six months of hell". Laybourn says he believes Edgar, now writing educational books in Auckland, will "never, ever place himself in that vulnerable position again". New Zealand's most famous case of an innocent man living with the aftermath of accusation is Arthur Allan Thomas, twice wrongly convicted of murdering Harvey and Jeanette Crewe at Pukekawa in 1970. He spent several years in prison, was pardoned and received $1 million in compensation. His wife, after campaigning for him, left. He now farms with a new wife -- who also campaigned for his release -- and family. He won't talk about his feelings at the time because he's "soon" going to write a book about it. He does say that after his arrest, "I thought it would come right", and was horrified and depressed when he went to trial. On remand in prison he became depressed. "I could not see anything. The window was too high. It had its own smell. There was a hole in the wall for the air conditioning, but not much air was getting through." He worried about his case and his farm and sometimes woke at night wondering where he was, and praying to God. When the guilty verdict was announced at his second trial, he yelled that he was innocent and at home at the time of the crime. At Paremoremo prison hospital he was drugged and unable to sleep. Auckland lawyer Murray Gibson acts for David Dougherty, who was wrongly imprisoned for 31/2 years for the 1993 rape of an 11-year-old girl. He can't talk about the case while compensation is being considered. But Gibson said at the time his client's innocence was proven that he had nevertheless "lost his life". --Evening Post -------------------- CAPTION: Nick Wills was wrongly accused of rape in 1995. He is still haunted by his wrongful arrest.John Edgar's teaching career was ruined by false indecency allegations.