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Allegations of abuse
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Home / police allegations / Rickards,
Shipton, Schollum vs Jane Doe Page 5 - Further Reaction to
Not Guilty Verdict |
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Suspended assistant police
commissioner Clint Rickards is broke and says his career is in tatters - but
insists he should still get his old job back. Rickards, who has been stood down
on full pay since rape allegations involving then 18-year-old Rotorua woman
Louise Nicholas surfaced in 2004, is believed to have spent $500,000
defending the historic claims - with no guarantee that he will be reinstated
as "Yes, I'm broke," he
reveals in a TV3 television interview screening tomorrow night, but he says
the financial cost has been nothing compared with the toll the two court
cases have taken on his family. "Yes, my career has been
destroyed. Yes, my life has been destroyed. At the end of the day, it's the
impact on my family that's been the major issue for me," he says. Rickards maintains he should get
his job back, despite serious questions now over his suitability for the role
and fears that his reinstatement could further undermine public confidence in
the police. He says that while he is not proud
of his behaviour, as far as he is concerned, he has done nothing wrong. He
has confirmed that he was seen by deputy police commissioner Steve Long in
2004, days before the Nicholas allegations went public, when it was suggested
that he consider resigning. Rickards was astonished, as he had
presumed he was innocent until proven guilty. "I did things I'm ashamed
of, given I was in a relationship and had two young kids, but I'm no
rapist," Rickards told the Sunday Star-Times. He was reluctant to be drawn on
whether it was an abuse of power for police officers to have "group
sex", saying: "I think that if you say that, it's degrading to
women. We are talking about consensual sex. I could have been Jo IRD or Jo Fireman.
I'm not proud of some of the things I've done, and I make no excuses for
them. A lot of it was my fault," he told the newspaper. When Rickards discovered that
Nicholas was going public with the allegations, he rang his former partner,
who also now lives in However, this wasn't the only time
Rickards had been unfaithful. When he moved from Rotorua to
Hawke's Bay in the mid-1980s, he began an affair with his current wife Tania
Eden, who at the time was in a relationship with a Between them, the couple has five
children, including 22-year-old Southland and Highlanders rugby wing Willie
Rickards. "Her partner was pretty cut
up about it at the time. Rickards had befriended both of them and then ended
up running away with Whether Rickards returns to his
$150,000-plus-a-year job is now in the hands of the police, but some, like
former Police Association boss Rob Moodie, suggested he would have a
difficult time, given the fallout from the two trials and his criticism
outside court last week of the Operation Austin investigation. Last week, Rickards and former
policemen Brad Shipton and Bob Schollum were cleared of charges of kidnapping
and indecently assaulting a 16-year-old in Rotorua between November 1983 and
August 1984. The verdicts were followed by the lifting of suppression orders
that had prevented the jury from knowing that Shipton and Schollum were
currently serving 8 1/2 years and eight years, respectively, in prison for
the rape of a woman at Mt Maunganui in the late 1980s. Shipton is now facing fresh
allegations of sexual violation against a woman 12 years ago. Shipton is eligible
for parole in 14 months and Schollum in a year. Rickards said words could not
describe the relief at the verdict last week. "Bob broke first, Brad was
next. I'd given Bob my hanky, but by the time it was down to the last few
[not guilty verdicts], I needed my hanky back," he told a newspaper. However, there is still more to
come, with the Police Complaints Authority now clear to resume its
investigations into the rape allegations. A former senior officer with a
significant role in police management in police national headquarters
throughout the 90s told the Herald on Sunday that there had been disbelief
that Rickards had progressed so far and so quickly within the police, given
that the allegations had been so widely known. "It was the stuff of bar-room
comment," the former officer, who did not wish to be named, said. "Throughout a wide level of
police management - and indeed around the country - there was consternation
that someone like Rickards was on the road to rapid promotion. "He had tattoos on his arm, a
shaven head and was always wearing sunnies. "He looked like a gang
member, and there were concerns about whether this was the sort of image we
wanted to portray." The general belief was that former
commissioner Rob Robinson, who worked with Rickards in Rotorua, was intent on
making him commissioner of police. Robinson could not be reached for
comment but has previously defended promoting Rickards. He had been aware
that Rickards had admitted to "consensual sex" with Nicholas, but
he did not believe that was necessarily an employment issue. Former detective chief inspector
Rex Miller - who investigated the Nicholas rape allegations for the Police
Complaints Authority - was reluctant to discuss the case or Rickards' future,
saying only that he was "surprised totally" at last week's verdict. |
