Ellis seeks a pardon again
December 27th, 2010 at 9:50 am by David FarrarNZPA report:
Convicted child abuser Peter Ellis is to lodge a fresh petition to the Governor-General seeking a full pardon.
Mr Ellis served almost seven years in prison after being found guilty of 16 charges of sexual abuse of children at a civic creche in Christchurch in the early 1990s.
Mr Ellis, 51, has always denied the allegations and has already had three petitions for a pardon and two appeals against his conviction turned down. An application for a Royal Commission of inquiry into his case was also rejected.
I was bitterly disappointed that the Government turned down a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Ellis case, as there were so many aspects of the case that needed a full investigation.
His lawyer Judith Ablett-Kerr QC said the new petition rested on fresh Otago University research indicating the questioning of the children was below a legally acceptable standard.
I’m not optimistic that the Government will act, but I hope they do. While opinion is divided on many other high profile cases, I know of very few people who think the Ellis convictions were safe – ie proven beyond reasonable doubt.
Tags: Peter Ellis
December 27th, 2010 at 9:59 am
I know of very few people who think the Ellis convictions were safe – ie proven beyond reasonable doubt
Except the 12 members of the jury who sat and listened to all the evidence, the presiding judge, the judges at all the appeals…
[DPF: the jury did not hear all the evidence. When a child said in an interview "Peter took us down to the cemetery and then Peter killed a boy, and buried him, and then Peter touched my penis", all the jury heard was "Peter took us down to the cemetery and touched my penis"]
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 10:12 am
This is why there needs to be a Royal Commission of Inquiry – to explain why so many people would appear to have got it so wrong
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 10:29 am
What if the people who saw the original 60 Minutes interview that established his “innocence” and didn’t get the benefit of all the evidence presented in court and ignore the fact that most of the children (who are all now adults) still insist that he did it are wrong, and that the court system in New Zealand can’t find fault with the convictions despite many attempts by Ellis have got it right. I know I hold a minority view on this, but Ellis has had so many failed attempts to clear his name that you start to question how it is possible for him to be innocent.
Or are we establishing trial by media as a legitimate justice system in NZ? Is that why the arrogant Hotchin is guilty and humble Hubbard is innocent?
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 10:48 am
Maybe people find accusations of mass Witchcraft a bit medieval & suspect. Even for Christchurch.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 10:50 am
Michael I think you may be on the wrong side of this. I had a friend who worked at the creche for a while and she is adamant he not only didn’t have it in him to do this but he just didn’t have the opportunity or time to abuse the kids.
The more I look at this case and see it in the context of the time the more it looks like there was more to the case than meets the eye. Conspiracy theory or not I heard more then once lecturers at teachers colleges saying they wanted men out of early childhood education and this was the best way to achieve their aims.
When alot of the kids are now saying he did nothing I would start listening to them and not the so called professionals who only ever seem to prove their assumptions 100% of the time.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 10:53 am
Is he meeting the costs from his dole or is it on the good ole Legal Aid.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 10:54 am
Gosh, Ellis, 51 …
Michael:
there is a history of media campaigning to right injustice. Pat Booth started it with Arthur Alan Thomas, even though Galloping Yalloping was very good at hogging the credit. What got Booth started was he was in court one day at Thomas’s (first, I think) trial, and Thomas’s quoted words in the evidence presented did not match how Thomas the farmer spoke.
There were trials and appeals, and everyone ‘heard’ the evidence that the Crown chose to put. But in the end he was pardoned.
Donna Chisholm got David Daugherty freed from a rape charge he never committed, couldn’t have committed, going by the DNA evidence. Indeed, another man was found to have done it. But even after Daugherty was freed, the victim still kept saying that he did it.
As for Ellis and the Christchurch creche and the children. I understand there were problems with the interviewing, particularly by a biased clinical person. I believe there were discrepancies about what the children said. I understand some recanted.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 10:56 am
Backster:
Why should it matter? If he was done a wrong in our name, then he should be able to have that wrong righted, and at the cost of you and me.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 11:03 am
“It is better to risk sparing a guilty person than to condemn an innocent one.” — Voltaire, Zadig (1747)
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 11:11 am
If a list was made of the unsafest convictions in NZ’s history, the Ellis case would be at the top of the list.
Unfortunately, given National’s complete spinelessness in the face of controversial decisions, and Simon Power’s refusal to hold a Royal Commission into the convictions, we can rest assured that one of the worst blights on our criminal justice system will not be resolved under the current government.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 11:13 am
That is an interesting theory, and would be backed up by some of the “expert’s” opinions on the male sex. Karen Zelas, for one comes off as a rabid feminst from what I have read of her.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 11:22 am
Thomas and Doughety managed to overturn their convictions based on the evidence. Ellis has not been able to present any evidence clearing himself apart from his protests. If Ellis really couldn’t have done it because a lack of oppurtunity then why didn’t his defence present this?
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 11:27 am
Ellis was found guilty by public opinion and the so called MSM, heavily supported by overseas experts in rabid feminist interpretations.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 11:38 am
So our legal system is based on the doctrine of guilty until proven innocent now, is it? Ellis must tender evidence to clear his own name?
Exactly right.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 11:51 am
Nick, it’s also important not to dismiss the findings of our jury process so swiftly.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 12:00 pm
A jury can only function properly if the defense and prosecution are on an even playing field, Fale. In the Ellis case they demonstrably weren’t in my opinion (and the opinion of most people).
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 12:26 pm
And I’m eternally grateful that our justice system is not based on public opinion, but on evidence and fact. Truth be told – the jury in question was provided with evidence that was never released to the public domain.
We might be entitled to our own legal opinions in this case, but are we entitled to our own facts?
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 12:39 pm
Val Sim will be ratting around with a box of matches just making sure that nothing is left to chance.
Not only will she burn anything that in uncomfortable and is combustible, she will have a shovel and will bury it if it won’t burn.
And put a hex on anyone that has seen the light, just in case, you know.
ALL my opinion of course. Heh.
Now where have I heard that name again, Ah yes, it was all about the Bill of Rights, not a conflict of course, just an opinion of course. Yes of course.
db..
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 12:40 pm
Murder five people in Dunedin you get a full whitewash but try to teach young children in ChCh and you’re labeled bad for life.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 12:50 pm
Fale not too sure what you are meaning, but after all the books, documentaries, inquiries and pardon applications I doubt there is much evidence left that is not in the public domain?
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 1:03 pm
Scott Watson is another where the media was manipulated by the prosecution to taint a potential jury.
No social responsibility the bastards.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 2:33 pm
Ellis is an acknowledged homosexual – so why would be sexual abuse girls?
Ellis and 3 or 4 women were intiallially charged. Only the case against Ellis was proceeded with. Why?
The evidence used to convict Ellis was “recovered memory”, since proven to be not recovered memory, but manufactured memory.
The Elis case was just one of many similar cases with satanic overtones at the time, not just in NZ, but also in Canada, UK and Australia. The few convictions obtained in those countries have since been overturned.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 2:39 pm
Michael,
You seem ill-informed about the Ellis case. You say that there have been “trials and appeals”. In fact there has been only one trial. There have been 2 appeals and neither appeal heard all of the evidence. You may be unaware that at the second appeal, the court said it was not the right place to hear all of the evidence! It actually suggested that a Commission of Inquiry was needed to hear all of the evidence – successive governments have been too weak to hold a thorough inquiry into the case.
An American researcher, Mary deYoung, has researched similar cases. In the US, the last prosecution of a mass allegation day care case occurred in 1992. (Peter Ellis was arrested in 1992 and convicted the following year.) Between 1984-1992, there were more than 100 prosecutions of such cases in the US. While there were a number of convictions, only a handful withstood appeal. In arguably the most notorious case, five adult day care employees were alleged to have abused more than 350 children at the McMartin Pre-School in Manhattan Beach, California. One of those charged was a 78-year-old grandmother. Charges against her and two others would later be dropped. By the time the two remaining accused were due to stand trial, deYoung says that “professional, public and media skepticism about the day care ritual abuse cases and the roles that social workers played in them had swelled. So did scientific skepticism, as well-designed and controlled empirical studies revealed just how easily young children can be led to make outrageously false allegations”.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 2:51 pm
Mary deYoung’s research fndings can be found here – they make fascinating reading in the context of the Ellis case.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0CYZ/is_4_34/ai_n25466116/?tag=content;col1
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
Thanks for that ross, really interesting.
It was quite bizarre how the “satanic ritual abuse” cases took off and got taken seriously by lawmakers, police, etc.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 3:17 pm
nickb wrote “I doubt there is much evidence left that is not in the public domain”.
Vote:There is a lot of stuff that could blow the case wide open that remains suppressed. Those with vested interest etc.
It’s a credit to Ellis’s team that they, at least, have played by the rules.
December 27th, 2010 at 3:22 pm
Professor Harlene Hayne’s research is apparently behind the application by Ellis’s lawyer to seek a pardon.
Some of her research into the case has previously been reported. I understand she has undertaken more research since then.
http://poneke.wordpress.com/2007/12/17/civic-case-child-interviews-revealed-as-worse-than-the-worst-similar-american-miscarriage/
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 3:30 pm
If you are the Ross who wrote this article in the NZ Law Journal you’ve done a good job exposing some of the shonky Ministry of Justice maneuvers:
Vote:http://peterellis.org.nz/2007/2007_francis_new_evidence.pdf
December 27th, 2010 at 3:38 pm
If the children who are now adults really believe it happened, then that is tragic. They may as well have been abused, but it is not Peter Ellis what done it. It was mass hysteria built up and constructed out of fear and terror.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 3:46 pm
The justice system fucked Peter Ellis. Why not, as in my personal dealings with them the truth doesn’t matter! Bastards should be held accountable.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 4:30 pm
Fellow creche workers suffered with Ellis from the astonishing Christchurch creche ritual abuse case. These were working women whose reputations were unjustly smeared. They suffered heavily in court costs and inhibited job prospects after the case.
The Ellis case was similar to a number of ritual abuse cases which swept around the Western world. They were a modern witch-hunt craze.
The Ellis case is a stain on Christchurch, a miscarriage of New Zealand justice, and the shame of successive politicians who declined to remedy it.
For an interesting summary of the Ellis case by a Canadian group, look at this web site:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/ra_newze.htm
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 4:39 pm
Not guilty. Get off ya arse Key and give him a Royal Commision of Inquiry.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 4:42 pm
Haha starboard, a “Royal Commission of Inquiry” is impossible in kiwiland as ALL the judges are police parrots.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 5:08 pm
Many of the people involved in bringing this case to prosection are now senior in their field. Their reputation is allegedly at risk if the prosection is seen as unsafe. Given the overwhelming evidence about the high probability of interviewer bias and error in questioning we need to accept that there is more than reasonable doubt. This latest research may give grounds for a deserved pardon.
Vote:Every paedophile in Christchurch prisons was roughed up by other inmates. Peter Ellis was inside for 7 years and never touched once. Anyone want to explain that?
December 27th, 2010 at 5:20 pm
The Ellis case was similar to a number of ritual abuse cases which swept around the Western world. They were a modern witch-hunt craze.
Yes its quite obvious the allegations are and were childish fantasies. I wonder what the now-adult “victims” are going through. Nothing whatsoever good has come out of this case yet, everywhere you look, there is carnage to people’s lives and all of it unnecessary.
Honestly what were we all thinking back in those days when it was all playing out. And how come, why, how come, we have including me, tolerated this obduracy within the system to redress it. Incredible obduracy. How come FIGJAM isn’t turning his considerable talents (according to the MSM) toward this crying-out issue? Yoo hoo. FIGJAM? er.. FIGJAM?
Every paedophile in Christchurch prisons was roughed up by other inmates. Peter Ellis was inside for 7 years and never touched once. Anyone want to explain that?
Yes that’s always struck me as well Fisiani.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 5:33 pm
Every prisoner at Pap and Camp Rolly knew that Peter Ellis was stitched up by the filth. Shame on corrupt Christchurch police.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 5:47 pm
Every prisoner at Pap and Camp Rolly knew that Peter Ellis was stitched up by the filth.
The puzzling thing looking back on it for me d4j is, why? Why the fuck, how the fuck could the cops think he was guilty of the sorts of allegations the children were making? Why, we see with perfect hindsight, was there no senior cop stepping in saying, hang on, are we wrong? I mean the senior people in Christchurch at the time, apparently never once thought that, not in the whole several years this thing played out. That’s fucking hard to believe isn’t it and yet this is what we’re asked to swallow.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 5:53 pm
reid the Christchurch police don’t care about lying in Court. Anybody that is not in the legal gravy train should fear these bent sods!
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
Just to expand on this “crying-out” issue, cause it’s Christmas and we’re all laxing out, is that this covers multiple cases to Tamihere to Bain to Watson to Ellis to others. Some people’s mileage may vary but this to me is a fundamental flaw in justice which is slow to redress mistakes and that shouldn’t be when people’s freedom and reputation lie in the balance.
It’s built-in, this obduracy because to give confidence in the system it has to be. However you don’t have to throw that away. I refuse to believe that with our jurisprudential capacity today we can’t revise the system to redress such cases and prevent such in future. How that’s done I’d leave in more capable hands but I wish FFS someone in the judiciary would make a start just the once, please. FFS now, if it please your Lordships.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
Reid,
The mantra at the time was that children don’t lie about sexual abuse. And the mantra was also that if they deny being abused, that is evidence of abuse! So either way the children must’ve been abused – either by saying they were abused or by denying. That left Ellis in a terrible position. We now know that children can lie about abuse, but that what happened in the Ellis case was likely heavily influenced by parental and interviewer contamination. A number of experts have looked at the children’s evidence and have come to that conclusion. The authorities, however, don’t want a bar of it. Too many reputations are on the line.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 6:14 pm
“The authorities, however, don’t want a bar of it. Too many reputations are on the line.”
Well said ross and I guess that explains why the public just accept judicial corruption. Oh well no wonder I view politicians, judges and cops as moronic filth devoid of trust and integrity. They all make me sick. Anybody that states they are proud to be a kiwi needs a lead pill. What a sick country that allows such judicial malfeasance!
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 6:15 pm
The mantra at the time was that children don’t lie about sexual abuse. And the mantra was also that if they deny being abused, that is evidence of abuse! So either way the children must’ve been abused – either by saying they were abused or by denying.
I know ross. But to mature adults, this had to have been complete and utter bollocks. I was in my early twenties at the time and I knew it. It was a phenomena happening briefly throughout all Caucasian nations worldwide for a brief but intense period and then it just vanished from view or as history has proven, from subsequent analysis and investigation.
It’s the lack of investigation bit I’m interested in. Why is that? Not to re-examine individual cases but the institutional roles in promoting that hysteria as it was, at the time.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 6:16 pm
Of course Lynley Hood wrote a superb book on this case “A city possessed – The Christchurch Civic Creche case” which the Hon Phil Goff refused to read. When senior politicians have such closed minds what chance of justice.
Vote:To my mind this is one of the greatest miscarriages of justice ever perpetrated in New Zealand and is a continuing weeping sore.
C’mon politicians lets see justice prevail, even at this belated stage.
December 27th, 2010 at 6:17 pm
The investigation of the Peter Ellis case will cause more rocking than the fucking earthquakes – eh your honour you lying overpaid masonic ####! Judicial corruption in quake city. And you wonder why we are shaking!
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 7:02 pm
reid wrote:
It’s the lack of investigation bit I’m interested in. Why is that? Not to re-examine individual cases but the institutional roles in promoting that hysteria as it was, at the time.
Go to http://www.peterellis.org.nz for the answer to this and more. Start with The Ross Francis articles, one of which published in the NZ Law journal, I provided a link to above, and the featured articles on the site. Whoever set that site up has put multiple gigabytes of info on it.
Just about everything ever legally written or published on the case is there somewhere, except complete books, and from all sides. There is also stuff that the Courts undoubtedly wish was still gathering dust buried in their archives.
Read Lynley Hood’s award winning book A City Possessed for an excellent examination to how the case unfolded.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 7:28 pm
And at the same time D4J claims to be working with the Police and being connected to the extent that they are willing to supply cops to sit in on meetings he wants to have with people who call him nasty names over the internet.
Judges are far from Police parrots in this country, they just see some people for who they are, as D4J found out.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 7:37 pm
Haha Dexter. What a load of shit, idiot. I have said before, I have a good relationship with police however I detest police corruption which is so destructive. Really get a backbone and some facts together before foaming your verbal diarrhea you nitwit.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 7:53 pm
Hmm, Ellis was guilty of being gay, good enough for a Christchurch jury one would believe.
Vote:A royal commision, yep good idea if the country can have a Canadian, a yank, or a brit judge sitting.
One who is happy to ask a bent copper, are you lying
December 27th, 2010 at 9:29 pm
Lynley Hood’s outstanding book was the most clinical dissection in NZ legal history of the Crown’s flawed case. Power would do well to read it and announce a Commission of Inquiry
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 10:05 pm
Same! Certainly seemed far too outlandish to be credible, and as time wore on it got more and more outlandish! He was the perfect scapegoat though, as grumpy sez.
The simple question that was begging to be asked, particularly after the claims got beyond a joke, was “Is a fag really going to fiddle with girls as well?”. I’m no fan of faggy’s but to stitch someone up, especially in such an obvious fashion, was criminal. I hope he succeeds in his quest for innocence.
Vote:December 27th, 2010 at 11:36 pm
I actually read much of Hood’s book after I read an article on it.
It was fascinating. She’d done similar books in the past and (apparently) always found that the situations were always “fault on both sides”.
However her comment on the Ellis case was that the evidence disappeared as scrutiny was applied. Her book detailed how a comment in the hearing of an anxious mother started concern, then hysteria. Even though the comment meant nothing, the mother started a support group because she was convinced something was wrong then all those supporting went home and questioned *their* kids until the kids told them what they wanted to hear.
In fact, the case is a classic episode of liberality biting itself in the backside. It was the fact that the children in the creche had radical feminist mothers that lead to the radical feminist staff being rounded up. Unfortunately, Peter was the only one who’s involvement was not patently ridiculous.
I actually have some friends who had a neighbor in jail at about the same time, for the same reason. Girl given “counseling” by someone with an agenda, bizarre stories with demonstrable factual problems made up under hypnosis, off to prison the innocent man goes.
Vote:December 28th, 2010 at 9:59 am
Lets hope this time he gets a pardon and the justice of monetary compensation. A group of obsessed people were responsible for his conviction; it has eerie similarities to what happened in the Salem witch trials in America. Collective delusions – we humans have the potential to act in very weird ways and after reading a lot about this case I am convinced it was not Peter Ellis who was behaving strangely, but a group of people caught up in a situation which none of them was capable of examining rationally. Peter Ellis you deserve your pardon, you have been dignified throughout the years and you are a decent person who didn’t deserve this.
Vote:December 28th, 2010 at 11:57 am
There must be a full, frank and unbiased report into what happened here. If we are to have any trust in the judicary, then it must open itself up to such inspection, rather than continually manipulate the rules in order to protect itself……
As to the matter of compensation should Ellis be cleared, and in my opinion, that should be substantial, the other parties that should be compensated are the children who have been convinced that they have been abused.
Vote:December 28th, 2010 at 12:26 pm
It is horrifying to contemplate the expense in monetary terms and effort already sunk into this fiasco.
Tens of millions of dollars and countless thousands of hours, volumes upon volumes of words and reports, all of it looking at narrow aspects of the case almost all of it failing, or refusing, to look at the case in its entirety; Hood comes closest to a proper review with A City Possessed
Miscarriages of justice of this scale just don’t go away, despite the hopes of Val Sim and those charged with protecting the reputation of the status quo. In the long run, their efforts have the opposite effect on public confidence in the system and the drain on resources will continue until the case is properly reviewed by a Commission of Inquiry.
Vote:December 28th, 2010 at 1:31 pm
IMHO the prosecution of Ellis must be one of the dodgiest stichups I’ve ever seen in NZ.
Vote: