Peter Hugh Mc Gregor Ellis - Aftermath

Aftermath

A number of irregularities in the trial were publicised in a TV3 20/20 television programme which aired on 16 November 1997. The programme alleged that the jury foreman had been the celebrant at the Crown Prosecutor's wedding 15 years earlier, and another juror had had a sexual relationship with a close work colleague of a complainant's mother. The investigating detective, Colin Eade, had had sexual relationships with two of the mothers after the trial and had propositioned another during the course of the investigation. He also had had a sexual relationship with one of the evidential interviewers after the trial. The mother whom he propositioned subsequently withdrew her child, the first to make a formal disclosure of abuse, from the inquiry. In 1994 Eade left the police suffering from post traumatic stress disorder. Colin Eade said in the television documentary that he would not be surprised if all the complainants had not recanted at some stage of the investigation.

The Accident Compensation Corporation, ACC, reportedly paid more than $500,000 to about 40 parents of Civic Creche children. Generally parents received a standard $10,000, "but in cases where Ellis faced multiple charges relating to a single child, some parents claimed for each alleged incident of abuse" (McLoughlin, 1996). One child's parents allegedly claimed five payments, another claimed four. A conviction was not necessary before money was paid out. An absence of charges did not prevent parents from receiving a payout. Colin Eade and therapists working with the complainants wrote letters to ACC supporting claims for compensation, many of these applications involved children who were not part of subsequent court proceedings.