Editorial: Police must submit to full inquiry

New Zealanders are properly proud of the character of their police and deeply grateful for it. The most precious quality is any successful state is an incorruptible professional police force, committed to enforcing the law with fairness, common sense and integrity. New Zealand has such a force and more. The young men and women who graduate to the ranks of the police seem to be invested with some fine personal qualities that, even off duty, make them readily recognisable.

Any large corps of people, of course, will contain a few whose off duty behaviour, were it publicly known, would be a discredit to themselves and a disgrace to their uniform. Over the years the police have had to eject the odd bad apple, but they have been occasional exceptions to an impressive rule. So impressive that the accusations of rape brought against three policemen, one of whom is now the Auckland police commander, deserve to be treated for the moment with a completely open mind.

A woman alleges she was raped by the three men in Rotorua around 1986 when she was about 18. The men denied, then and ever since, that the sex was anything other than consensual. The woman was seven years older before she took a formal complaint to the Rotorua police. The complaint was handled by the head of its CIB, Detective Inspector John Dewar, who decided there was insufficient evidence to bring charges. The woman made further complaints and the original investigation was reviewed for first the Bay of Plenty regional commander, then the Police Complaints Authority. The authority's investigator, former Detective Chief Inspector Rex Millar, says he was unable to adequately check Mr Dewar's original investigation because the complainant, under the influence of Mr Dewar he believes, did not co-operate with Mr Millar's inquiry.

If it all sounds impossibly murky, that is because the complaint seems never to have been satisfactorily dealt with. Mr Dewar was investigating fellow officers in Rotorua. He says his association with them was purely professional. "We don't socialise or go to each other's homes. We don't call each other up." Nevertheless, when criminal accusations are brought against any member of the police, it would seem only sensible to have them investigated by an officer from another district, if not by a properly constituted Police Complaints Authority at the outset.

Indeed, this case is one more example of the need for an agency with independent investigative resources. It is too much to expect of the most professional police officer that he or she can put aside all sympathy for a colleague whose career could be ruined by the conclusions the officer reaches.

Now that the 20-year-old complaint has come to public knowledge, the Police Complaints Authority is considering a new investigation, possibly by four independent people. At the same time the Police Commissioner, Rob Robinson, has ordered an internal inquiry and the Prime Minister has asked the head of her department, Dr Mark Prebble, to report on the needs for an independent inquiry.

Dr Prebble's exercise, at least, should be easy. The need for a truly independent inquiry is obvious. It should be undertaken by a member of the high judiciary and its terms of reference should allow it to range as close as necessary to the original criminal allegations. It must try to do justice not only to the complainant, Louise Nicholas, but also to Assistant Commissioner Clint Rickards whose career has already suffered from the unproven allegations against him and two former policemen, Brad Shipton, now a Tauranga District Council member, and Bob Schollum, a Napier car salesman.

None of them should be left with suspicion over his name. A full judicial inquiry must find the truth.