KEY POINTS:
Louise Nicholas says that despite everything, she does not hate the three men she accuses of raping and sexually assaulting her 21 years ago.
"Hate is a strong word, a useless word." The petite 39-year-old says she does not feel pity for them, either. "If I think about
how I feel about them, I'm putting them back in my head, and I don't want to do that."
Nicholas says she was naturally disappointed with last week's verdict. On Thursday, a jury in the High Court at Auckland acquitted the same three men - assistant police commissioner Clint Rickards and two former police colleagues Brad Shipton and Bob Schollum - of kidnapping and indecently assaulting another Rotorua teenager in the 1980s. The verdict came almost a year after the trio were found not guilty of the offences a defiant Nicholas alleges.
"Why would I lie about this, why would I make this stuff up?" Nicholas spoke to the Herald on Sunday in response to claims by Rickards and family members of Shipton and Schollum that she was a trained liar - and her allegations were a work of fiction.
She says she is absolutely convinced more women will surface to support her claims.
Until now, Nicholas has been prevented by court order from speaking freely about last year's case, but last week, she revealed the personal toll of the trial, her feelings towards the accused, how her teenage years were "destroyed" and her relationship with the other complainant who claimed the three accused men indecently assaulted her with a bottle.
Nicholas - whose allegations led to wide-ranging inquiries into the police - also wanted to set the record straight on claims she had been a "police groupie" and a willing participant in group sex.
She also revealed for the first time her shock at being told in 2004, when she first went public with her allegations, that Rickards had risen to become one of the country's top police officers.
"When I was told, I said, 'Hell, really?' I had no idea."
With no legal possibility of a civil court claim, Nicholas says her focus for the time being is on changing the culture within the police and ensuring a better deal for rape victims.
"There is no blame on any particular person here. It is just our system. Changes need to be made. Until those changes are made, I will keep fighting.
"If I can help in any way to right the wrongs of the past, I'll do it.
"I want to be able to help other victims - actually no, they're not victims; they're survivors."
Nicholas says last week's verdict is further evidence of how tough it is to get a rape conviction in New Zealand. She says she has only met the complainant - who has permanent name suppression - on a couple of occasions, including once in the supermarket, where emotions welled up and they hugged each other.
"I felt for her, as I knew exactly what she was going through. I thought I may have heard more from her, but she has chosen to handle this in her own way, and I respect her for that."
Nicholas believes there was too much focus on the complainant's recollection of peripheral issues, a ploy designed to destroy her credibility, and a technique the defence also used in her trial.
She says she could recall in graphic detail what had happened on the days the sexual offending allegedly took place, but "I couldn't tell you what I had for lunch that day".
"You always remember the traumatic events. They never leave me.
"It's the small stuff they try and trip you up on."
Nicholas says in her case she had never wanted the matter to go to trial, as she knew "it would end up being swept under the carpet". Her reason for speaking out had been to prompt an inquiry into police conduct.
That being the case, though, she also wants to make it clear that she had complained to police at the time she was allegedly raped, but was ignored. "To suggest I waited 10 years, or whatever it was, to raise these issues is nonsense," she says.
"It's just that no one wanted to listen to me.
People had made all sorts of judgments about her, says Nicholas, but she knows the truth - and what happened in Rotorua in the mid-1980s.
"I've been called a liar, a maggot-lying bitch. These people don't know me. I am disgusted at these types of comments. I just wish these people had the balls to say this sort of stuff to my face."
Under no circumstances had the sex with Rickards, Shipton and Schollum been consensual, she stresses.
"It was never, ever consensual. At the time, I was going out with my husband. I say again, why would I make this up? I have no reason to make it up, no reason to put myself through all this."
The suggestion she was some sort of "police groupie" was absolutely ridiculous, she says.
Nicholas told the Herald on Sunday that for years she had put up with the nightmares - but she now refuses to allow her life to be ruled by what she claimed had happened more than 20 years ago.
"I used to shudder when I saw a police car. But I basically retrained myself not to do that any more. It was like I was letting them back in again - and I refuse to allow that to happen. I decided I had had enough of looking at cop cars sideways.
"It had to stop."
However, she still holds regrets about her lost teenage years. Instead of dating and hanging out with girlfriends, she says, she was trying to cope mentally and emotionally with the worst imaginable kind of violation.
And that, she says, was tough.
"I feel I missed out on my teenage years. I know that. I suppose that's why I tell my own daughters to live and enjoy their childhood, and have fun," she says.
"But there's a part of me that wants to keep them wrapped up in cotton wool because I fear bad things are going to happen to them."
Throughout the ordeal, her husband Ross was by her side - as he was 21 years ago when she claimed she was first raped by Rickards, Shipton and Schollum.
It was tough on him, but their marriage is strong, she says. The couple is expecting a baby in May.
Nicholas says that while she is committed to moving on with her life, she can't erase the memory of what happened to her more than two decades ago.
"It will never be over for me. I can't bury it. You can never bury it."