Top NZ cop under review after pack rape allegations

6.00pm

The police command of New Zealand's biggest city is under review after Auckland's top police officer was publicly accused of being in a pack rape of a teenage girl 18 years ago.

Police Commissioner Rob Robinson today ordered a full review of issues raised in a media report today that a woman was raped by three policemen, including Clint Rickards who is now an assistant commissioner and Auckland city police commander.

Louise Nicholas claimed in the Dominion Post newspaper today that she was raped and violated with a baton by the three officers in Rotorua when she was 18 years old, and that another officer covered up her allegations to protect his colleagues. Mr Robinson said the allegations had potential to be very damaging to the reputation of New Zealand police.

He told reporters in Wellington this afternoon that all the matters raised in today's Dominion Post -- the historical allegations and the inquiries into them -- would be reviewed.

Deputy Commissioner Steve Long had started work to lead the review and would assemble a team of senior investigators.

"These are serious historical allegations which involve not only individual police members but which potentially call into question the integrity of investigatory work conducted a decade ago," Mr Robinson said.

"I appreciate the concerns that this story has raised in the public's mind and I will be doing my utmost to provide whatever reassurance I can to maintain the trust and confidence of the community in the integrity of New Zealand police in 2004."

Mr Robinson said Mr Rickards was on rostered days off this weekend and out of Auckland on private business. Command of the Auckland city district rested with Acting Superintendent Gavin Jones.

The command would be reviewed again on Monday morning.

Mr Robinson said he had already discussed the media report with the Police Complaints Authority, Judge Ian Borrin, who could provide directions to him in more discussions early next week.

Mr Rickards and the two other men Mrs Nicholas accused of rape issued a "strong denial of the allegations and of the serious damage that the story is doing to their reputations and to their families". The other two men have since left the police force.

The Dominion Post reported that Mrs Nicholas went to the Rotorua police station in 1993 intending to make a formal complaint about the alleged pack rape seven years earlier but was advised by a detective not to make a complaint in writing.

She now believes she was manipulated by the detective in order to protect his police colleagues.

She told the newspaper that even after the initial attack, two of the police officers would arrive at her home uninvited and always demand sex.

Two years after she complained to the Rotorua detective, then Detective Chief Inspector Rex Miller and other senior police were brought in by the Police Complaints Authority to conduct an investigation.

The newspaper says the PCA inquiry, whose existence had not previously been made public, looked at whether the Rotorua detective had conspired to cover up the allegations but found that he had not committed any criminal or disciplinary offence.

But his failure to record and investigate the allegations showed a gross lack of judgment and competence, the inquiry found.

Now, nine years after that investigation, Mr Miller has spoken out, saying the woman was "moulded like play dough" into not making a complaint, according to the Dominion Post.

Mr Robinson said he personally became aware in the late 1990s of the historical allegations of sexual offending involving Mr Rickards.

"I was also aware that they had been investigated and that those investigations had been reviewed and taken to resolution," Mr Robinson said.

"What is new today is the allegation that the integrity of those investigations that were conducted into those original historical allegations... has been called into question."

Mr Robinson said he was "essentially not yet aware of any residual concerns" that Mr Miller may have.

The police commissioner said the Government was aware of the allegations against Mr Rickards and they had been investigated to a point of resolution, before he was appointed assistant commissioner in 2000.

- NZPA