Uproar follows claims Aboriginal politician is serial rapist

A leader claims trial by media and fellow Aboriginals cross words in the aftermath. BILLY ADAMS reports.

SYDNEY - Big, bearded and brusque, Geoff Clark has long been regarded as a formidable leader of Australia's indigenous people.

But this week public life has been shaken by sensational allegations that the country's most powerful Aboriginal politician is also a serial rapist.

Four women claim that they were raped by 48-year-old Clark, chairman of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, in the 1970s and 1980s. The fallout has been fierce.

Not only have Clark's reputation and career been thrown into doubt, but the way the stories made it into the public arena has left public opinion sharply divided.

Two newspapers decided to run the allegations despite the fact that none of the claims had previously been thought strong enough for a criminal prosecution.

In the bitter aftermath, Australia's first female Aboriginal magistrate, Pat O'Shane, questioned the women's motives, and insisted that "a lot of women manufacture a lot of stories about men."

Amid the resulting uproar, New South Wales chief magistrate Patricia Staunton said she would consider whether O'Shane should stop hearing sexual assault cases.

And a leading Aboriginal, Dr Evelyn Scott, said the remarks may have jeopardised years of work to overcome the high prevalence of violent and deliberate sexual abuse perpetrated against women and children in indigenous communities.

The life of Clark, a father of three who met his wife more than 30 years ago, could be justifiably described as tough and colourful.

From an imposing hardline activist he rose to the highest position in Aboriginal politics using skills honed as a heavyweight boxer and Aussie Rules footballer.

So tough was Clark that he apparently broke one of the point posts at Perth's Subiaco Oval by running into it.

When he was appointed ATSIC chairman in 1999, he joked about his "knockabout" youth in Victoria.

That youth included arrests for "loitering" and being "drunk and disorderly." At the age of 16 he spent six month in a boys' home for an assault during a street fight.

He has the unusual distinction of being Aborigine and blond. The Aboriginality comes from his mother, Maisie Clark, and the blondness from his father, Jeff McIntosh, described by one of the newspapers which published the rape allegations as a Scots-born criminal who served time in prison.

Clark's loves now include dabbling in art, creating bluestone sculptures and listening to country music.

Rape allegations first surfaced against him last year when he was charged with the sexual assault of Joanne McGuinness in 1981.

After a three-day committal hearing the magistrate ruled there wasn't enough evidence to go to trial.

Last week the Age in Melbourne, and its sister paper, the Sydney Morning Herald, published detailed accounts from four women - including McGuinness - who claimed they had been raped by Clark on separate occasions in the Warrnambool area between 1971 and 1983.

The detailed accounts included the closing lines of a statement to police made by one of the alleged victims, Sharon Handley, who compared the attack to being assaulted with a burning knife.

"I just laid back and let him rape me so that he would not bash me."

Another woman, Carol Stingel, alleges that in 1971 she was stripped naked and raped by a gang of seven men, including its leader, Clark.

"They had to hold me down, with one holding each leg, one each arm and one my head," she told the Age.

Three of the women never reported the rapes at the time. Like many rape victims, they were ashamed of what had happened and fearful of the social stigma. They also claim to have feared reprisals.

Apart from the McGuinness case, police last year also investigated two of the other claims. Police say the matters will not be proceeded with "at this stage."

Going ahead with the story was the biggest decision the editor of the Age, Michael Gawenda, has made. He says it was in the public interest, arguing that serious criminal allegations were made against a senior public figure. The fact that they were being made by four women who were in no way related was of prime importance.

Most politicians, including Prime Minister John Howard, say Clark is entitled to a presumption of innocence. After a meeting in Adelaide this week, ATSIC's board expressed unanimous support for its chairman.

Clark has strenuously denied the claims, blaming them on a concerted campaign by political opponents inside and outside the Aboriginal community.

He says he has been subjected to an "unprecedented and unprincipled" trial by media, and the first of its kind in Australian publishing history.

"They have surpassed the bounds of reporting and have constituted themselves as judge, jury and executioner. Why? They have clearly crossed the bounds of journalism and entered the arena of scalp-hunting, for whatever motive."

The passionate debate over the decision to publish has even split journalists at the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald, which are published by John Fairfax Holdings.

"They're all talking about it in the lifts," one staffer said. "For every one that supports what we did, there is someone else standing there who was equally against it."

The way the newspapers presented the women's evidence also drew criticism from those who supported publication.

"I do think it would have been wiser and more prudent if the stories had made it clearer that they were being published as highly plausible new allegations and not as established facts," wrote Robert Manne, an associate professor of politics at La Trobe University.

O'Shane believes the publication constituted an outrageous abuse of power by the media. This week she also stood by her controversial assertion that women manufacture stories about sexual assault.

Responding to O'Shane's claims, Scott revealed that her four daughters had been sexually abused by a close family friend.

Scott, a former chair of the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation, said her example highlighted a huge problem within the Aboriginal community that had remained under a veil of secrecy for too long.

One 1999 report into violence in Aboriginal communities described how a 3-year-old child was gang-raped.

"It has taken the leaders of Aboriginal communities decades to change the widely held perception by our women that sexual and physical abuse is a price to be paid for being Aboriginal, and that in these days of isolation and alienation it has become part of our tradition and culture and cannot be spoken about," wrote Scott in the Sydney Morning Herald.

"Now, in just a few short minutes, with a few ill-considered words, there are grounds to believe that what was once a positive tide in the affairs of women and children is in danger of turning ... We must hope that O'Shane's words are soon forgotten."

Clark must also wish people will soon forget the events of the last 10 days. It is a forlorn hope.

Despite announcing intentions to lodge a complaint with the Press Council, he has said a defamation claim against the papers is unlikely because of the costs involved.

Clark is unlikely to relish the prospect of details of his youth being raked over at a trial. The burden of proof in a civil case would also be significantly reduced.

"I do not regard the action by the Age as reason to stand aside," said Clark, adding that he would now put his full concentration into fighting for his people.