NEWS > 17 March 2006

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Stuff.co.nz - Wellington,New Z
17 March 2006

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'Police surprised to see me' -

The husband of a woman allegedly sexually assaulted by three police officers said two of them appeared surprised when he answered the door one day.

An emotional Ross Nicholas was one of three members of Louise Nicholas' family giving evidence in the High Court in Auckland yesterday.

On trial are assistant police commissioner Clint Rickards, who is suspended on full pay, and former policemen Bradley Keith Shipton and Robert Francis Schollum. They have denied a total of 20 charges of rape and sexual abuse in the mid-1980s.

Mr Nicholas, a driver, who was Mrs Nicholas' boyfriend from 1985, recalled how Shipton and Rickards had turned up at his wife's Rotorua flat when he was home alone sick.

"They were quite surprised to see I was there � I just remember the way they looked at me."

At another point, Mr Nicholas broke down when he was asked about the dress his wife was wearing when she was allegedly raped and sexually abused.

Mr Nicholas said he had bought her the ankle-length white muslin dress in 1985.

Mrs Nicholas told the court two days ago that she was wearing the dress when the three accused allegedly forced her to have group sex and indecently assaulted her with a baton at a police rental house in Rotorua in January 1986, when she was 18.

She said she was led into a bedroom where Schollum and Shipton were waiting for her, and she said she told them she didn't want to do anything with them.

Mrs Nicholas said she didn't tell anyone about the alleged baton incident or occasions when she said Shipton and Rickards paid uninvited visits for intercourse and oral sex during 1985 and 1986, because "no one would believe me".

In cross examination, Rickards' defence lawyer, John Haigh QC, handed Mr Nicholas an unofficial police statement made by Mrs Nicholas in 1993.

Mr Nicholas was present at the time the statement was taken and the officer recorded him as saying he remembered when Shipton and Schollum turned up unexpectedly at Mrs Nicholas' flat.

Mr Nicholas said the statement must have been wrong, because he remembers Rickards and Shipton.

Ms Nicholas' mother-in-law, Phyllis Nicholas, also gave evidence that she remembered see a marked police car outside Mrs Nicholas' flat on three occasions.

She said she saw two men exit the house and hop in to the police car.

She said Mrs Nicholas had appeared to be off-colour when they left. Phyllis Nicholas suggested they go to the doctor, but Mrs Nicholas declined.

Retired Rotorua inspector Ray Sutton told the court he had been contacted in 1993 by Mrs Nicholas' father, Jim Crawford, to say his daughter had been sexually abused by a police officer in Murapara in the early 1980s, and later by the three accused in Rotorua.

Mr Sutton said Mrs Nicholas gave him details of the claims and he told them the procedure for making a formal complaint. A few days later Mrs Nicholas was referred to the Sexual Abuse Team.

Over coming days, the Crown is expected to read out statements given by the accused in 1995, regarding their sexual relations with Mrs Nicholas, as well as written evidence by an old flatmate of Mrs Nicholas.

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Article sourced from

Stuff.co.nz - Wellington,New Z17 March 2006

'Police surprised to see me' -

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Stuff.co.nz - Wellington,New Z
17 March 2006