Police bend rules in battle to curb domestic violence. - Dominion Post October 2008.
POLICE are flouting privacy laws to save the lives of domestic violence victims.
Officers battling to curb domestic violence in a region described by one murderer as “the most evil valley in New Zealand” are sharing files relating to offenders and victims with agencies that are not party to official agreements allowing information-sharing.
The decision to bend the rules has the support of agencies receiving the potentially life-saving information — and even the privacy commissioner accepts privacy laws should not stop information sharing where safety is at stake.
In a broad approach to curb domestic violence, Wairarapa police identified the 10 most violent families in 2003 and began working with three of them.
The worst family was seen by police for serious violent incidents every 14 days on average — 25 emergency calls in a year. There were a further 49 callouts for crimes committed by children in the family, which police say were linked to seeing their father assault their mother.
Another 40 families are now on the list, though police say that is just the tip of the iceberg as many domestic violence incidents fall below the radar.
Wairarapa’s police chief, Inspector John Johnston, said his staff no longer waited for permission before sharing information with non-governmental anti-violence agencies not covered by memoranda of understanding or agreements covering government agencies.
Investigations by commissioners into child murders, such as those of Masterton half-sisters Saliel Aplin and Olympia Jetson in 2001, blamed a lack of information-sharing for the deaths and continuing cycle of violence.
Mr Johnston said it was better to say sorry later than put a life at risk. “We are prepared to go to a meeting with all the agencies and slap a file on a desk and say, ‘Take out of it what you want," and hell yes, it is making a difference.
“In the past we would not have taken that step. Now we say, ‘You can see the situation clearly, we don’t care if it’s the weekend and a bean-counter has said wait tifi Monday. Just get that kid out now.’”
Privacy Commissioner Marie Shroff said that, though police needed to consider the Privacy Act when disclosing personal information, it was a question of trust. “We don’t expect the police or other government agencies to share our information without a good reason for doing so. For example, it may be necessary
to disclose information to avert a threat to someone’s safety.’
She said agencies should still have a clear policy on what they disclosed, to whom, and when.
Women’s Refuge Wairarapa coordinator Lyn Buckley said that, when it was about safety, the rules surrounding privacy had to move. “You can have all the rules about silence that you like but if that child is still at risk what good is that? It is about that child’s safety.”
Mr Johnston said the focus on at-risk families would not stop. “A Mongrel Mob member — a convicted murderer — said to me, ‘This is the most evil valley in New Zealand. It is where you kill your kids.’
“It made me think hard about the area we live in and even more determined to make it a safer place ... for our children especially.”
There were numerous complaints about McPhee's drunken violent home invasion in 2005, which Police refused to even acknowledge, he was also involved in the attack on me in my home in February 2009 which is well documented.
POLICE are flouting privacy laws to save the lives of domestic violence victims.
Officers battling to curb domestic violence in a region described by one murderer as “the most evil valley in New Zealand” are sharing files relating to offenders and victims with agencies that are not party to official agreements allowing information-sharing.
The decision to bend the rules has the support of agencies receiving the potentially life-saving information — and even the privacy commissioner accepts privacy laws should not stop information sharing where safety is at stake.
In a broad approach to curb domestic violence, Wairarapa police identified the 10 most violent families in 2003 and began working with three of them.
The worst family was seen by police for serious violent incidents every 14 days on average — 25 emergency calls in a year. There were a further 49 callouts for crimes committed by children in the family, which police say were linked to seeing their father assault their mother.
Another 40 families are now on the list, though police say that is just the tip of the iceberg as many domestic violence incidents fall below the radar.
Wairarapa’s police chief, Inspector John Johnston, said his staff no longer waited for permission before sharing information with non-governmental anti-violence agencies not covered by memoranda of understanding or agreements covering government agencies.
Investigations by commissioners into child murders, such as those of Masterton half-sisters Saliel Aplin and Olympia Jetson in 2001, blamed a lack of information-sharing for the deaths and continuing cycle of violence.
Mr Johnston said it was better to say sorry later than put a life at risk. “We are prepared to go to a meeting with all the agencies and slap a file on a desk and say, ‘Take out of it what you want," and hell yes, it is making a difference.
“In the past we would not have taken that step. Now we say, ‘You can see the situation clearly, we don’t care if it’s the weekend and a bean-counter has said wait tifi Monday. Just get that kid out now.’”
Privacy Commissioner Marie Shroff said that, though police needed to consider the Privacy Act when disclosing personal information, it was a question of trust. “We don’t expect the police or other government agencies to share our information without a good reason for doing so. For example, it may be necessary
to disclose information to avert a threat to someone’s safety.’
She said agencies should still have a clear policy on what they disclosed, to whom, and when.
Women’s Refuge Wairarapa coordinator Lyn Buckley said that, when it was about safety, the rules surrounding privacy had to move. “You can have all the rules about silence that you like but if that child is still at risk what good is that? It is about that child’s safety.”
Mr Johnston said the focus on at-risk families would not stop. “A Mongrel Mob member — a convicted murderer — said to me, ‘This is the most evil valley in New Zealand. It is where you kill your kids.’
“It made me think hard about the area we live in and even more determined to make it a safer place ... for our children especially.”
TRAGIC TOLL:
June 1992: Raymond Ratima stabbed to death two adults and five children in Masterton — three of them his sons. Ratima approached 13 sources for help in the 24 hours before the killings.
July2000: Hinewaioriki Karaitiana-Matiaha (Lillybing), 23 rnonths, after being shaken by her aunt, Rachealle Namana in Carterton. She was found to have been scalded and to have suffered genital mutilation capable of killing her, had she not been shaken to death,
January 2001: Two-year-old Thomas Schumann suffocated by ex-boxing champion Hugh Bryant, 23, who was boarding in Masterton with relatives. Bryant found not guilty by reason of insanity.
December 2001: Saliel Aplin, 12, and Olympia Jetson, 1 stabbed to death in their beds at the Masterton home by stepfather Bruce Howse. The community was shocked as allegations of sexual and physical abuse, and details of frequent intervention by social agencies, emerged at Howse's trial.
September 2003: Featherston’s Coral-Ellen Burrows, 6, beaten to death by her mother’s partner, Steven Williams, who was high on P. Coral-Ellen’s birth father had called CYF nine months earlier to say he was worried about his children.
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This policy of sharing information is adding to the problems, not solving them. The standard of the people 'working' for the 'community agencies' is appalling The police are sharing information with the offenders in many cases. For example, local "advocate" Tere Torea. I was advised by local community organisations to ask Tere Torea for assistance - what a mistake! Here is a picture of his appalling, and uninviting window display for his "social services organisation.
I rang him and explained my problem, he then turned up at my home and brought his mate, Dave, who he informed me used to be employed at Rimutaka prison, until he was sacked for bringing contraband into the prison. I was horrified that he could bring this loutish mate of his to my home without even asking me if I minded him blabbing about my personal matters with his extremely dodgy mates let alone bringing them to my home. At the end of our "meeting", Torea insisted on us all saying a prayer, then he insisted on giving me a hug - a disgusting embrace of his fat smelly body, which nearly made me sick!
Torea said he'd pick me up and take me to Court the following day, but sent 'Dave' instead. I reluctantly got into his unwarranted old bomb of a car (only because I had no other choice at such late notice) and was taken - not to the Court at all, but to Dave's house.
I was taken inside and told that Tere Torea would be meeting us there and we would go to Court from there. I immediately felt very uncomfortable and asked Dave to take me straight to the Court and Torea could meet us there. Dave refused, and eventually Torea arrived and started shouting at me in an authoritarian manner about how we had to do everything his way and let him do all the talking in Court - he has no law qualifications or any other qualifications for that matter! He started to go on about working with the police rather than against them and how I should plead guilty to the ridiculous charges. He refused to listen to anything I said, shouting and sulking and throwing his weight around and finally I had to walk to Court. He is an utter creep, who receives funding because he tells the funders he does this and that and provides advocacy for people like me when nothing could be further from the truth! Women do not want hugs from disgusting creeps like him, I've spoken to other women who have also experienced his disgusting groping and religious BS. These are the people the local police are "sharing information with".
Above is the disgusting window display for his "Services", and a newspaper cutting regarding the murder of Paul Irons, saying the sentences given to the killers were an insult to all Maori. Paul Irons wasn't Maori, the 3 men that murdered him were, and the whole community was responsible, just like they were all responsible for Coral Ellen Burrows murder too, because these men were always time bombs waiting to go off and nobody said a thing. Torea is mates with the killers, and using Iron's family to raise his own profile with this rubbish. Local Wairarapa TimesAge chief reporter Nathan Crombie, and other journalists, are responsible for promoting Torea and his unprofessional mates. Others who the local hack journalists promote include the following:
Ex Mayor Gary McPhee, who is on the committee of Victim Support, who told me to piss off (like Woman's Refuge manager Lyn Buckley, quoted in the news article about the Privacy Act breach policy), after the home invasion by Michael Francis Murphy in 2009.
There were numerous complaints about McPhee's drunken violent home invasion in 2005, which Police refused to even acknowledge, he was also involved in the attack on me in my home in February 2009 which is well documented. Victims of violence are committing suicide in droves locally because this is what passes for advocacy and leadership in the Wairarapa. "Tell someone" Barry Taylor says - we've told him that the victims of violence and bullying and abuse in the Wairarapa are having to suffer further abuse and violence when they try and "tell someone" like Gary McPhee, who is on the committee of Victim Support, after committing a violent drunken home invasion at a local flat, and incompetent and/or unqualified people who don't know what they're doing.
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