[kall]

From yahooxtra.co.nz:

Two former policemen found not guilty today of historic kidnap and sex charges are already in jail for rape.


Brad Shipton, 48, and Bob Schollum, 54, were acquitted by a jury in the High Court at Auckland this afternoon on charges of kidnapping and indecently assaulting a 16-year-old girl in Rotorua between November 1983 and August 1984.


At the conclusion of the trial suppression orders from an earlier trial were lifted, allowing it to be revealed that Shipton and Schollum are already in jail for rape.
The pair, together with two other men, were convicted in July 2005 for the rape of a 20-year-old Mount Maunganui woman in 1989.


Schollum was sentenced to eight years' jail and Shipton to 8-1/2 years.


Suspended assistant police commissioner Clint Rickards, 46, was also found not guilty in the High Court today of kidnapping and indecently assaulting the Rotorua teenager.


While he now walks free, his former colleagues will return to prison.

[Cobra]

One of the problem with cop related crimes is that cops are recruited at a young age. And at that time many of them have not really shown their true colors yet. So they pass the background check and few years later their true color comes out.

[kall]

Interesting observation.. shouldn't the checks be made more stringent?

(I have added a poll to this topic.)

[kall]

And also.. they were sworn officers at the time they commited the other rape, as far as I know.

[Cobra]

Kall,

I do not know if stricter background check would help for following reasons.

I think majority of Cops are recruited when they are around 22 or so. At that time they have not really committed any serius crime yet. They discover their evil side once they are in force. No one really suspects a cop. So, I think it is quite easy for a cop to conceal his/her criminal behavior till the lid is off.

I think what we need is stringent internal affairs divisions and zero tolerance towards dishonorable conducts.

[kall]

Ahh, I see, and totally agree.

I noticed even Ms Clark is appaled by the notion that a 16-year old girl would consent to group sex with three sworn officers.

[Cobra]

Yes, it seems very unlikely that a 16 year old would agree to a group sex with three cops. And this brings to the dishonorable conduct I was talking about. This sort of conduct does not speak well for a cop.

Helen Clark seems like a reasonable woman. I was watching a news footage about her speaking on immigration issue. She seemed very logical. Or am I wrong?

[kall]

Not wrong at all.

If she were any more logical, she'd be a Vulcan.

[tazjet]

Well Cobra, my personal opinion of Helen Clark is that she is false and tyrannical. A former partner of mine worked in her office.

Let me put it this way. I am no way homphobic. I have gay and transexual friends and accept them for who they are.

There are however persistent rumours which I have personal reasons for accepting as true, that say she is lesbian and her husband is gay. That according to this persistent rumour and based on comments by a best friend in his (Dr Brian Edwards') biography of Helen Clark, it is suggested the marriage was a sham marriage of convenience to get her elected.

Now if that is true and I personally believe it is, then it runs to the core of whether you can trust someone who would lie to get elected ?

She has however done a lot of good, but I believe there are many instances where she has abused her power to silence critics in a bullying manner.

I am very wary of her because she has surrounded herself with sycophant ministers of questionable ethics and competency. The $64,000 question is have the other side got anything better to offer. Remains to be seen if the National Party offer anything truely new or if they are just tired old hacks ?

[Cobra]

tazjet,

Well, I am not an expert on New Zealand’s internal politics. So, I would not go out of my way to defend Helen Clark.

But I have a question, what is the significance of $64,000.00?

[NNY]

even if all of that were ture
do you really believe that our politicians sexual orinetation has any relevance as to their ablity to run the country?

Of course their past offences are relevant. if they are repeat offenders then they need to be thrown in jail.

As for the police force in general, they are just a gang.