WEBVTT - Bonus episode: Jared Savage on the fall of Jevon McSkimming 0:00:05.400 --> 0:00:05.800 Kiyota. 0:00:05.880 --> 0:00:09.240 I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is a special bonus episode 0:00:09.320 --> 0:00:12.960 of The Front Page, a daily podcast presented by The 0:00:13.000 --> 0:00:19.040 New Zealand Herald. There have been no official talks yet 0:00:19.160 --> 0:00:24.400 about compensation for the complainant against Gevin Mcskimming, The former 0:00:24.480 --> 0:00:28.800 deputy police commissioner, is awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty to 0:00:28.880 --> 0:00:33.120 having child sexual exploitation and beast reality material on his 0:00:33.280 --> 0:00:38.159 work devices. A scathing watchdog report has found some of 0:00:38.159 --> 0:00:43.080 the nation's highest ranking officers ignored a young woman's anonymous 0:00:43.080 --> 0:00:49.560 complaints against mix Skimming. Instead, she was prosecuted for digital harassment. 0:00:50.200 --> 0:00:53.280 The handling of the case has been called appolling by 0:00:53.320 --> 0:00:58.400 the now Police Commissioner Richard Chambers and Police Minister Mark Mitchell. 0:00:58.560 --> 0:00:59.120 Today on The. 0:00:59.040 --> 0:01:03.520 Front Page, colleague HEROLD Senior reporter Jared Savage is with 0:01:03.680 --> 0:01:06.679 us to take us behind the scenes of how this 0:01:06.800 --> 0:01:11.600 case unfolded and how the sordid details came to light. 0:01:14.880 --> 0:01:18.400 First off, Jared, how did this first come to your attention? 0:01:20.360 --> 0:01:24.320 So late last year? Sort of December tweeny twenty four, 0:01:24.880 --> 0:01:29.200 we started hearing sort of whispers around how Deputy Commissioner 0:01:29.280 --> 0:01:34.160 gim Skimming was possibly under criminal investigation that related to 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:37.440 a complaint from a young woman who happened to have 0:01:37.520 --> 0:01:40.200 worked for the police for some time. So we started, 0:01:40.200 --> 0:01:42.560 you know, as we do, started sniffing around and trying 0:01:42.600 --> 0:01:45.200 to find out what was going on, and we put 0:01:45.240 --> 0:01:49.160 some questions into the police, saying, you know, what's going on, 0:01:49.320 --> 0:01:53.960 essentially as the Deputy commissioner under investigation and so on 0:01:54.000 --> 0:01:58.000 and so forth, and what happened. The response back was 0:01:58.720 --> 0:02:02.320 a typical no comment, but they also said they also said, well, 0:02:02.600 --> 0:02:06.640 there's actually another prosecution which we can't tell you about, 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:10.760 and there are massive suppression orders all over it, which 0:02:10.800 --> 0:02:15.440 means that essentially you're gagged from saying anything. So that 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:17.919 was the starting point. We broke a story saying that 0:02:19.120 --> 0:02:23.200 jem mcskimming was under investigation, but we can't retell you 0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:28.840 much more than that. Now. As time went on, mc skimming, 0:02:29.680 --> 0:02:36.040 the police investigation uncovered quite extreme pornographic material on his 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:40.720 work devices. So he denied these allegations that we couldn't report. 0:02:40.720 --> 0:02:44.239 He denied these allegations saying I'm innocent, you know, and 0:02:44.320 --> 0:02:46.079 I'm looking forward to coming back to work. That was 0:02:46.120 --> 0:02:50.320 in January. Shortly after that, the police found the subjectionable 0:02:50.440 --> 0:02:55.120 material on his devices, and that triggered a separate criminal investigation, 0:02:56.200 --> 0:02:58.280 and as we now know, he pleaded guilty to a 0:02:58.320 --> 0:03:01.840 possession of abjected material. He had to resign in disgrace, 0:03:02.880 --> 0:03:05.800 and that easy yet to be sentenced on that. However, 0:03:05.880 --> 0:03:08.640 there was this underlying what had happened was is that 0:03:09.320 --> 0:03:12.720 the other investigation, which we couldn't report on, we kept 0:03:12.760 --> 0:03:14.880 on digging and we've we found out what was going 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:18.080 on there. And what had happened was is that the 0:03:18.120 --> 0:03:22.040 woman who had made these allegations about mic skimming had 0:03:22.040 --> 0:03:26.560 in that been prosecuted for essentially a harassment campaign of 0:03:26.960 --> 0:03:32.440 multiple emails, and so of course her defense was, well, 0:03:33.000 --> 0:03:35.520 I'm telling I'm telling you, I'm telling the truth about 0:03:35.520 --> 0:03:39.760 this guy. And that is only just this week we 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:43.280 managed to fight the suppressions getting uplifted. And that's what's 0:03:43.400 --> 0:03:46.520 how everything has tumbled out in the last couple of days. 0:03:46.520 --> 0:03:49.120 Because it would be so frustrating knowing that there was 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:52.520 something under the surface, being kind of so close but 0:03:52.600 --> 0:03:56.000 yet so far because of those blanket suppressions. And it 0:03:56.080 --> 0:03:58.640 is important though, when something is suppressed, when there are 0:03:58.640 --> 0:04:03.080 two concurrent cases happening at the same time a suppression 0:04:03.080 --> 0:04:05.560 on both of them, you need, right. 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:08.600 Yeah, I mean, in this case, the suppression orders were 0:04:08.600 --> 0:04:10.480 put in at the time of that she was arrested 0:04:10.520 --> 0:04:12.960 in the middle of last year. The suppression orders were 0:04:12.960 --> 0:04:17.400 put in place ostensibly to protect mc skimmings's reputation. He 0:04:17.440 --> 0:04:19.320 was about to put his hand up for the top job. 0:04:20.000 --> 0:04:23.400 If they had been reporting of these emails accusing him 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:26.120 of being a sexual predator, obviously that wouldn't have been 0:04:26.160 --> 0:04:29.200 good for his chances of getting that job, regardless of 0:04:29.240 --> 0:04:32.360 the veracity of the allegations. So therefore, the suppressions were 0:04:32.360 --> 0:04:37.800 put in place to sort of stop further harm to 0:04:38.200 --> 0:04:40.840 him and his reputation and his Stanley. But of course 0:04:41.600 --> 0:04:44.480 that's the narrative that he was putting putting forward, and 0:04:44.480 --> 0:04:46.800 that was the reason why the police didn't take these 0:04:46.839 --> 0:04:50.480 allegations from this young woman seriously at the time. They 0:04:50.560 --> 0:04:55.360 didn't investigate them. They chose to basically accept his version 0:04:55.400 --> 0:04:59.240 of events on face value, and that's led to these 0:04:59.360 --> 0:05:03.800 charges and suppressions. And it was incredibly frustrated because, you know, 0:05:03.880 --> 0:05:08.000 as we were on following these cases, you know, throughout 0:05:08.000 --> 0:05:10.320 the year, we kind of knew that the IPC A 0:05:10.560 --> 0:05:13.520 report was going to come out and make this quite 0:05:13.600 --> 0:05:18.120 sort of damning findings about how senior police handled the allegations, 0:05:18.560 --> 0:05:22.440 and up until you know, five pm on Tuesday on 0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:25.000 Tuesday night, like, we were fighting to get it lifted 0:05:25.279 --> 0:05:29.440 because if we didn't succeed, the IPC A report couldn't 0:05:29.440 --> 0:05:32.200 be published and we can tell you the full story. 0:05:33.279 --> 0:05:35.960 And yeah, very frustrating, but yeah, you've got a as 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:38.120 a reporter, you've got to stick to the six of 0:05:38.120 --> 0:05:40.320 the laws and the rules, and you know, we're just 0:05:40.480 --> 0:05:44.039 lucky that we had the resources to fight it. 0:05:44.120 --> 0:05:48.720 I suppose, Jared, what kind of pressures are there that 0:05:48.839 --> 0:05:53.120 come with reporting on people in power, especially within the 0:05:53.160 --> 0:05:57.640 police hierarchy. You're juggling, you know, getting answers from police, 0:05:57.680 --> 0:06:00.960 but obviously work very closely with them in your capacity 0:06:01.080 --> 0:06:04.880 as a senior crime reporter. Is it quite difficult to juggle? 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:08.840 Yeah, because often the people that you're speaking with are 0:06:08.920 --> 0:06:12.400 unable to speak to you in an official capacity or 0:06:12.400 --> 0:06:15.520 on the record, so you're just getting snippets of information 0:06:15.720 --> 0:06:20.359 here or there. You know, the police have a large 0:06:21.120 --> 0:06:24.839 communications team of pr advisors, so often when you're a reporter, 0:06:25.000 --> 0:06:28.080 they actually can know a lot more than you about 0:06:28.600 --> 0:06:31.560 the case or what's going on, So it can sometimes 0:06:31.640 --> 0:06:34.279 be like shining a bit of a torch in a 0:06:34.360 --> 0:06:36.960 darkened room. You can just see one little bit, but 0:06:37.080 --> 0:06:39.960 you know there's other stuff happening in the in the shadows. 0:06:40.800 --> 0:06:42.640 On top of that, you've got to be very careful 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:48.240 legally around not defaming people, making sure that everyone has 0:06:48.279 --> 0:06:51.720 the right to reply. In this case, you had multiple 0:06:51.760 --> 0:06:54.839 things going on. There was developments all the time, so 0:06:54.920 --> 0:06:59.640 you're having to report at speed and have political ramifications 0:06:59.680 --> 0:07:02.359 as well. So this was a this was quite a 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:06.160 tricky story to report on. Now that the floodgates are open, 0:07:06.560 --> 0:07:08.640 it's all it's all coming out, and that's great because 0:07:08.680 --> 0:07:13.000 sunlight's the best disinfectant and and that's brilliant. But but at 0:07:13.000 --> 0:07:15.680 the time when you're reporting on things, yeah, you're not 0:07:15.800 --> 0:07:18.720 you're not always entirely one hundred percent certain, and you've 0:07:18.720 --> 0:07:22.040 got to work really hard to confirm things or corroborate 0:07:22.080 --> 0:07:28.440 things even when people aren't, you know, cooperating essentially, And 0:07:28.480 --> 0:07:30.600 in this case, the suppression order has made it harder 0:07:30.640 --> 0:07:33.600 as well, because people could just turn around, you know, 0:07:34.000 --> 0:07:37.760 government agencies and departments or individuals involved could say we 0:07:37.840 --> 0:07:42.280 can't talk to you about that because it's suppressed. So yeah, 0:07:42.400 --> 0:07:45.120 and at the same time, you as a journalist, you're 0:07:45.160 --> 0:07:47.640 wanting to be incredibly fear to people like you know 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:52.200 you're making these you're publishing these allegations. You know you've 0:07:52.200 --> 0:07:57.040 got to give everyone an opportunity to be heard. And yeah, 0:07:57.080 --> 0:08:01.880 you fight, you walk a fine line at times. 0:08:05.240 --> 0:08:09.360 I mean, I lead an organization of fifteen thousand men 0:08:09.400 --> 0:08:11.800 and woman who do an incredible job day and night 0:08:11.840 --> 0:08:14.720 across the country. I know how hard they work because 0:08:14.720 --> 0:08:19.280 I'm connected to the front line. You know this report, 0:08:19.720 --> 0:08:25.960 the findings, there's a kick in the guts for them. 0:08:26.440 --> 0:08:27.480 They are no different to me. 0:08:28.200 --> 0:08:30.560 We take a huge amount of pride in the job 0:08:30.600 --> 0:08:35.719 that we do for our country. That won't change. What 0:08:35.800 --> 0:08:40.719 will change is we will make a swift action of 0:08:40.800 --> 0:08:45.880 implementing this with my new leadership team, and we will 0:08:45.880 --> 0:08:48.120 do our absolute best to ensure this never happens again. 0:08:50.440 --> 0:08:54.160 It doesn't really seem like Chambers or Mitchell were too 0:08:54.200 --> 0:08:56.880 privy to a lot of this information before the IPCA 0:08:57.040 --> 0:08:59.800 report actually landed on their desks. I mean, what did 0:08:59.840 --> 0:09:02.680 you think reading those one hundred and thirty five pages. 0:09:03.679 --> 0:09:06.360 It's a bombshell of a report. May have seen anything 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:09.319 quite like it. Into of fifteen twenty years of reporting 0:09:09.480 --> 0:09:12.880 on these matters, that really dived into a lot of detail, 0:09:13.280 --> 0:09:16.480 the intermassinations of what was happening at Police National Headquarters 0:09:17.440 --> 0:09:21.599 and the failures of many senior beliefs to not investigate 0:09:22.080 --> 0:09:24.040 what was run in front of them. They actually named 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:27.600 certain officers and they're including the former Commissioner Andrew Costa, 0:09:28.480 --> 0:09:33.040 and detail quite significant failings over a long period of 0:09:33.080 --> 0:09:36.120 time by a number of police officers. Essentially, what it 0:09:36.120 --> 0:09:39.560 boils down to is this young woman has made allegations 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:43.840 of quite serious sexual and physical nature against jem mcskimming. 0:09:44.600 --> 0:09:46.959 His explanation for all of this was, look, we were 0:09:46.960 --> 0:09:51.360 in a consensual a year. It's ended badly and this 0:09:51.559 --> 0:09:55.760 is a campaign of harassment or revenge to destroy my career. 0:09:55.920 --> 0:10:00.440 And instead of stopping to think, well, maybe she's telling 0:10:00.440 --> 0:10:02.800 the truth here and maybe we need to investigate, but 0:10:03.040 --> 0:10:07.320 just wholesale brought his vision of events, and you know, 0:10:08.559 --> 0:10:10.839 it's brought down the entire weight of the States to 0:10:11.200 --> 0:10:15.320 prosecute her and drag her through the court system. And 0:10:15.360 --> 0:10:20.200 so it's a huge power balance. Yeah, it's it's quite 0:10:20.280 --> 0:10:23.000 it's a staggering report in the end, like the police 0:10:23.160 --> 0:10:28.000 didn't lay criminal charges against Geno Mixginning in relation to 0:10:28.360 --> 0:10:32.199 her complaint, but that you know, that's sort of that's 0:10:32.240 --> 0:10:34.880 sort of by the buy and away this this report 0:10:34.960 --> 0:10:41.320 details with this this long running attempts to Yeah, they 0:10:41.360 --> 0:10:43.640 just they just didn't look at it. And it's it's 0:10:43.720 --> 0:10:46.400 quite staggering and it's been a huge amount of damage 0:10:46.400 --> 0:10:48.840 to the New Zealand place. Yeah. 0:10:48.840 --> 0:10:50.920 I've read a fair few I p c A reports 0:10:50.960 --> 0:10:53.280 and similar as well A And what struck me was 0:10:53.320 --> 0:10:57.520 the language. It was quite emotive, more emotive than what 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:00.320 you would expect with these kind of things. So I 0:11:00.360 --> 0:11:03.720 actually remember gasping when I saw the press release come 0:11:03.800 --> 0:11:09.400 through from Richard Chambers using the word appalling, which is unusual. 0:11:09.640 --> 0:11:13.320 Right, Yeah, very you could sense, I mean he said 0:11:13.320 --> 0:11:16.160 he was angry, and you could sense the anger in 0:11:16.200 --> 0:11:19.920 the press release, but also the subsequent press conference with 0:11:20.160 --> 0:11:23.839 Richard Chambers, the police, mister Mark Mitchell and Judith Collins 0:11:23.920 --> 0:11:30.800 attune in general quite an emotional press conference, a lot 0:11:30.840 --> 0:11:33.400 of anger and disappointment in it. I think it's because 0:11:33.440 --> 0:11:36.400 they realized the damage that this does to the reputation 0:11:36.480 --> 0:11:40.320 of the New Zealand Police. It brings up or resurrects 0:11:40.360 --> 0:11:43.640 a lot of bad memories from the Beijley Reports sort 0:11:43.640 --> 0:11:47.120 of twenty years ago, where again there were allegations of 0:11:47.160 --> 0:11:51.760 cover ups and serious sexual complaints made against police officers. 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:54.640 You know, so this is history repeating in some regards, 0:11:55.080 --> 0:11:58.679 and you know, I guess the police would have been 0:11:59.240 --> 0:12:02.240 kind of hoping some of those attitudes of bariing in 0:12:02.240 --> 0:12:06.160 the past. But I mean, here it's it's quite clear 0:12:06.200 --> 0:12:10.959 that they they believe Mick Skimmings vision of events and 0:12:11.000 --> 0:12:12.960 they didn't want to hurt his shot at the top job. 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:16.160 And it's it's it's it's. 0:12:16.000 --> 0:12:19.160 Remarkable as a reporter, how does it feel sitting on 0:12:19.200 --> 0:12:21.440 this information and what does a day in the life 0:12:21.520 --> 0:12:24.520 look like when you're trying to hunt down these leads. 0:12:27.440 --> 0:12:31.160 Most of it is really boring league work, So it's. 0:12:31.040 --> 0:12:34.000 Not like the movies and Spotlight where they're running around 0:12:34.040 --> 0:12:37.560 town and opening up files and things. 0:12:37.600 --> 0:12:40.319 Certainly not quite as dramatic as the movies make out, 0:12:40.360 --> 0:12:42.520 but I mean a lot of it is simply calling people, 0:12:43.320 --> 0:12:48.520 filing requests for court documents, talking to two people involved 0:12:48.520 --> 0:12:51.680 in the case, and just sort of trying to piece 0:12:51.840 --> 0:12:54.520 piece it all together. We had quite a nervous wait 0:12:54.559 --> 0:12:57.040 on Tuesday. We were obviously waiting to we you know, 0:12:57.080 --> 0:13:00.120 we had engage lawyers to try and get uppressions lift it, 0:13:00.120 --> 0:13:03.079 and we had a story prepared to go, and you know, 0:13:03.160 --> 0:13:05.480 little bits and pieces were leaking out and other you know, 0:13:05.559 --> 0:13:07.640 other media, and you know, there's there's pressure to make 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:11.120 sure that we're complying with the suppression orders. They'd also 0:13:11.760 --> 0:13:14.000 be the first to break the story, and so yeah, 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:15.439 it was a bit of a relief when we were 0:13:15.480 --> 0:13:18.880 able to do so and get it out at sort 0:13:18.920 --> 0:13:21.880 of you know, five oh one on Tuesday night, and 0:13:21.960 --> 0:13:24.199 everything just fell out of that, and obviously there was 0:13:24.200 --> 0:13:26.280 a bit of a feeding frenzy with the press conference 0:13:26.320 --> 0:13:30.559 and the ips air report coming out. So yeah, it's 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:35.040 a good reminder actually about you know, the value of 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:40.400 transparency and the value and journalists, you know, and it 0:13:40.520 --> 0:13:42.920 wasn't just me, it's other journalists and other newsrooms as well, 0:13:42.960 --> 0:13:46.520 and also without our newsroom, support of editors and lawyers 0:13:46.520 --> 0:13:48.600 to try and get this over the line so that 0:13:48.800 --> 0:13:51.640 people could be fully informed about it. And I guess 0:13:51.640 --> 0:13:54.280 that shows the value of the media, and it's sort 0:13:54.320 --> 0:13:55.959 of watched og role in the. 0:13:55.920 --> 0:13:58.160 Fourth estate, and we'll just end on that. I think 0:13:58.200 --> 0:14:00.640 one of the most important aspects of this story, and 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:03.640 that's the woman involved at the center of this case. 0:14:03.679 --> 0:14:06.160 So I understand that you've spoken to her legal counsel. 0:14:06.640 --> 0:14:10.160 Yes, I've spoken to Stephen Lackett, who barised an author. Yep. 0:14:10.760 --> 0:14:13.199 He you know, he gave quite a strong statement to 0:14:14.559 --> 0:14:17.439 the Herald for that first story in relation to how 0:14:17.640 --> 0:14:22.080 the police had failed his client, that instead of treating 0:14:22.120 --> 0:14:25.440 her as a potential victim, that they have chosen to 0:14:25.440 --> 0:14:28.040 ignore her essentially and brought the full weight of the 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:32.600 state down instead of devastating impact on her. The Lewis 0:14:32.760 --> 0:14:34.640 is and so I would not be surprised that at 0:14:34.680 --> 0:14:37.640 some point there's going to be some kind of civil 0:14:37.720 --> 0:14:40.680 or compensation kind of claim brought against the police in 0:14:40.720 --> 0:14:43.640 relation to this. And yeah, it'll be interesting to see 0:14:43.640 --> 0:14:45.120 how that plays out as well. 0:14:45.360 --> 0:14:47.600 Thanks for joining us, Jared Legia Jose. 0:14:47.760 --> 0:14:48.040 Thank you. 0:14:51.040 --> 0:14:54.280 That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You 0:14:54.320 --> 0:14:58.240 can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage 0:14:58.240 --> 0:15:02.160 at ends at herold dot co z. The Front Page 0:15:02.240 --> 0:15:05.800 is produced by Jane Yee and Richard Martin, who's also 0:15:06.000 --> 0:15:10.480 our editor. I'm Chelsea Daniels. Subscribe to the front page 0:15:10.520 --> 0:15:14.120 on iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts, and tune 0:15:14.200 --> 0:15:17.200 in tomorrow for another look behind the headlines.