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Speaker 1: Ryan Bridge, a senior police officer who hit his children

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Speaker 1: with a belt on at least three separate occasions, will

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Speaker 1: not face criminal charges and he's keeping his job. He

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Speaker 1: was censured by an employment investigation. This is by the

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Speaker 1: police force, but the IPCA they say the sanctions not

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Speaker 1: good enough. The police couldn't charge him, they reckon because

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Speaker 1: of a lack of evidence. The officer in question refuse

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Speaker 1: to allow his children to be interviewed for evidential purposes

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Speaker 1: and refuse to be interviewed himself. Mark Henahan is an

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Speaker 1: Orkland University law professor. He's with me tonight.

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Speaker 2: Hi Mark, Hi Ryan, Love to be talking with you

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Speaker 2: again and to you.

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Speaker 3: Too, Mark. How do you prosecute a child a potential

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Speaker 3: child abuse case If the parent can say no, my

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Speaker 3: child doesn't give permission to be interviewed, or I don't

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Speaker 3: give permission, and the adult can say they don't give

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Speaker 3: permission either.

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Speaker 2: Well, I think the way it works. I mean basically,

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Speaker 2: as you know, anyone who is going to be questioned

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Speaker 2: by the police as a right to science, they didn't

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Speaker 2: have to answer questions, and in some situations they may

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Speaker 2: to give their name and address. But there is a

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Speaker 2: provision in a rang of tamaricki and the police could

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Speaker 2: have used it. If it's a situation where the child's

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Speaker 2: at great risk, they can get a warrant to root

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Speaker 2: the child and obscurring at Tamberiki, I think in the

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Speaker 2: case felt that the children were safe, which was surprised.

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Speaker 2: But they said that the children were safe. So I

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Speaker 2: suppose they say, because they're guardians to the children, saying

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Speaker 2: we're not going to let you take away the children

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Speaker 2: to interview them. And it's kind of tricky in a

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Speaker 2: way because I suppose the children themselves would feel that

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Speaker 2: dobbing and dad not the greatest thing they could that

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Speaker 2: they would be doing. But there was other evidence, I thought.

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Speaker 2: I mean, obviously a rang of tamariki got evidence from

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Speaker 2: the children talking to them. They said it happened, So

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Speaker 2: I don't see why they couldn't use that. I mean,

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Speaker 2: even though it's secondhand, to some degree, the children did

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Speaker 2: say to a ring of tabariki, that's why the ranger

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Speaker 2: Tamriki knew about him and still thought the children were safe.

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Speaker 2: Exactly what what you just said. The children had been used.

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Speaker 2: They else had been used on them. So because in

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Speaker 2: some ways it is hard to sort of put pressure

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Speaker 2: on children to to give evidence against our parents. I

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Speaker 2: can understand and pitically when they had a belted ust case.

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Speaker 2: No totally, so not evidence they could have got because

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Speaker 2: it seemed to be other rang Mariki said quite clear

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Speaker 2: that that this had happened and the children had told

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Speaker 2: them that. Yes, so the reason that they couldn't that's

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Speaker 2: evidence from it?

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Speaker 1: Are you saying, Mark, Are you saying if the in

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Speaker 1: a case where auditing a timody key decreed that the

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Speaker 1: children were unsafe in the house in that instance, then

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Speaker 1: the children would be able to be interviewed and that

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Speaker 1: would be evidential.

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Speaker 2: Well, they could remove the children in that case if

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Speaker 2: as risk of the children, they can remove the get

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Speaker 2: a warrick. But even in this case, because of ranging

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Speaker 2: Mariki had found out and felt the children was there

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Speaker 2: was some evidence and I think you know it would

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Speaker 2: be challenged because it's textually here so it's not the

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Speaker 2: children talking themselves. But the court may well accept because

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Speaker 2: it can in certain circumstances say that in this case

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Speaker 2: the children did say to us a belt had been

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Speaker 2: used on them, and that would be sufficient evidence for

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Speaker 2: a court if it ever accepted to say, well, that's

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Speaker 2: evidence to prove that there has been a Sultan's case

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Speaker 2: because it's clear assault. I mean, the interesting thing about

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Speaker 2: this case is Liz Can just taped someone on the

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Speaker 2: shoulder and chatted with the whole look in the district

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Speaker 2: court and overall by the High Court. This is haitting

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Speaker 2: kids with the belt and nothing has happened. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 2: a good point contrasting.

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Speaker 1: It's a good point.

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Speaker 2: Mark.

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Speaker 1: We have to leave it there. That's Mark Kenahan, his

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Speaker 1: Augland University's law professor with us. This very sad case

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Speaker 1: for the for the kids involved, the parents, both parents

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Speaker 1: actually not speaking to police. For more from Hither Duplessy

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Speaker 1: Allen Drive, listen live to news talks. It'd be from

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Speaker 1: four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio