Analysis - What did these places look like - the endless corridors, the sloppy food? This week, more than 30 years on, some welcome specifics may appear in the public record, David Cohen writes.
Warning: This story discusses details of sexual violence
Where are the Cherries? This was the constant thought going through the mind of a nine-year-old boy who was sent to the adult psychiatric hospital, Cherry Farm.
Photo: RNZ / Patrice Allen
Now aged 59, Toni Jarvis has given evidence to the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care s inquiry into residential state care.
Adopted at birth, Jarvis was severely physically abused by his adopted father.
Between the ages of seven and eight, he ended up fostered in various family homes before, five days after turning nine, he ended up in Cherry Farm awaiting a placement at Hokio Beach School.
Photo: RNZ / Patrice Allen
The investigation by the Royal Commission will examine abuse and neglect of children and young people in residences run by the state, and by independent organisations on behalf of the state.
This includes boys and girls social welfare and family homes, and institutions that provided combined care and protection and youth justice care.
The hearing will hear from survivors of Kohitere Boy s Training Centre, Hokio Beach School, Epuni Boys Home, Ōwairaka Boys Home, Bollard Girls Home, Whakapakiri Youth Trust (Great Barrier Island), Kingslea Girls Homes, Moerangi Treks, and also Family Homes throughout New Zealand.
Sixteen witnesses will give evidence to the Royal Commission on their experiences while in care between 1950 and 1999.
Gangland: a book about meth and the people whose lives it touches
Review
Chloe Blades spent two years working to rehabilitate men like those in Jared Savage’s Gangland: New Zealand’s Underworld of Organised Crime. She explains how the book has upended her thinking.
Gangland has the kind of title I’ve spent six years avoiding.
Books and films on gangs are too often sensationalist. Typically, we get brief intros to gang members, emphasising their role as part of a dangerous collective. We’re left fearful of those with a patch, or in a hardhat riding a Harley. We are unable to see the person behind the mask.
250k Kiwis estimated to have been abused in state and faith based care
Chair of the royal commission, Judge Coral Shaw, said the figures were deplorable.
250k Kiwis estimated to have been abused in state and faith based care Wed, 16 Dec 2020, 2:02PM
Up to 253,000 people are estimated to have been abused in care in New Zealand between 1950 and 2019, with the number of people passing through care judged to be six times higher than previously thought.
The Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care has released two research reports by consultancy agency Martin Jenkins and an internal report by the inquiry s research team.