2 June 2006

Bradford and Kiro asked to tell the truth by mother

The mother at the center of the infamous 'horse whip' case in Timaru, that the anti-smacking lobby has quoted as being a good reason to ban smacking, has written an open letter to MP Sue Bradford and Children's Commissioner Cindy Kiro.

She has called on them to tell the truth regarding the case.

In her letter, she says
"I am fed up with you deliberately misleading and misinforming the public about my case to push your own anti- social political agenda. Your comments about me are nothing short of defamatory.

You were not part of the jury, and yet you continually speak as an authority on our case as if you were party to the complete case. You were not.

How arrogant of you, who were not part of the proceedings to insist the Juries decision was wrong and state that this was a clear cut case of abuse. Clearly to the jury, it was not.

I love my son very dearly.

I have not ever attacked my son or assaulted him on any occasion and I demand a formal public apology. I insist that you desist immediately from quoting my case in any media of any form, other than to formally apologise to me, my son for the undue stress your defamatory lies have caused, the jury whose decision you have defamed, the general public and the members of the select committee for deliberately misleading them in citing our case, and intentionally lying about the "facts".

If you are heard to quote this case again you will be formally served with defamation proceedings."

Family First believes that the public of NZ needs to know the full facts of this case, (as with the Four by Two case and other similar cases), as they will then understand why this mother (and many other parents who use physical discipline) was found to be acting as any reasonable parent would in the circumstances.

ENDS

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