Abuse victim to countersue ACC doctor

Photo / Alan Gibson

A sexual abuse victim says she will take legal action against a senior ACC employee who had lodged a defamation case against her over comments she made on an internet blog.

Dr Peter Jansen, a sensitive claims clinician with ACC, began legal action against the woman after she questioned his competence on her internet blog. He sought $200,000 in general damages, and an additional $50,000 in aggravated damages.

However, ACC Minister Nick Smith told Radio New Zealand this morning Dr Jansen would not be continuing with the action because the comments had been removed from her blog.

The comments were still online this morning when NZPA visited the website.

The woman, identified only as "Jax", said she had no intention of taking down the comments and was now considering countersuing Dr Jansen.

She would not say on what grounds, but said she had received several offers of legal support.

Dr Smith said the doctor's lawyers had written to the woman in December, asking for the comments to be removed from the website.

"The material was still up this week and that is what led Dr Jansen's lawyers to take action," he said.

"I spoke with Dr Jansen last night, he noted that the material had subsequently been taken down from the web, he has said that he will be withdrawing the legal action."

Dr Smith said there were two sides to the case.

"I can understand why Dr Jansen, as a well-respected and capable medical practitioner, was offended by the material that was put up on the net about him," Dr Smith said.

"He became aware of the material on the web last November, he's never wanted money from the person, all he's simply wanted is for the highly defamatory material about him personally to be taken down."

Labour MP Carmel Sepuloni raised the case in Parliament yesterday when she questioned Dr Smith about how victims of sexual abuse were treated by the organisation.

Ms Sepuloni also asked whether the minister would investigate how Dr Jansen had accessed private information about the woman to initiate legal action.

Answering on behalf of the minister, Cabinet Minister Tony Ryall said Dr Smith was always concerned about the victims of sexual abuse, and if Ms Sepuloni provided him with information about the case Dr Smith would address it.

"It is completely unacceptable if ACC staff have not been dealing with the victims of sexual abuse in a sympathetic and professional way," Mr Ryall said.

- NZPA