Cry from heart of Whakaruru family

The mother of James Whakaruru, the 4-year-old boy beaten to death by his stepfather, is daily being judged by people with no understanding of what she went through herself, says her uncle, Rangi Whakaruru.

The Commissioner for Children, Roger McClay, has damned welfare agencies for failing to protect James, who was killed by Ben Haerewa shortly before the boy's fifth birthday.

In a letter to the Herald this week, Rangi Whakaruru described the shock of learning about James' death. And he had a message for those who criticised the family for having failed to protect the boy.

"I pray dearly that the writers of the articles who apportion the blame to the parents and families of James do not suffer any similar tragedy.

"I would ask you to imagine this: 'You have been telephoned and advised that a child member of your family has been killed.

'You and members of your family gather on a miserable, rainy day outside a mortuary doorway in a hospital.'

'You cannot talk with either of the parents. The mother is being held in a refuge, being comforted and nursed through injuries, both physical and mental, that she suffered as well. The father is in jail.

'You ask permission for you and a number of select family members to see the body. You take a deep breath and the emotion builds, tears well up, the wailing begins and it gets louder as you get closer.

'The sight of the little battered body of your child is not only shocking, but frightening. You are not sure which part of the body you can touch, caress or just hold because you are left to grieve alone ...

'The family members present haltingly begin to reflect on the events of the day and those preceding, leading up to the tragedy.

'Self-recrimination and anger are the two primary emotions everyone experiences.

'All present reflect on what they should have, could have, or would have done and the overwhelming consensus was that there was no shortage of concern, caring and intervention.'

"The conclusion reached at the time and under the circumstances was that the real tragedy, aside from the act of murder, lay in the assumption that a young, vulnerable and impressionable teenager who was doing her best to survive in an abusive relationship could protect another more vulnerable life beside her own.

"This tragedy has not finished with the death of Te Rangi Whakaruru's son, James. She bears the guilt of inaction and revisits this daily.

"The release of the report by the commissioner and the intense media coverage has placed a great deal of pressure on her, the recovery process, and the extended support she is now receiving from family and friends.

"James' whanau were not absent in his short life. For me, I was late and I assumed that so much was being done for my moko and my niece.

"A similar assumption was made by others in the judicial system, social services and medical profession, resulting in not one but two victims being left totally isolated and unprotected.

"My niece bears the worst scar in our society and is judged daily by people who have no comprehension of her situation leading up to, during and immediately following the incident.

"These judgmental comments have placed the blame, resulting in Te Rangi becoming the worst type of outcast viewed by our society and she is being penalised constantly and will be throughout her lifetime.

"Haerewa will get another chance in 12 years or less if paroled. Will my niece get the same?"

Inquiries by the Weekend Herald have revealed that a cut-price Hastings medical centre that treated James nine times mistook him in its records for another child.

The Doctors, the local branch of a franchised business, treated James for several cuts on his lips, a head injury and a nose injury, as well as common childhood problems, between October 1995 and March 1997, two years before he was beaten to death.

But it recorded him in its computer system as "James Southon," another Hastings boy with the same birth date who visited the centre twice in April and July 1995.

And it never alerted the Department of Child, Youth and Family or any other authority to the possibility that James Whakaruru's injuries were being caused by child abuse, because he was seen on his nine visits by several doctors so no one doctor saw the pattern of injuries.

The centre normally employs eight doctors, although its manager, Dr Hannes Meyer, says it is "a bit less" than that at present.

Dr Meyer himself treated James Whakaruru for a runny nose in June 1996 and recorded no signs of any abuse.

"I personally would never remember him. I only saw him once and very fleetingly."