Grandmother weeps as she tells of girl's abuse

By AINSLEY THOMSON


Kiritina Edwards clung to a mental picture of her granddaughter as a healthy, active child to give her the strength to nurse the physically and emotionally abused 5-year-old back to health.

That mental image was far from the reality she faced two years ago when she rescued the little girl from a home where she had been forced to live in a kennel and suffered a life-threatening brain injury that left her in hospital.

Mrs Edwards quietly wept yesterday when she described how close she came to losing her granddaughter, who has become the centre of a political debate over the 280-hour community work sentence given to her mother, Cassandra Edwards, and her mother's partner, Bruce Potaka.

Mrs Edwards, 65, discovered the abuse when she tried to contact her son's former wife, Cassandra Edwards, so she could see her two granddaughters, then 5 and 7.

She was told Cassandra and the younger girl were away, but was able to take the older girl back to Auckland with her for a holiday.

Over the next few weeks the story of the abuse was slowly revealed. She was told her grand-daughter had been confined to a kennel and had to drink out of puddles.

Mrs Edwards contacted a lawyer and the police, who removed the child from the Taihape home.

She said she was stunned by the leniency of the couple's sentence.

"Then I got a new lease of life, and I said, 'it hasn't ended here'. Her story will be told."

Mrs Edwards contacted National MP Dr Paul Hutchison, who has pursued the case on her behalf.