Earl Campbell is awaiting sentence for kidnap, rape and sexual violation. Photo / NZ Police
Earl Campbell is awaiting sentence for kidnap, rape and sexual violation. Photo / NZ Police
A former probation officer who became the girlfriend of a “serious criminal” 32 years her junior has been sent to jail after trying to persuade his rape victim against giving evidence.
Linda Grace Kelly, 71, is a former probation officer and rehabilitation programme facilitator who was once awarded a seven-year good conduct award by the Department of Corrections. She has a master’s degree in psychology.
Kelly has also worked in a law office as a legal executive and according to her LinkedIn profile was for some months an executive secretary to former Prime Minister Sir Robert Muldoon.
The girl was sitting in the passenger seat of a van when Campbell crashed it through the Pettigrew Green Arena’s glass doors in September 2020.
According to evidence given at his High Court trial this month, Campbell took the girl to a motel the next day, when he raped, choked and violated her.
Today, the Napier District Court was told that in April 2023, after Campbell had been charged, Kelly conspired with two other people to meet the girl, who was by then 17, to persuade her to change or withdraw her evidence against him.
A van driven by Earl Campbell crashed through the doors of the Pettigrew Green Arena in Napier early on November 8, 2020.
Kelly was later charged with conspiring to pervert the course of justice for her part in the meeting, having discussed it with Campbell earlier, attended the meeting and debriefed him afterward.
Kelly, who had no previous convictions, pleaded guilty and was sent to jail for two years and five months.
The two other people involved in meeting the girl have been sentenced to home detention.
One was an associate of Campbell’s, William Horne, 49.
The third person at the meeting was a woman who cannot be named as it may lead to the identification of the victim, who has statutory name suppression.
Kelly discussed meeting the girl with Campbell in phone calls to the prison where he was on remand or when visiting him in person.
Historical figure’s name used for ‘legal adviser’
Some of the phone conversations were recorded by prison authorities, except at least one which was deemed privileged after Campbell claimed it was from his legal adviser, whom he told officers was named Eva Braun.
Despite the obviously fictitious name, the phone call was put through.
Eva Braun was the mistress of Adolf Hitler and died with him in 1945.
Kelly appeared as the “McKenzie friend”, or non-qualified courtroom assistant, to Campbell in another, previous trial.
Meeting with girl lasted about an hour
On April 24 last year, Kelly travelled from her home in Te Awamutu to Hastings to attend the meeting with the girl, who did not know she was coming.
Court documents say that over an hour the three adults exerted “emotional pressure” to dissuade the rape victim from giving evidence against Campbell at his trial.
At one point during the meeting, Kelly left the room and spoke to Campbell on the phone.
“You were putting pressure on her,” Judge Bridget Mackintosh told Kelly in court today.
She cited the “bravery” of the young woman who did not give in and gave evidence against Campbell at his trial.
Linda Kelly's LinkedIn profile says she was once a secretary for Sir Robert Muldoon. Photo / NZME
Judge Mackintosh said Kelly’s offending was “a significant and determined example of a conspiracy to pervert the course of justice” by applying pressure to a teenage rape victim.
“This kind of behaviour does require denunciation,” she said in handing down the 29-month prison sentence.
Kelly gave alibi evidence at Campbell’s trial, saying she was with him at home on the night of the ram-raid, and was with him at the motel on the night the Crown said he raped the girl there.
The trial jury did not believe her. Manning said the evidence was false.
Kelly has said the girl lied about her ordeal and was “infatuated” with Campbell.
“I have my suspicions that is what your situation is,” Judge Mackintosh told Kelly.
The judge said Kelly did not appear to be remorseful at all, although the defendant had accepted that she should not have met the girl and that this was “unprofessional”.
“It was more than that, it was criminal,” Judge Mackintosh said.
Police said outside the court that they were happy with the sentencing outcome.
“This type of offending strikes at the very heart of our justice system and was a serious attempt to dissuade a fragile and vulnerable victim of serious sexual offending,” said the officer in charge of the case, Detective Sergeant Darren Pritchard.
“This sentence denounces this type of behaviour and we are very pleased with this outcome,” Pritchard said.
Earl Campbell’s father, Ricky Campbell, has been found guilty of kidnapping, by allegedly locking the girl in a room at his house, and being an accessory to the burglary after the fact by using grinders to open the stolen ATM.
He and Earl Campbell will be sentenced on August 30.
Ric Stevens spent many years working for the former New Zealand Press Association news agency, including as a political reporter at Parliament, before holding senior positions at various daily newspapers. He joined NZME’s Open Justice team in 2022 and is based in Hawke’s Bay. His writing in the crime and justice sphere is informed by four years of front-line experience as a probation officer.
