Murdered girls' mother prepares to sue CYF

By JAMES GARDINER

The mother of Masterton murder victims Saliel and Olympia Aplin plans to sue the Government department that failed her daughters.

Charlene Aplin is also returning the letter of apology Child, Youth and Family sent her this week. Its own inquiry found its staff did not do their jobs properly and committed serious policy breaches.

Mrs Aplin went into hiding this week before the reports criticising the agency's handling of her daughters were made public.

She did so on legal advice that she should not comment before filing civil proceedings.

Marlene Gaskin, the social worker who dealt with Saliel, 12, and Olympia, 11, has also gone to ground.

Mrs Gaskin and her supervisor, Piri Tetau, were disciplined by their employer, although CYF refuses to say what action it took, and both have resigned.

Mr Tetau left some time ago and now works for the Rangitane tribal organisation in Masterton.

A Rangitane spokeswoman, Lisa Mulitalo, said he was consulting his family and marae elders about whether he could speak publicly.

"You have to understand he's had a tough time and this report coming out has been very painful," Ms Mulitalo said.

Mrs Gaskin, who wrote the letter to Charlene which Howse opened before killing the girls, is believed to have left the Wairarapa.

The letter requested an urgent meeting to discuss "new information" in relation to Olympia.

A woman at Mrs Gaskin's former home in Carterton refused to say how to contact her.

Masterton Mayor Bob Francis said too much blame had been heaped on the two CYF staff in the reports released this week by Children's Commissioner Cindy Kiro and the department's internal inquiry.

Mr Francis said not enough attention had been paid to the fact that CYF removed a senior manager from its Masterton office early in 2001, before the girls were murdered in their home by stepfather Bruce Howse.

Mr Francis said he wrote to the CYF chief executive, Jackie Brown, to express his concern about the removal of the manager and the fact that the overseeing of the office was going to be done from Wellington.

"It's interesting that since that case and following further discussions, they have now put a more senior manager here," he said.

Mr Francis also felt other members of the girls' extended family had been "let off lightly" in both reports.

"There was wider knowledge of what was going on. These reports in the media are certainly attaching blame but I don't think the blame lies entirely with Child Youth and Family.

"The extended family and the community, neighbours, I think everyone's got a responsibility."

The victims' grandfather, Alan Aplin, said the two CYF workers had been made "scapegoats" for a failure in the department's systems but he did not accept his family should be blamed.

"You can only do so much."

Mr Aplin said the Family Court ruled that the girls, who had been in his custody, should be returned to their mother and her de facto husband, Howse.

Whenever he went near the home Howse would become upset and he stayed away to keep the peace rather than have Howse take it out on Charlene and her children.

He said at one stage Howse accused him of molesting his granddaughters and he insisted that they immediately see a doctor who, he said, found no evidence of that.

Mr Aplin confirmed the letter of apology was to be returned because Charlene felt it was "worth nothing".

Opposition social services spokeswoman Katherine Rich said that while bad errors were made by the department and Charlene Aplin was entitled to got to court, "she's also going have to deal with Child Youth and Family coming back and arguing her role, the role of the family and the role of every other person who let those girls live in such a violent environment".