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We watched them in fascination, those Rickards/Schollum/Shipton women. Wearing their best summer clothes and bravest faces, they appeared immaculately made-up, heads held high, smiling at the not guilty verdicts before a barrage of TV and newspaper cameras.
Not for them a protective hand held over the lens or a furtive exit through a back door. They were there to show the world that they loved the men in their lives, that despite the hours of gruelling evidence which revealed sordid details of group sex and infidelity, they were standing firm. The message to the outside world was "We don't believe our men are capable of such crimes".
While the man cleared of all rape charges, Clint Rickards, and his partner Tania Eden stood outside the Auckland High Court surrounded by the media 10 days ago, Caron Schollum and Sharon Shipton watched as their husbands, Bob Schollum and Brad Shipton, disappeared once again, back to Mt Eden Prison, where they are being kept in segregation for the kidnap and rape of a young woman at Mt Maunganui in 1989.
Home alone, too, is Joanne Percy, long-term partner of Mt Maunganui businessman Peter McNamara, who received seven years jail for the Mt Maunganui incident. Percy has recently given birth to a son, a brother to Percy and McNamara's four-year-old son, after sperm was taken from Rimutaka Prison by a prison doctor.
After the birth, Percy put out a statement saying the couple remained committed to each other and their children and that McNamara "will always be the love of my life".
Experts say the loneliness and pressure on a woman left behind when a partner or husband is jailed, particularly for a crime that society abhors, can put an unrelenting strain on a relationship. While many women stand strong through the trial period, cracks start to appear once the years of being on their own set in.
For some, the burden of remaining positive in the face of hostility can be intolerably lonely. Many women, believing their husbands innocent, have no choice but to carry on.
Pretheeva Fernando, wife of disgraced New Plymouth doctor Hiran Fernando, answers her phone confidently, announcing her name in a soft, friendly tone. She does not sound like a woman wanting to hide from the shame of a husband jailed for indecently assaulting 10 young female patients, between 1981 and 2002.
On the day Fernando was sentenced to three years and two months in jail in October last year, and was ordered to pay a total of $29,000 in reparation to the victims, Pretheeva Fernando told media outside the court that she and her family believed he was innocent and would continue to support him. "We love him, we will stand strong."
This, despite hearing evidence from the victims about how the doctor's abuse had affected them. And during the sentencing, Justice John Priestley made his views clear.
"All of your victims were young, some pregnant and vulnerable and some young shy Roman Catholic girls," he said. " You succumbed to temptation to have a fiddle around."
But last week Pretheeva Fernando blamed the media for her husband's predicament. "There is a lot more to this than seems to meet the eye. The press has completely been against us all along. We don't believe he is guilty but the press believes otherwise."
For Fernando, it is a solitary wait. Her three daughters are adults and have left home. She sees her husband "when I am allowed to see him". But she does not want people's pity.
"It's quite easy for people to say 'OK, the poor woman, he's done this crime, and now she's on her own' but that's not how it is."
The list of men indulging in seedy, sordid or simply eyebrow-raising behaviour gets longer every year, and more often than not there's a long-suffering wife or partner hurting in the background.
High-profile equestrian Mark Todd caused embarrassment when in 2000 the Sunday Mirror accused him of being secretly gay and a cocaine user. The paper ran grainy pictures of Todd allegedly snorting cocaine with another man. Todd's wife Carolyn never faltered in her support, even when Todd appeared on Holmes and refused to specifically deny the allegations. The two are still together.
Convicted of sex crimes was Bert Potter, the Centrepoint leader jailed for drug offences in 1990 and then in 1992, when he was charged with indecently assaulting five minors, including victims as young three.
Morgan Fahey, a doctor and former deputy mayor of Christchurch, was jailed in 2000 for rape, sexual violation and indecent assault involving 11 female patients over a 30-year period. Christian Heritage Party leader and father of 10 Graeme Capill was jailed for nine years after pleading guilty to sexually abusing young girls. In all cases, the women in their lives elected not to walk away.
Massey University clinical psychologist Mei Wah Williams says there are many reasons why women stay, including fear of being on their own, neediness or the women genuinely loving their partner.
"In the media we often only see the bad things they have done.These women have probably seen a whole range of other sides of this person."
In cases where women maintained their partner's innocence in the face of overwhelming evidence, psychologists refer to the "cognitive dissonance" theory, a type of protective mechanism people use to set aside or discount information that is too hard to deal with or accept. "We can discount information that doesn't fit with our beliefs and value systems, if it doesn't fit in with the image of their husband as a kind, caring person."
For some women, the need to be needed and loved was so overwhelmingly strong they overlooked bad behaviour.
While some women wait for the man they love to come home and take up where life left off, others never had a life together in the first place.
Coral Branch, a Rotorua mother of four, fell for double murderer Scott Watson after he was imprisoned for the murders of Ben Smart and Olivia Hope who disappeared after a 1998 New Year's Eve party at Furneaux Lodge in the Marlborough Sounds.
They have never known a normal married life and Branch has endured humiliating behaviour on the part of her husband. Two years ago he was busted for using a cellphone to send explicit photos and flirting through texts, and having another relationship with a female prison visitor.
A New Zealand woman, who does not want to be identified, began a relationship with a man in prison for a serious crime 10 years ago. For five intense years it became a large part of her life. The relationship alienated her from friends and weekend visits to the prison became her social life; phone conversations were her lifeline.
To survive, some inmates developed the ability to project their personalities and were always on best behaviour during visits. Her observations are echoed by Williams who has worked in prisons in Manawatu. "The only female contact prisoners might have are nurses, other prison officers or a psychologist. Having someone who comes to visit and writes to them can develop into a very special relationship. When that person comes to visit, you are going to show the best side of yourself."
Many prisoners had good interpersonal skills and could be charming.
"Having someone come to visit you is very special. And the woman can feel quite charmed. The prisoner might have a violent or abusive background but there is no sign of it."
Williams says that for some women a relationship with a prisoner is ideal.
"There are no demands but you get to know this person very well, quite intimately but not in a sexual way. There are no sexual demands; you don't have to clean up after them or fight about who cleans the toilet. So you can see why that relationship might carry on for quite a long time."
Two years ago Timaru woman Frances More married killer Richard Greist in a psychiatric hospital in Pennsylvania. The man she loves has spent 29 years in a hospital after stabbing and strangling his pregnant wife and cutting out their eight-month-old foetus from her. He also attacked his six-year-old daughter, and beat his 71-year-old grandmother.
More and Greist, both Jehovah's Witnesses, met on the internet three years ago. More has rented out her house in Timaru and has moved to the United States to be near Greist.
The couple take Bible classes at the hospital and More believes her husband would never harm her. She told the Timaru Herald last month that from the moment she met Greist, she knew he was the man for her. "I trust him completely and know he would never strike me."
Peter Adams, associate professor at Auckland University School of Population Health, is looking at the effect romantic myths have on young women as they begin relationships.
Bombarded from a young age by fairytales, love stories, songs and movies, Williams is concerned women are being convinced that love conquers all. Even in the face of violent or controlling behaviour, women believed unconditional love would be enough to bring about change. "If you love a person enough, bad boy becomes a good boy. The frog turns into a prince."
