With regret, Robinson discharges his painful duty

It was as if he was announcing a death in the family.

"It is with regret and disappointment that I must advise the public of New Zealand ... ", Commissioner Rob Robinson began ... that hundreds of his staff had been caught with pornography.

Once again - could it get any worse - his force was embroiled in a scandal.

The latest blow to morale and the police's public image was dealt by the astounding revelation that police computers were loaded with thousands of sexually explicit images.

They were messages opened, stored and sent on for others to look at - more than once. They were of explicit sex acts, and showed genitalia.

Not surprisingly, Ross Robinson was grim.

He entered a room filled with media. But it was his fellow police and civilian staff who gave away the gravity of the day.

They were glum, disbelieving, eyes cast down, saying nothing as they waited for Mr Robinson and his assistant commissioners to arrive.

Standing behind a lectern, he tried to be positive. The police had found the problem, as part of an internal review of police culture, and they were dealing with it.

There would be no shirking of individual accountability, and no excuses.

The behaviour of those who spread the pornography was abhorrent and some might face charges.

It was distressing, he said, to the large number of police who had dedicated large chunks of their lives to serving the community to know that some among them had not acted with professionalism and integrity.

He was there as much for the 9600 staff who had done nothing wrong, as for the 327 who were to be investigated.

He hoped they could get on with the job, reapply themselves as they had had to do while scandal and controversy rocked the force.

"In the minds of some people in the community, unfortunately our reputation is dented."

He didn't offer the assorted media a last question. When it seemed there was simply nothing more he could say, he turned and left.