KEY POINTS:
A judge has asked police to disclose their grounds for charging a Christchurch woman with making a false gang-rape complaint, when he considers her application for continued name suppression on Thursday.
The woman maintains that the gang-rape did occur and entered a not guilty plea to the false complaint charge in Christchurch District Court today.
She also denied having a knife in her possession at Christchurch Central Police Station a month after the allegation of rape arising from an incident that began at Corsair Bay.
Police had asked for public help to get any photographs that were taken at the bay on November 16 when the rape inquiry began.
By December, four 17-year-olds had been charged with stealing a range of items from the woman.
They have pleaded guilty and mostly been remanded for the diversion scheme which allows first offenders to avoid a conviction.
The woman's defence counsel, Michael Starling, today handed up to Judge David Saunders a report by the woman's own doctor and asked that the interim name suppression order be continued.
He said the woman maintained that she had been raped and could not understand why police had now charged her and had discontinued the rape inquiry against the four teenagers.
Judge Saunders asked police for their reasons for the charge, but the full police file was not at court.
He has set the name suppression hearing down for Thursday morning when police will have the full file.
The judge said he would expect police to explain on that day why these charges were now before the court.
The charges against the woman have then been set for a status hearing on March 9.
These hearings take place before cases are sent for hearing of evidence before a judge-alone.
- NZPA
