Networked Knowledge - Media Report

Channel 7 Today Tonight Adelaide - Handling of child abuse cases involving Wards of the State

Wednesday, 19 December 2007

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Ki  Meekin child abuse victim
Rosanna Mangiarelli; Presenter
Graham Archer; reporter

Rosanna Mangiarelli: Well, once the prince of children’s television, Rick Marshall has played many roles in his life but he exits the stage in disgrace as a convicted paedophile. It was on this program almost five years ago that Ki  Meekin stood up to be counted as one of Marshall’s victims, but even so, the Department responsible for allowing him to be preyed upon doesn’t seem to have learnt much from its own experiences. Graham Archer with more.

Ki Meekin: It’s very difficult for me to speak out when other past young men, like myself, who have been victims of the family, have spoken out and they have ended up in body bags, or thrown in the Torrens, or shark bait.

Graham Archer: When former Adelaide TV presenter Rick Marshall, AKA, Mr McQurik [phonetic], the phoney school teacher, bogus priest, swindler and now a paedophile, faced court some months ago, no one could have been happier than Ki  Meekin.

Ki Meekin: Absolutely over the moon. Over the moon, enough to go and get absolutely drunk and celebrate for the first time in my life, that the fact that this person had actually been charged.

Graham Archer: Ki’s courage led to the Today Tonight series we called, The Takeaway Children, exposing the systematic abuse of children in State care so vehemently denied by successive State Governments.

Ki meekin: I didn’t turn to drink, I didn’t turn to drugs. They didn’t break me, but I’m doing this solely for those that they did break.

Graham Archer: Ki had spent eight years battling the Government in court over his abuse at the hands of Marshall and others while he was a Ward of the State as an eight year old.

Ki Meekin: I knew of at least 20 boys, at least, with at least another 10 girls from other institutions, that had been out with deviants, who had no police record, who were squeaKi  clean, and had come back, and had been raped and abused. Nothing was done about them and it kept continuing.

Graham Archer: The State Government knew Ki’s case was dynamite and when they couldn’t wear him down with their legal might they preferred a confidential settlement to stop the public getting wind of what had been going on.

Ki Meekin: The Crown wanted me to give up. I did not want to give up because I wanted the Crown to admit to what had been done to me.

Graham Archer: That didn’t stop Ki and it was his preparedness to speak out that contributed significantly to the establishment of the Mullighan Inquiry into the abuse of children in State care. At the time, Today Tonight outed Rick Marshall as one of Ki’s tormentors.

Replay Of Former Today Tonight Program

Ki Meekin: There would be a voice, on the right hand side when you walked in, they could choose any of those boys that they wanted, and then the person at the end with the keys would take some money off them and then they would go upstairs and they would have sexual relations with any young boy that they pleased.

Reporter: How young were these kids?

Ki Meekin: These kids would have ranged from the ages of 10 through to 16.

Reporter: Shortly after that Ki was approached by another man who he also can name about travelling interstate.

Ki Meekin: He said to me that he knows a man who is world famous, who lives up on the Gold Coast, and would only be too willing to have me as a guest for the weekend.

Reporter: Despite still being in State care that weekend turned into a three month ordeal as Ki says he was drugged and raped by the pair almost daily.

Ki Meekin: Rick Marshall would rape me first and then Peter Leith would go seconds.

Reporter: When we contacted Marshall and Leith they both denied all allegations and then issued a firm no comment. But it’s clear Marshall had Ki in Queensland, he even enrolled the Ward of the State in the local Catholic school and his name appears in the program of a musical in which Rick Marshall was performing. And then there’s this photo, which was removed by police, from Marshall’s house. That’s Marshall and Ki  in Queensland wearing matching safari suits inspired by one of the entertainer’s very influential friends.

Ki Meekin: He actually arranged for Don Dunstan’s tailor to tailor-make a blue safari suit for me and Rick to wear when we were going out on our theatre outings.

Reporter: Eventually Ki ran away and contacted Queensland police who arranged for South Australian authorities to retrieve him. But back in Adelaide Ki was told to keep quiet about the whole affair.

Ki Meekin: He then said to me the same day that I was going to be moved from Coomanka [phonetic] if I didn’t behave myself. And - and forget whatever lies that I’d told, whatever stories I had in my brain, they had to go.

Graham Archer: We understand it was our expose which brought forward other victims leading eventually to charges being laid against Marshall. Marshall, and accomplished actor, outdid his friend Don Dunstan’s pyjama clad press conference by turning up to court via ambulance on a barouche in an attempt to stall the legal proceedings.

Ki Meekin: It seemed to me that his sicknesses seemed to be exacerbated by the continuance of his court appearances.

Graham Archer: Judge Dean Clayton wasn’t impressed and he convicted Marshall of his sexual crimes. However, yesterday Marshall was sentenced to six and a half years at home, not penalty enough according to Ki.

Ki Meekin: My first reaction was of extreme anger that there was no jail term out of this, but my second reaction after thinking about this seriously is at least we got this person convicted as a sexual child offender. And in that sense to me a win is a win, he’s had his credibility absolutely shattered for the rest of his life in South Australia.

Graham Archer: But some things don’t appear to change. When Ki recently raised the question of why staff involved in his case were still employed by the Department of Families and Communities, he received the brush off.

Ki Meekin: Well the letter described to me, from Sue Vardon, that no one on the Department’s behalf had actually been responsible for any negligence that could be used in a court of law against any of their staff members.

Graham Archer: But Marshall has just been convicted as a paedophile.

Ki Meekin: Precisely.

Graham Archer: And it was into his hands that you were allowed to fall as a young child.

Ki Meekin: Extremely correct.

Graham Archer: And how could they be so certain? Because they excluded from the review Ki ’s entire case against the Department, citing the settlement as the reason for this exemption. But that was just a commercial settlement, it shouldn’t protect them, surely, against potential charges of negligence?

Ki Meekin: That’s exactly right.

Graham Archer: But it has, according to them?

Ki Meekin: According to them it gives them an ultimate, how should I say, immunity from any prosecution.

Graham Archer: So the same old culture of keeping a lid on things seems to have survived, but Ki is not deterred.

Ki Meekin: They can keep on denying what they are denying but I know the truth and that’s why I’m here, Graham.

Rosanna Mangiarelli: Graham Archer with that report.

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