Girl tells of forced flight to Perth

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32406, 19 September 1970, Page 20

Girl tells of forced flight to Perth

(N.Z Press Association—Copyright) PERTH, September 16. A 15-year-old girl from Auckland told police her mother had made her fly to Perth to live with a 49-year-old man, the Perth Children’s Court heard today.

The man had taken her to live in a caravan at one time and had tried to have sex with her on several occasions, she told the police. She was the subject of an application by the Women Police to have her declared neglected. Policewoman Miss F. Murray, said that last week she interviewed the girl, who had been living at Armadale, an outer Perth suburb, with a man aged 49. The man was a friend of the family who lived in Auckland, said Miss Murray. In an interview, the girl had said that she got on all right with her mother but her father drank. When she was two he had beaten her and left her outside for two nights. On July 9 this year she had flown to Perth to live with the family friend. She had not wanted to leave home but her mother told her she was going and that her fare had already been paid by the man. The man had met her at the airport and they stayed for four nights at a hotel in separate rooms. The man lived by himself in the Armadale house, where they had separate rooms, but he would get mad when she refused to have sex with him. She said she wanted to go home to New Zealand. The girl had nothing to say in court. The Magistrate told her he

was very concerned about a 15-year-old girl being in Australia under such circumstances. In view of what he had been told her wish to be returned to New Zealand would be treated very cautiously indeed. After reading a Child Welfare Division report from New Zealand he said he would agree to her returning only if it was to be under the jurisdiction of the division.

He committed her to the care of the West Australian Child Welfare Department.