Warning: This report and the video above contains distressing content.
“Insulting”.
That's how a survivor of sexual abuse by describes a court outcome, which let her attacker out of jail.
Jody Hughes has chosen to have her name suppression lifted and has shared her story on camera for the first time in an interview with 1 NEWS.
Ms Hughes was indecently assaulted by Olympic gold medallist Arthur Parkin on two occasions, when she was aged 11 and 12.
“He pulled me across and made me sit on his right thigh and he held onto my wrist, and he made me stroke his penis multiple times, while he was reading the paper,” she recalled.
The Blenheim woman thought she had justice when he was jailed in May this year.
“It felt like the loop had been closed. It was done,” she explained.
Two other women also claimed they'd been assaulted by Parkin, but those complaints weren’t upheld.
He was sentenced to one year, eight months in prison on the Jody Hughes convictions, but this was reduced on appeal.
“To have it turned over was insulting. Really, really insulting,” Ms Hughes said.
After just four and a half months behind bars, Parkin was placed on home detention and given 400 hours community service.
The court credited his "good character, over a long period of time".
“Maybe he has been a man of good character for 37 years. But where was that good character when I was an 11 year old child?” asked Ms Hughes.
It also stated "any sexual offending against a child is serious, but this was relatively fleeting and isolated”.
“How dare they? What is it about that that is fleeting? Just because it happened once?” Ms Hughes queried.
Wellington Sexual Abuse HELP Foundation says the outcome sends “a really bad message out to survivors that if you see your day in court, somewhere along the line, your experience is going to be minimised”.
“There is a cultural element in New Zealand of, ‘something happened a long time ago, someone should have got over it by now’, but the reality of trauma is that it stays with you until its resolved”.
Parkin denies Ms Hughes' version of events.
Hall of Fame
The New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame board considered the case of Arthur Parkin when it met in Dunedin earlier this month.
Parkin was part of the 1976 Men’s Hockey Team inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1990.
In a statement to 1 NEWS, the board said it looked at whether Parkin was a “fit person” to continue to be associated with the honour.
It decided that because he was inducted as part of a team and not as an individual, the board “could not change the historical fact that Parkin won a gold medal as a member of the team”.
Work underway
Auckland Sexual Abuse HELP Foundation has been funded for 12 months to provide a pilot programme that supports sexual violence survivors through the criminal justice system.
Chief Executive Kathryn Phillips says its received “really good feedback, both from the Crown, survivors and police” and hopes its success will lead to the service being rolled out across the country.
But the charity is still calling for radical reforms raised by the Law Commission in a 2012 paper to bring ‘balance to the justice system’.
If you need support
Call 0800 842 846 or visit the Victim Support website for organisations that can help.
The Harbour - a New Zealand-based website for people affected by sexual abuse or offending, their families and whanau.
24/7 helplines
Auckland HELP - 09 623 1700
Rape Prevention Education
Wellington HELP - 04 801 6655, push 0
Male Survivors of Sexual Abuse - 0800 044 334
Women's Refuge - 0800 REFUGE 0800 733 843
Shakti - providing specialist cultural services for African, Asian and Middle Eastern women and their children - 0800 742 584
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