Airwoman’s joy at compo chance
A woman who was groped and locked in a cage by her Air Force boss has been given another chance at compensation.
The Court of Appeal yesterday overturned parts of a 2018 High Court decision that found former airwoman Mariya Taylor had run out of time to ask for damages from the Crown, despite proving she had been abused for years.
The High Court decision demanded Taylor pay jailed child rapist Robert ‘‘Groper’’ Roper almost $28,000 to cover his legal costs.
The Crown, acting for the NZDF, also asked Taylor to pay more than $100,000 costs. But after reading a Stuff investigation in 2018, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told the NZDF to drop its claim.
The Court of Appeal has ordered the Crown to pay the cost of Taylor’s appeal.
Taylor will no longer have to pay Robert Roper’s costs, and a new decision on costs will be considered by the High Court.
At her home on Australia’s Gold Coast, Taylor said she was overcome with emotion when the decision came through yesterday.
‘‘I’ve been crying with joy. It’s just a weight off my shoulders.’’
Taylor said the five-year fight had been painful for her and her family.
‘‘The courts should be for everyone, including the vulnerable, and not just the wealthy. My case was classic example of a power imbalance, and having to make those financial decisions along the way to keep going – that made me feel (even more) like a victim.’’
She said her family could now move on ‘‘without this hanging over our heads’’.
Yesterday’s decision also said High Court Justice Rebecca Edwards was wrong to determine ACC laws meant Taylor was not eligible to ask the court for damages for being falsely imprisoned.
In the High Court case, Justice Edwards found Mariya Taylor did suffer humiliating sexual harassment and abuse at the hands of Roper in the 1980s. Taylor was a young airwoman assigned to the transport division at Hobsonville/ Whenuapai Air Base at the time.
Roper would demand she drive him home from the noncommissioned officer’s mess and grope her in the car; he threatened to sack her if she told anyone. He also prodded her backside with an iron bar and locked her in a cage in the tyre bay on base on multiple occasions.
After three years of abuse, she dropped her dreams of an Air Force career and fled overseas.
Throughout the court action, Taylor insisted she repeatedly told senior officers about Roper’s treatment of her and others and nothing was done.
But the NZDF, which spent $600,000 fighting Taylor in court, argued she had run out of time to ask for compensation under New Zealand laws.
During the High Court case in 2018, the NZDF also claimed Taylor was not suffering from mental
‘‘I’ve been crying with joy. It’s just a weight off my shoulders.’’
Mariya Taylor
trauma that prevented her from bringing her case earlier.
Taylor says she did suffer severe trauma from the abuse and tried to bury it, but a headline in 2014 brought it all back; Roper had been convicted and sentenced to 13 years jail for the rape and sexual abuse of his two daughters, and others.
She said as he was already behind bars, she opted to sue the Crown for doing nothing about Roper, despite knowing about his behaviour.
Her High Court suit asked for $600,000 compensation for loss of earnings, medical and legal costs.
Taylor’s lawyer, Graeme Little, said yesterday’s decision ‘‘opened the road to compensatory damages (for) emotional pain and loss of enjoyment of life’’ along with the damage to what could have been a long career in the air force.