Inquisition 21
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A country by country report on the progress of the sex abuse Inquisition
Bart Lauwaert tells his own story
Shocking verdict results in freeing one man
In a dramatic day on Friday, June 09, 2006, Clint Betterridge was set free in Australia immediately after the Australian government heard the disgraceful news of how his appeal and that of Bart Lauwaert had gone in Cambodia.
This is how the appeal went.
Part 1 of both men’s appeal was heard on June 1 2006, and appeared to go very well for both Clint Betterridge and Bart Lauwaert, as all the girls who had formerly accused them stood firm, and stated that they had been coerced into giving false evidence by the CWCC. The most serious of three charges against Bart appeared to have been were struck out by the judge.
We expected that the judge would give a verdict based on the recantations made by the girls, and that Bart would be freed because of the remaining less serious charge and his time already served, and that, hopefully, the Australian government would then also free Clint who was accused by the same girls, and convicted in Cambodia after he managed to flee home to Australia, only to be locked up there pending his extradition back to Cambodia. To our horror on June 9, despite the girl’s new testimony made at great risk to them, the judge reaffirmed the savage 20 year sentences on both men.
What happened in the days between the first stage of the appeal hearing and the delivery of this verdict?
We will soon publish the significant events, such as the police and the CWCC invading the villages of the families of the girls and how they re-arrested and re-grilled some of them, and how the judge threatened them with imprisonment because they stood their ground against the CWCC.
The CWCC response to the verdict was swift. It accused the men's helpers of bribing the girls and implied that all had criminal intentions towards the girls. If five women from countries outside Cambodia were not involved in the campaign to free the men and to support the girls, other accusations, the kind they level at men, would also have been issued by the CWCC. They came close to branding all the campaigners supporting the men and the girls as child abusers, which would be amusing coming from them were it not so serious.
For the hour or so after the shocking verdict, the CWCC crowed, even, wickedly, writing to Bart's mother.
Then the pyrrhic nature of their victory transpired as the Australian government, apparently sickened by such obvious injustice, immediately released Clint Betterridge and quashed his extradition order.
See original stories below.
Please help these girls!
These Cambodian girls are now in great danger from the organization they are criticizing – the CWCC, which is headed up by a US woman and funded by the US Republican party. We are asking anyone who cares to first look at their picture, and especially at their faces, and then take time to read both the related story and their statements, which we have translated from Khmer. Also see the statement signed with thumb marks from 100 villagers. In particular read the translated interview which we have on tape also – it is in image form with the pictures (Link below).
The importance of this case goes away beyond the three men still in prison because of the false testimonies these girls were bullied into making, and even beyond the lives of these poor brave girls. Two men (Betterridge and Lauwaert) were originally accused by these girls. The reason that Lauwaert only is on their banner is that he is the only one of those two still in prison in Cambodia. The Australian government, which also supports the CWCC, put Betterridge in prison. A different group of girls were involved with the CWCC in the case against Cleghorn. They also retracted. Now we have heard the alarming news that the Cleghorn girls have been put back under ‘the protection’ of the CWCC. This greatly increases the danger for the Lauwaert girls shown here in our photograph. With the support of US Republican Party funds, new pressures, including threats and more bribes, are being brought to bear on both these girls and their families. Also under threat are the few people attempting to write about what is going on here. At risk are both free speech in the West and the kind of journalism that exposes fraud and corruption. This web site is edited from Ireland, but even here we are experiencing uncomfortable interference from the US authorities, especially with email between us and concerned US citizens.
This is what we are asking you to do. Please copy the picture of the girls and disseminate it as widely as possible, because attempts are now underway to suppress its further publication. Copy the story also, in particular the interview, and as many of the documents as you can and distribute them widely too.
The translated interview with some of the girls and one mother can be read in image form HERE.
Next below is the appeal from the 100 villagers. Their thumb signed statement can be seen with the girls’ translated interviews above.
KINGDOM OF CAMBODIA
NATION RELIGION KING
Siem Reap, 10th October 2004
P E T I T I O N TO THE G O V E R N M E N T
WE, THE PEOPLES OF CAMBODIA BY OUR THUMB PRINT, ASK OUR GOVERNMENT TO HELP THE AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL
MISTER BART '' LUCKY '' LAUWAERT
TO BE FREED OUT FROM THE JAIL IN SIEM REAP PROVINCE. HE IS NOT GUILTY. HE IS A GOOD PERSON WHO HELPS THE POOR PEOPLES. HE NEVER BROKEN THE LAW IN CAMBODIA.
SEND BY; KUUN SAVY, BANTEAY CHAS VILLAGE, SLOR KRAM COMMUNE, SIEM REAP
PETITION AS ATTACHMENTS
To see all the statements in image form click on the link above
From inside Siem Reap Prison
By Bart Lauwaert
After my marriage broke up in Australia, I decided to travel to Cambodia on the recommendation of my brother who had previously been living there.
Since my youth I have had an interest in Eastern philosophy and religion and was told that Cambodia was a good place to study Buddhism and meditation. On arrival in Phnom Penh in August 1994, I stayed at a Buddhist monastery in Phnom Penh for three months to study the Buddhist scriptures and to learn meditation and study the Pali language. Upon leaving the monastery, I found a job as an English instructor and spent the next five years teaching English to thousands of Cambodians, many of them for free. In early 2000, I moved to Siem Reap to be nearer to the Angkor Wat Temples (spiritual heart of Cambodia and an excellent place for meditation) and here I continued my quest for enlightenment.
One of the main teachings of the Buddha is to show compassion to fellow human beings, and so, when I had moved in to a large rundown villa and was approached by a poor Khmer family and asked to help with their children’s education and welfare, I happily obliged by offering them free language and cooking classes in exchange for them doing odd jobs around my house, including weeding the huge overgrown garden, washing clothes and shopping at the market. I also gave the two girls (fourteen and fifteen years of age) and their older brother (eighteen) a monthly allowance, and when the Cambodian Women's Crisis Centre (CWCC) heard that a new foreigner had moved into their neighbourhood and had employed some of the local youths, they become suspicious and started watching my house.
One day Noun Kep, the CWCC's director, actually came to my house and after introducing herself told me that her organization was looking for larger premises and asked if I'd be willing to move as my house would be perfect as a new safe house for them. When I told her I had no intention of moving, she then asked for my landlord's phone number and when I refused she became infuriated and said she would get me for this. (Shortly after this, the house was sold and turned in to a church.) Around this period, I was teaching at a reputable college in Siem Reap and one afternoon while I was standing outside the school gate talking to a high ranking police officer, by the name of Soun Sen, who was one of my students at the time, we were approached by two teenaged girls who were on the verge of tears and asked us for help. They told us that they had run away from the CWCC safe house where they had been held against their will for over a year. They claimed that they had been beaten and abused during this period at the safe house. They showed us their bruises and they also looked under-nourished, so out of compassion. I handed them $5. My student, the police officer, then asked me if I wanted to file a complaint against the CWCC. I declined, but on the following day I went to the CWCC Centre and accused Kep Nuon of child abuse. I reminded her that the CWCC was receiving funding from Australia and that, unless she and her staff stopped abusing the very people they were being paid to protect, I would lodge a formal complaint with my embassy. She was furious and evicted me from the premises.
Shortly afterwards, I met an Australian by the name of Clinton Betteridge and helped him obtain a teaching position at my school. Clinton then invited me to share his house with him. I accepted and brought my two helpers and their brother along and they continued doing add jobs around the house. The two girls and their brother were still living at their parent's house and only worked at my new place a few hours daily and never after dark. As I was teaching full time at this stage (from 6 AM until 9:30 PM), I was rarely at home to supervise them.
Clint, as he is known, was also out of the house most of the time and neither of us has any idea what went on in the house while we were out. Clint was, at this stage, waiting for a large insurance claim to be paid out to him from Australia and this was no secret around town. I believe now that when the CWCC found out about this (through the school), they started tapping both Clint's and my phone and put both of us under surveillance. I soon moved out of Clint's house because we didn't get along too well due to our different characters.
Both Clint and I then changed our helpers as our original ones had become unreliable and some of our possessions had gone missing while we were at work. I would like to state here that it is perfectly normal and acceptable in Asia (a cultural tradition) to have young people provide help around the house. (similar to the West where teenagers are employed to do paper rounds, mow lawns or paint fences after school to make extra pocket money). Several months later, on the exact day that Clinton's insurance money was due to arrive and our salaries were to be paid, I was arrested on my way to school. I spent the first night in custody at the police station and was told that the CWCC had filed a complaint against me. I rang Clint and asked him to cancel my classes and collect my salary on my behalf. I did not mention his insurance money over the phone. The following day, I was dragged in front of the investigating judge at the court who informed me that the CWCC had demanded my arrest and had taken my two helpers into custody. He then asked me if I had ever had sexual relations with these two teenagers and I denied the allegations. He then said: “Kep Noun of the CWCC says you did.” Then he asked me if I had any insurance money coming from Australia. When I told him I had no idea what he was talking about, he asked me if I knew a certain Clint Betteridge.
I told him Clint was a colleague of mine at the school. When the interrogation was finished, the judge told his officers to take me to the prison, and on my way out of his office I heard him shout: “Now go get the other one!” (Clint).
When Clint was brought in, he was told by the judge that I had made a full confession and that I had accused him of having had sexual relations with my helpers. (This of course must be one of the oldest police tricks in the book.) He was then also brought to the prison, at which point he appears to have blamed me (unjustly) for his arrest. During a later interrogation at the prison, Clinton was told that if he signed false statements against me and paid a large sum of money to the court he would be free to go. I understand that Clint, still believing I had accused him first, may have made statements (which however were made without a lawyer present and under duress). The judge expected me to do the some against Clint, but I refused. I was then told to pay $70,000 to the judge or be guaranteed maximum sentence and ‘many (fake) witnesses’ against me. I refused, telling the judge once again that I was totally innocent and would therefore not pay.
The judge then, in cooperation with the CWCC, started fabricating ever more false evidence. Unknown to me at this time, neither the judge nor the court ever had any intention to allow us a proper defence or fair trial. Even with Clint they would have taken all his insurance money and still convicted him. The real reason for this scheme was to obtain extra funding from the Australian government (through AusAid) and we are talking millions of dollars here.
I would hereby also like to state that because of a personal dispute with the investigating judge (I flushed a piece of fabricated evidence down the lavatory in the courthouse (for which I was not charged - due to the fact that it was indeed, ‘fabricated’ evidence). This however infuriated the judge and the prosecutor to such an extent that they promised to bury me alive (36 years in prison = death sentence), which indeed they have.
A few facts about my case.
1. I was never ‘caught in the act’ (because of course there was no act)
2. After months of surveillance, no evidence of any illegal activities was discovered (no photographic evidence or other). Precisely for this reason my two helpers were internally kidnapped by the police and CWCC on the street in front of my house.
3. I have no criminal record and no complaints were ever filed against me until the CWCC forced and coerced (fake) witnesses to do so (offering huge bribes).
4. There was no forensic evidence.
5. All the complainants at the trial made pre-rehearsed testimonies, which had been memorized by rote during the complainants six month pre-trial detention at the CWCC Centre (which they have now admitted to in their open letter to Prime Minister Hun Sen).
6. The complainants have now publicly retracted.
I have now been waiting for my trial for more than two years, though there is plenty of evidence to prove my innocence and obtain an acquittal, The complainants in my case have written an open letter to His Excellency Prime Minister Hun Sen, stating my innocence and asking for my immediate release. These witnesses are ready to testify on my behalf in court.
Both I and Clint are innocent and there is plenty of evidence to prove this.
WHY ARE WE STILL IN JAIL?
Note: I have asked my lawyer to file a lawsuit against the CWCC.
Editor. Bart’s story should be read in conjunction with both Clint Betteridge’s and Graham Cleghorn’s, both in the sub-menu below, together with the ‘Australia’s criminal involvement in Cambodia’ and other Cambodian stories, also below.
Is there anyone in Australia, or Belgium where he came from originally, and where his mother now is desperate to find help, or anywhere, who can help this man? The evidence against the other two men who were convicted is already in tatters. The accusers were the same in all three cases, and they have publicly retracted.
At last! The Cambodian witnesses retract
The Khmer newspapers in Cambodia have printed an open letter from the ten girl witnesses in the Betteridge and Lauwaert cases in which they state their complaints and court evidence were completely false and given for money promised to them by the child right’s group CWCC. The originals letters were sent to the Prime Minister his Excellency MR. Hun Sen and the Human rights Committee of Cambodia by these witnesses.
We have copies of the letters in Khmer. We have also sent them to the relevant Australian government ministers and officials to secure the release of Clint Betterridge from prison in Australia.
Statement from the girls translated into English
KINGDOM OF CAMBODIA
NATION RELIGION KING
With respect to his Excellency the Prime Minister HUN SEN
Open letter : Respect to your Excellency HUN SEN
We who have put our thumbprints on this letter, beg you to help "Bart Lucky Lauwaert" who was convicted of sex offences in the Siem Reap District Court and has been in Prison for two years already.
We state on oath to his Excellency, that the organization CWCC made us learn a false story that was not true and forced us to accuse "Lucky", and to give false evidence to the court so they could get money from the Australian (Government)
At that time the CWCC forced us to do this and promised if we did so, they would give us lots of money. They never gave us anything.
Now all of us girls want to file a complaint against the CWCC. Because we were forced to give this false evidence this has destroyed the Australian "Lucky's" reputation
As stated above, we beg your Excellency to help the Australian national to be released from prison and have his freedom. He is an innocent man.
Your Excellency, this is a true statement from us all.
Declared on : 21.07.2004
Thumb printed on one page X 8
Witnessed on one page X 4
(Translated on 08.09.2004)
See pictures of the statements and thumbprints in the Picture gallery.
Country by country
Clint Betterridge - stop this extradition! It's over.
The Peter Ellis story
The Shieldfield travesty
The Saskatoon story
The McMartin and other US stories
Act of infamy – the Nora Wall story
Bart Lauwaert tells his own story
Australia’s criminal involvement in Cambodia
Graham Cleghorn writes from Cambodian prisons
The setting up of Rudolf Knuchel
The Pitcairn sex trial – the cast and the story
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