Delcelia Petrina Witika

News reports on the death of Delcelia Witika sickened New Zealanders. The description of the events leading up to her death and how Delcelia’s body was found left many asking ‘How could such a horrific crime occur and go undetected in a civilised society'. Authorities were first alerted to this case by a phone call on the night of 21 March 1991 from Tania Witika, Delcelia’s mother. Witika made a call from a local video store to report in a matter-of-fact way that she had just arrived home after “a couple of hours” absence to find her two-year-old daughter dead. Martin Smith was the ambulance officer sent to the Mangere home. He later told the High Court he found an emaciated child lying dead in a fetal position on a scrunched piece of filthy plastic on her bed. The child had gross scarring on her buttocks, which appeared to be burns. There were also burns to her feet and hands, and bruises over the remainder of her body. Before calling for urgent police attendance, he asked Eddie Smith about the burns and the reply was that the child fell into a bath “four or five weeks earlier” but had not been taken to a doctor. When police arrived, Tania Witika sat outside in a patrol car with Detective Constable Caroline Fisher who says she’s never forgotten the coolness and lack of emotion shown by the mother, who casually asked her for a cigarette. Initially police were only going to charge Smith with Witika as a witness against him. However, later police laid charges against Witika believing that although Smith has beaten her, she still failed her daughter by not supplying medical care. As the investigation progressed, more charges were laid against the pair, which included; willfully ill-treating Delcelia between July and October 1990 in a manner likely to cause her unnecessary suffering; failing to provide medical care for the burns so that Delcelia’s life was endangered; willfully ill-treating Delcelia by placing her in hot water; murder; and manslaughter. Source: https://childabuseinnz.wordpress.com/lest-we-forget/delcelia-witika...

Delcelia Witika - A case of child abuse http://www.crime.co.nz/c-files.aspx?ID=472