Apparently multiple complainants about sexual offending by men who then brag about it on the internet isn't enough to get before the courts. But there'll be no hesitation in prosecution if you dare to make a pretend poster criticising the Police's attitude towards such crimes!

There's been enough blogosphere coverage of the ongoing investigation of a group of young repeat rapists in Auckland that I haven't felt the particular need to vent on it. Lots of other people are better at discussing the issues, and I didn't have much extra to add to them.

But things are getting to the stage where the matter is starting to go beyond rage at the activities of some very nasty people to serious alarm about how the Police have responded to it.

Let me say at the outset that I'm prepared to give the Police a degree of slack on this topic. I'm aware that the way the law works in relation to sexual offending makes it hard to bring successful prosecutions. It's a shame that past suggestions about doing something to change this have fallen by the wayside.

So the fact no prosecutions have (yet) been brought isn't in and of itself a reason to condemn the Police out of hand; whether the original investigation was satisfactory is something the IPCA will tell us in time. But let's all agree the Police's "messaging" on the issue has been pretty average. Going from "we didn't have the individual complaints we needed to prosecute", to "actually, there were four individual complaints, but none of them were formal enough to prosecute", to "it turns out we actually did get a formal complaint, but it still wasn't enough to prosecute" is ... troubling.

In a straight off choice between a cock up and conspiracy, I'm tempermentally inclined to prefer the cock up option. Partly this is because I'm a cozy part of the establishment, who expects the other parts of it to do their best to carry out their jobs properly. Partly it's because most people I know are prone to screwing up even the most simple of tasks, and so managing a conspiracy is beyond them. Partly it's because it would just be so monumentally stupid to think that you could cover up the complaints that had been made, once the media was hot on the trail of the story.

So, again, if it turns out that the Police's problem in telling a straight story on this issue came out of personnel changing jobs and confusion as to what constitutes a "complaint" or a "formal complaint" or the like, I'll accept it. Provided, of course, the story is a believable one.

However, for the police to now turn around and threaten to prosecute a blogger (oh, OK, Martyn Bradbury) who mocks up a police recruitment poster savaging the Police's record with respect to rape allegations is beyond dumb. (You can see a copy of the relevant poster on NoRightTurn here ... I agree with Idiot Savant that the tag line could have been better framed, but the fact a satire isn't very subtle (or that clever) doesn't make its point any less valid.)

The Police may think this poster is unfair. They may think it is inaccurate. Individual officers who are doing their best to help survivors of sexual assault and bring them some justice may even find it hurtful.

But that's just tough bikkies. The Police "have form" in this area, as we would do well to remember. There are some grounds to look sceptically at how they have approached the Auckland rape ring investigation. So facing some robust and pointed criticism on this issue is perfectly legitimate. And trying to shut it up is not jsut dumb, but wrong.

For the record, the offence Bradbury was threatened with is this: