5 Men of Pitcairn Found Guilty

The final act of the drama that has convulsed this South Pacific isle for five years played out Sunday in a small wooden courthouse as five men -- including leading members of the tiny community -- were found guilty of sexual offenses against children.

They included Steve Christian, Pitcairn’s mayor and most influential figure, and his son, Randy, both of whom were found guilty of multiple rapes. Father and son sweated in turn in the dock as the lengthy judgments were read out in Pitcairn Supreme Court.

A sixth man, Dennis Christian, had already pleaded guilty.

A seventh defendant, Jay Warren, a former magistrate, was the only man to be cleared in the proceedings, being found not guilty of indecently assaulting a 12-year-old girl while swimming with a group of people at Bounty Bay in the early 1980s.

The convictions were not formally entered because two legal challenges to Britain’s jurisdiction over Pitcairn -- settled by mutineers from the HMS Bounty in 1790 -- remain unresolved.

The judges will make their sentencing recommendations Thursday, but even if the convicts are sentenced to serve time in the new prison that all seven defendants helped construct, they will be allowed to remain free until legal arguments are heard next year in London.

The defendants included men from three generations, all of whom were accused of preying on the most vulnerable members of a community that now numbers just 47 people. The cases dated from 1964 to 1998.

Len Brown, 78, twice raped a girl 27 years his junior, attacking her while she tended watermelons in her family’s gardens in remote spots on the island.

His son, Dave Brown, 49, who pleaded guilty to molestation and indecent assault, was convicted of six other indecent assaults.

Steve Christian, 53, was found guilty of raping one girl three times and another twice. One of his victims testified that he saw it as his right to “break in” girls at 12 or 13.

A generation later, his son Randy, now 30, emulated his actions, raping a girl three times from the age of 10, on one occasion in collusion with a friend.

According to prosecutors, it was Steve Christian, the mayor, who established a climate in which girls barely out of puberty could be raped with impunity. But it was his son’s actions that led to the exposure of the culture of abuse on Pitcairn.

His victim complained to a visiting British police officer in 1999, prompting an investigation that uncovered allegations of systematic sexual abuse dating back four decades. Anecdotal evidence suggested that similar offenses were committed even further back in history.

Just half a dozen locals sat on wooden benches at the back of the court to hear the judgments. And during the monthlong trials, few islanders came to hear evidence in the cases.

According to many locals, the British government, which administers the island and ordered the police investigation, has misunderstood a Polynesian society in which girls become sexually mature at an early age. No one has ever been coerced into sex, these islanders say.

But seven women who testified by video link from New Zealand described wretched childhoods characterized by repeated sexual assaults. All seven women were found to be credible witnesses by the three judges presiding over the separate trials.

The island, with its dwindling population and deeply divided community, is now looking to the future. Some locals fear that the removal of able-bodied men will jeopardize their survival, but others believe that the trials have begun a healing process and that Pitcairners who left may now return, convinced that the island is a safe place to bring up children.

Steve Christian, regarded as a leader since his teens, will be expected to step aside as mayor. Others hope to fill the power vacuum, including his sister, Brenda, who plans to run for mayor in elections next month.