Sophie’s Legacy

by Lesley Elliot

  This is a travesty of the worst kind. The way Robert was treated was to my mind grossly unfair and the attack so personal, he couldn’t face being in the economics department any longer and resigned his post. He now lives across the Tasman and I believe his emotional scars are far from healed. Robert became a central though unwitting pawn in Weatherston’s defence. His association with Clayton Weatherston and Sophie is best described in his own words.

  I was a senior lecturer in economics at the University of Otago and had known Clayton Weatherston for a number of years when he did a BCom, then a postgraduate diploma. He left the university for a job with Treasury but didn’t last long so returned to do a PhD. He was taken on as a part-time lecturer and given a third-year class of honours students to lecture.

  Throughout the time I knew him, I only recall him being in one of my classes for a short time before pulling out. He came to me worried that he wasn’t doing well enough. I thought he was overanxious. I believe he was concerned that he wasn’t coping, therefore would be unlikely to get his much desired A+. The following year he did the same with another lecturer. My impression was he was picking and choosing his way through a degree. If he couldn’t get a high grade, he would pull out and do a paper he could do better at. As a result his postgraduate diploma took seven years to attain, not the usual three.

  During the final year all sorts of problems arose with Weatherston. He had done a dissertation where he didn’t get a high-enough mark. I was the coordinator and he came to me complaining his mark wasn’t what he expected. He was talking about a difference of perhaps 2 per cent. The fact his mark didn’t quite meet the A+ threshold became a huge issue to him. He was going to make a complaint that the marking wasn’t fair, so I offered to read it before he laid a formal complaint. After an informal reading, I said he was lucky to get the mark he got and it had been pushed as far as it could go — a decent piece of work but not quite worth what he got. In the end he didn’t make a complaint, but apparently he bore a grudge against the marker for spoiling his chances. That seemed all so typical of Weatherston. On paper it looked like he had a good academic record, but scratch deeper and it was not so good.

  I actually had little to do with him, but I do recall telling him I thought he had a problem with being obsessive and perhaps he should seek advice about that. This was all before Sophie even started at university. I wasn’t being mean to him. I treated him the same as many other students; it’s my job to give advice. All I said was, you are too overly anxious about little details, you’re doing well enough. He seemed to take that advice.

  Weatherston did another dissertation while I was still coordinator and there was another fuss over that. He asked whether he would be penalised if his dissertation was longer than the word limit. I said, yes, it’s in the rules. If the limit is slightly exceeded there is no real problem. If it is well over then it could be penalised; that’s just the way it is. His dissertation was marked A, and when he questioned why, the marker said it was because it was more than twice the required length. There were parts of the dissertation that were totally irrelevant so in my judgement the marker (who was a professor) was being entirely fair and reasonable. But Clayton Weatherston simply couldn’t accept that someone could think his work wasn’t perfect.

  Not long after the complaints over unfair marking another incident arose where he claimed he co-wrote a paper along with another member of our department. Weatherston came to me very upset. At most he could have deserved a footnote acknowledging a discussion he had with the author, but not joint ownership. He rejected my advice and went to mediation. He had no written evidence but the author of the work had ample. Weatherston lost at mediation but his attitude over this matter certainly upset some people in the department.

  He then started to accuse the head of department of plagiarism, alleging he had stolen an idea of his. A pattern was starting to emerge. Because Weatherston was in dispute with the head of department and another staff member, I had to mark his doctoral thesis during my Easter break. I recall my wife saying I was looking more and more down over the holiday. I said it was because the more I read the thesis, the more disappointed I became. That thesis was simply way below what I thought it might be. It wasn’t good reading. I believe now that Weatherston submitted the thesis on a set date so he could qualify for $5000 of scholarship money. I wrote a lengthy report outlining many failures, most of which were about his habit of writing irrelevant things. He even had a chapter on New Zealand history that had nothing at all to do with the subject. I made it clear what he needed to change and he certainly didn’t like me because I had pointed out flaws in his work. I had no axe to grind with Clayton Weatherston. He eventually did what he was asked to do and then asked if his thesis could be placed on the dean’s list as an exemplary thesis. Quite unbelievable!

  Perhaps the most disturbing incident in the department was Weatherston’s misuse of university computers. I was told by the head of department that Clayton’s computer usage had been checked and there was an anomaly. He had been accessing and downloading pornography. Doing it at work is stupid, but to think he wouldn’t be caught defies belief. I really would have thought Weatherston would be smarter than that. What was even more surprising was the extent of his misuse of the computer. This wasn’t the occasional look at some pornographic sites, but hours and hours on end.

  In 2007 Sophie occasionally used my office to access data on my computer while I was in class. I had a contract with Statistics New Zealand that data supplied by them could not be taken from my office. Sophie was working on a topic and needed that data so there was nothing sinister in letting her use the computer in my office, as was later implied at the trial.

  One day I came back to my office and Sophie was still there. She had run into some problems and had a couple of questions. At that moment Weatherston came to the door and I said I would be with him in a few minutes. She looked at me sheepishly and said, ‘Do you know what’s going on?’ I didn’t connect Sophie with him. No one had mentioned it to me yet Sophie said everyone knew. I told Sophie I didn’t really want to know but now that I did, I’d have to be sure it was reported to the head of department. Sophie said Clayton was doing that. I checked to make sure that procedures were being followed. All that eventuated was that Weatherston’s supervisor would mark Sophie’s papers. That was called managing the conflict of interest. Personally I believe someone else should have taken the whole class rather than allow Weatherston to continue teaching.

  Towards examination time a group of three students came to me saying they were having trouble with econometrics and could I help. At this point I knew Weatherston was still angry at me over his thesis, which he still hadn’t submitted in its final version. Sophie had told me about the ups and downs in their relationship and there was no way I was walking into anything by helping these students. First, econometrics is not something I teach, so I said to the girls, ‘Why are you not asking Mr Weatherston?’ and they said, ‘It’s because he’s strange and creepy. When we have computer labs and we have a question and put our hands up, he won’t come. He spends all his time talking to the boys.’

  They also raised the matter of the girl in class (meaning Sophie) sitting alone and quite distressed. I said procedures had been put in place and they should go to the staff member responsible for Weatherston. It really wasn’t my place to hear their concerns, but the students weren’t happy. They knew something was going on between Sophie and their lecturer. They never suggested he was spending all his time in class with Sophie; in fact it was more the opposite. Although the students noticed Sophie’s distress, I don’t think they really knew the nature of the relationship. As far as I’m concerned it would have been better had the university assigned another lecturer to avoid a possibility of conflict of interest. If ‘procedures’ had been followed then to my mind it was clear they were inadequate. Either that or there were some bad judgement calls. What’s the point of ‘managing’ a problem if we have to wait for students t
o raise the problem? That certainly isn’t the way to address an issue.

  Soon after, Sophie was saying to me, ‘Clayton’s being mean, saying I’m fat and ugly.’ I told her to listen to herself. If in an early stage of a relationship you are having these problems, what sort of a relationship is it? She said I sounded like her mother. Sophie mentioned things to me because as teacher and supervisor of her work I saw her frequently. I think she saw me perhaps as a father figure, someone she could confide in. She never raised these issues in front of other students. One day she said to me, ‘It’s all over.’ I think I may have said, ‘You’ve made the right decision.’ However, a few days later I said to Sophie, ‘It’s on again, isn’t it?’ She was up and down; I could pick it.

  I hadn’t seen Sophie for some time, then one night in December I saw her with Weatherston. I was in my car leaving work and he made a deliberate move of putting his arms around her to ensure I would think they were still together. Sophie seemed quite uncomfortable. I thought of stopping the car and telling Sophie this wasn’t good for her.

  Sophie sent me an email two days before she was killed, saying she wanted to see me prior to going to Wellington. She came at 2pm on the Tuesday, late as usual, but this time because her car had broken down. I thanked her for the bottle of wine she had left and we had the usual discussion about how she was looking forward to the job at Treasury. She had come in to say goodbye, nothing more. Then she said, ‘You don’t want to hear all the other stuff, do you?’ and I said, ‘Not really, but looks like I’m going to.’ She talked about Weatherston’s assault on her in his flat and the recent incident in his office. I asked Sophie whether she would report the assaults to the police. She said she had talked it over with her mother and friends and decided not to. She was about to leave town, there were no injuries, it would be one person’s word against the other, and in reality by the time it got investigated, she would be enjoying a new phase of her life away from him. I think Sophie took the right step even if she was downplaying the assaults a bit. If I had thought she was in any imminent danger, I would have insisted she take action immediately.

  I had a lot of time for Sophie, as I have for many students. She was very able, personable and cheerful. I had been her teacher and supervisor but it was only on the day before she died that she really opened up to me. When it got to the court case, any conversations I had had with Sophie were made to look sinister and that I had it in for Clayton Weatherston right from the start.

  I found giving evidence in the trial daunting. Weatherston’s defence to killing Sophie was his belief that she, through an association with me, had ruined his chances of getting a permanent job at the university. Right from the very first question, I thought counsel Greg King was aggressive and accusing. Suddenly it was me who was responsible for tipping Weatherston over the edge. It had to be my entire fault. Where the Crown prosecutor had been measured, King appeared to me to be theatrical and trying to impose himself on me. He stood to his full height, thumbs inside his gown, looking threatening. It actually looked quite funny but of course it wasn’t.

  ‘You felt it appropriate to tell him you considered he had no chance of getting the job. You gave it to him straight down the middle that you considered he had no chance at all.’ King was definitely trying to unsettle me. While I did tell Weatherston I thought he wouldn’t get the position, it wasn’t said in anything like the manner suggested. I was simply answering a question Weatherston had asked me directly. I had actually gone down to Weatherston’s office to discuss a student’s complaint and reprimand him. At this point King cut me off and didn’t give me the opportunity to explain what actually happened.

  The reason I reprimanded Weatherston was because a young female student from Malaysia had been to see me, complaining that he had been putting her down. She was very upset at what she felt was unwarranted criticism. When I confronted Weatherston about this, he took exception. His explanation was that he was only trying to help students as their supervisors were no good. I didn’t take the bait but clearly what he was saying was that I wasn’t doing my job and he took it upon himself to help the student. I said it was not his role and there are proper procedures to follow if a supervisor isn’t up to the mark. He then asked whether his relationship with Sophie would affect his chances of getting the job. This was the first time Weatherston had raised this with me. I said you shouldn’t put it on your CV but in any case you don’t have any chance of getting the job. I explained the reason wasn’t because of him and Sophie; it was because he had caused all these other problems. Weatherston had asked me straight and I told him straight. There is no point in telling half-truths. Some people might find my style of giving a straight answer to a question an admirable quality, but in this case it was turned against me. With cross-examination you don’t usually get a chance to explain in detail, which can be very difficult, especially when you are being made to look like the villain.

  It remains my view that it would be a very odd department that would offer a job to anyone who caused as much trouble as Weatherston had. The fact he was in a relationship with a student was well down the list compared to the problems of alleging plagiarism, co-authorship, mediation, student complaints, pornography, etc. I told him he was already off side with the head of department so why should he get the job. He said, ‘Because I’m so much better than all the other candidates.’ Typical of Clayton Weatherston, he thought he was the best. ‘No one will be better than me.’ He wouldn’t have known the other candidates; just full of himself. I know of another applicant who was easily on a par with or better than him.

  A lot of things regarding Clayton Weatherston only came to the surface after the depositions hearing. To me they were highly relevant to assess his behavioural traits, but because they might be prejudicial, they never got mentioned in the High Court trial. I must say I think it unfair that Weatherston could say what he liked about Sophie, yet his accessing pornography at work was never raised. Why does the prosecution have to tiptoe around issues relating to his character? For example, when I challenged him about the Malaysian girl, he insisted he had this role he had created for himself as being a caring person who helped other students. While it was true there was a group around him who thought he was being helpful, several others were clearly not happy at his intrusion. I thought he was hanging around to be seen in the eyes of honours students as a helper. In retrospect I feel he was being predatory toward young female students. He was helping but there were strings attached. I hardly ever went to work after hours and never late in the evenings so had no idea this was going on. Young honours students would often be there late at night trying to get their dissertations finished, and he would be there in his office, door open, offering any help they needed.

  During my cross-examination, the defence kept trying to imply that I had long meetings with Sophie in my office with the door closed. This was to suggest she was turning me against Weatherston. I used to have meetings with all students I supervised and Sophie was no different. The longest conversation I had with Sophie was in my office the day before she was murdered when she confided in me about Weatherston’s assaults. To suggest anything improper was actually insulting, but it was the defence’s best line of attack. At no time did Sophie ever influence me against giving Clayton Weatherston the job he so desperately wanted. First, I wouldn’t be influenced by a student and second, I wasn’t even on the selection panel. I had no influence whatsoever but the defence still tried to make the connection. Another tack the defence took was that not only did I not like their client, I liked Sophie.

  What really disappoints me about the adversarial system in our courts is the way witnesses are attacked. The line of questioning is almost in tones of ‘we don’t believe you’. The reason the witness is in court is to tell the truth. Trying to unsettle them isn’t getting to the truth. Being trivial in a murder case just to score points should be stomped on by the judge. I think it’s a very sad day when our judicial system is more about trying to trap
a witness into making a mistake than searching for the truth. An example was the suggestion from the defence that Weatherston hated me because I had supposedly told Sophie what I had done to his thesis. The day before she was murdered, Sophie did say to me, ‘Clayton hates you because of what you did with his thesis.’ I’m sure he must have vented his anger to her about what a bastard I was not accepting his thesis the first time. I certainly wouldn’t have told Sophie, a student, that one of her lecturers had put in shoddy work. Yet the defence implies that I told Sophie, and that we somehow colluded to jeopardise his chances of getting a job. That simply wasn’t the case, but the witness gets very little opportunity to explain what really happened.

  Defence counsel is able to resort to other tactics. At one stage King tried to suggest that Weatherston never said Sophie was fat and ugly. Instead he tried to get me to concede Sophie was in fact attractive. How do you defend that? If I say Sophie wasn’t fat but was slim, that suggests I was taking far too much interest. If I say she’s attractive, counsel imply you are attracted to her.

  The summing-up was undoubtedly one of the worst experiences of my life. I was in the public gallery listening to Ablett-Kerr’s summation. For the first 45 minutes she told the jury why the murder was my fault. She was painting a picture of her poor young client in a relationship he just couldn’t cope with. This horrible girl and a third person were destroying his dreams. One of the detectives told me later he sat there stunned, wondering who this third person was going to be. ‘This man, old enough to be her father,’ said Ablett-Kerr. There was a long pause, and then she said it was me. I really thought I was going to throw up.