Anonymous Host

On Tuesday April 6, the charge against the three women was dropped, with Justice Williamson finding the evidence against them, quote, of insufficient weight to justify their trial.

That left just Peter Ellis to stand trial alone.

His charges had been significantly reduced during the preliminary trial process as well.

The 45 charges he'd originally faced were whittled down to 28 and the number of complainants had dropped from 20 to 13.

He was accused of having abused these children over five years, from 1986 to 1991.

The Crown Solicitor had offered to cancel all of the sexual violation charges if Peter agreed to plead guilty to one or two representational charges per complainant, but Peter had refused.

His trial began on Monday April 26 1993.

Some of the most bizarre accusations made by the complainants had not been included in the charges, such as the claims of animal torture, murder and satanic-style rituals.

With no corroborating or material evidence to support these claims, the prosecution concluded that airing them might undermine their case or prove off-putting to the jury.

However, the Circle incident would still be included, with the Crown alleging that Peter Ellis had abused children at an unknown location in the presence of others and had provided other adults with children to abuse.

Peter Ellis' defence barrister, Rob Harrison, wanted the children's videotaped interviews played in full.

He hoped that if the jury heard their wilder allegations, then it would cast reasonable doubt on their testimony and the case.

To Harrison's disappointment, the judge ruled that the tapes were not relevant and were therefore inadmissible.

The Crown would first be calling on the 13 complainants, all of whom were aged between three and a half to nine years old, and their parents.

They would be followed by other witnesses, including police officers, DWS interviewers, and experts.

The first witness was nine-year-old Azelda, the eldest of the complainants.

She alleged that Peter Ellis had touched her vagina while babysitting her in 1986, had done so again at the creche, and had also forced her to touch his penis.

The following two witnesses were girls who alleged that Peter had touched their genitals at the creche while they were fully dressed.

The complainants who followed made increasingly violent allegations.

Four said that Peter had urinated on them.