**Vanuatu’s coroner, New Zealand judge Nevin Dawson, has left the Pacific territory after receiving threats to the safety of himself and his family.**Justice Dawson had completed a report damning the Vanuatu Mobile Force after a man was beaten to death in custody.
A New Zealand foreign ministry spokesman told Radio New Zealand that the judge was on “holiday” after threats to his safety.
Justice Dawson is serving two years in Vanuatu and has not left permanently.
“There have been threats made against him and his family and we have had concerns about their safety for some time,” said the unnamed spokesman for New Zealand’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully.
Show of force
During the judge’s holiday the credibility of threats would be considered as well whether security arrangements were adequate, he added.
Local media reported last month that the coroner’s report into the death of rapist and prison escapee John Bule revealed a culture of police brutality that appeared to be condoned at the highest levels of the police force.
In particular it focused on the actions of the 300-strong paramilitary Vanuatu Mobile Force (VMF).
The report also detailed instances of intimidation, apparently aimed at derailing the coroner’s inquest.
Local media said Justice Dawson had received a death threat, and that rifle-carrying members of the VMF had made shows of force near his office.
A Radio New Zealand reporter told the station’s Checkpoint news programme that Justice Dawson was Vanuatu’s first coroner since the territory’s independence in 1980 and that his departure was “an indictment of Vanuatu”.
The reporter said Vanuatu’s official line has been to insist that the rule of law will prevail, and that the circumstances surrounding the death of John Bule - a mass prison escape - should also be taken into account.This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.