Jevon McSkimming scandal: Advocate calls for removal of another member of police executive
Saturday, 21 February 2026
Victims’ advocates are calling for the removal of a senior member of the police executive, who has retained her job despite describing a woman’s complaints against former deputy commissioner Jevon McSkimming as “complete spam” and “gobbledygook” during an inquiry into the police’s handling of the scandal.
Rachael Bambery was among those criticised in the subsequent Independent Police Conduct Authority (IPCA) investigation after McSkimming’s resignation, but she remains the police’s Executive Director of Service, Victims and Resolutions, The Post can reveal.
Police Commissioner Richard Chambers said the language used fell “well short” of his expectations, but he believed Bambery deserved the opportunity to learn from her mistakes.
Bambery has apologised, saying she was “nervous” and chose words she regrets.
Read more:
Scandal and scrutiny: The year that tested New Zealand’s top cop
‘A privilege’: Wellington’s top cop moves from city to national stage
‘We got an uppercut’: Meet the duo tasked with restoring faith in a bruised police force
In its 135-page report released last November, the IPCA found “serious failings” by “very senior officers” in responding to allegations of misconduct by McSkimming.
The allegations against him, made by a woman known publicly only as “Ms Z”, included sexual interaction without consent, threats to use an intimate visual recording, and misuse of a police credit card and property to further a sexual relationship.
After the release of the report, media named many of those who the IPCA found had failed to take appropriate action when complaints were made.
But until now Bambery – referred to in the report as “Ms F” – hasn’t been publicly named, leaving victims’ advocates questioning why others had lost their jobs over what they call a “lesser dereliction of duty”.
Complaints dismissed as ‘complete spam’
The most pointed criticism of Bambery by the IPCA relates to her handling of Ms Z’s three 105 reports.
At the time, Bambery had overall responsibility for the 105 non-emergency service. She had worked “very closely” with McSkimming for about 15 years, describing him as a mentor.
Bambery is a non-sworn police employee, with more than two decades of experience.
McSkimming first told her about his affair with Ms Z – a police employee nearly two decades his junior – sometime after it ended.
Then, in April 2024 when Ms Z’s 105 reports were submitted, McSkimming sent Bambery a text asking her to review them as overseer of the 105 service.
Bambery told the IPCA she saw only one of the reports and read it six months later, despite also saying she’d relied on the report's content as justification for how she dealt with them.
Regardless of what she read and when, Bambery said she’d class them as “complete spam” and “gobbledygook”, with “nothing for us to follow up on”.
She added: “We get a lot of those through 105 like, ‘Mickey Mouse here and this has happened’. You know, just people that are painful. It did not look like someone who had a serious complaint.”
The IPCA put it to her that, given her knowledge of McSkimming’s relationship with Ms Z, the reports “did not in fact read as spam”.
It noted the reports contained “coherent allegations” and said Bambery “should not have classified the reports as nonsensical”.
“Concerningly for us,” the IPCA wrote, “particularly given [Bambery’s] current portfolio includes responsibility for victims, was her view that the 105 report she read did not fit the profile of what she would expect to see from a victim”.
The IPCA found, while Bambery’s description of the complaints as baseless “spam” didn’t affect how they were handled, they did reflect her view that they were just further examples of harassment.
It accepted there were five levels of management separating Bambery from frontline 105 communicators and she was entitled to rely on staff to follow processes.
But, it said this case was different for two reasons: the complaint was against a deputy commissioner with whom she had a longstanding working relationship and the alleged perpetrator contacted her directly about the reports.
The IPCA also examined what Bambery had told the Public Service Commission (PSC) during McSkimming’s 2023 statutory deputy commissioner reference check.
Although Bambery told the IPCA she was aware McSkimming had an affair and needed a new email address and phone number because of the quantity of emails from Ms Z, she told the PSC she’d heard “a rumour a few years back about his family”.
Bambery told the IPCA the “rumour” was intended as a reference to the affair, but conceded her language was vague.
The IPCA found her disclosure “lacked sufficient specificity” to alert the PSC to the issue, particularly given her knowledge of the ongoing harassment and said the PSC “expected to be, and should have been, provided with that type of information”.
An apology – and the backing of the Commissioner
In response to questions from The Post, Bambery apologised for her comments in relation to the 105 reports.
“This was the first time I had been interviewed by the authority [IPCA], I was nervous and chose words that I regret. In my attempt to explain how unusual that situation was, I was not as clear as I would have liked.”
Bambery noted the 105 team followed the correct process for handling the reports and the IPCA made no findings against that.
“I did not wish to cause anyone distress and I want to reassure the public that the 105 team did handle those complaints correctly … The staff do amazing work every day and I want to reassure victims that they can have confidence in reporting.”
She also sought to reassure the public the 105 team was a “highly skilled team that does an incredible job managing over 4000 contacts every day, many of them complex situations”.
While Chambers described Bambery’s comments as “disappointing”, he said he did not want her decades of service “to be defined by this situation”.
“We all sometimes get things wrong,” he said.
Bambery was not among the staff the IPCA recommended for an employment investigation and Chambers said he did not believe one was necessary.
She had put a significant amount of work into ensuring it was “as easy and seamless as possible for victims to make reports and have them dealt with appropriately and promptly”.
The service provided to victims by police was a “priority” of his, Chambers said. “That commitment is a serious one.”
Calls for Bambery to step aside mount
But it is this commitment to victims that strikes at the heart of the issue, one advocate told The Post.
For David White – who has campaigned for better support for victims of crime since his daughter, Helen Meads, was murdered in 2009 – any suggestion there was a “right way for a victim to present” was “incredibly distressing”.
“[Bambery] apologised for her language, but from what I can see, there’s no apology to Ms Z. If you were a victim and heard that kind of apology, would you feel comfortable going to the police?”
White also questioned Bambery’s comments about being nervous when interviewed by IPCA: “Imagine how nervous a victim must be – now, more than ever – to come forward to police with their complaint”.
The IPCA’s findings raised serious questions about whether Bambery should remain in a role responsible for victims’ services, he said.
“I personally don’t understand why she still has her job, or how she feels comfortable holding it. If I’d failed a victim like this, I would step to the side. Someone with an understanding of victims needs to be in that role.”
Others – like former deputy commissioner Tania Kura, assistant commissioner Paul Basham and Andrew Coster – had either resigned or retired in the wake of the IPCA report.
“Other more public figures have lost their jobs over lesser dereliction of duty,” he said.