Pitcairn ‘had closed community mentality’

A WOMAN testifying against two men she claims raped her as a child said she couldn’t tell anyone about the assaults because of the closed community mentality on the remote Pacific island of Pitcairn.

The woman, who cannot be identified, was testifying via videolink from New Zealand against two of seven men on trial in the isolated British territory, home to descendants of the 18th century Bounty mutineers. The community’s entire year-round population numbers only 47.

Pitcairn, roughly halfway between New Zealand and Peru, has been reeling from unprecedented attention since the trials opened last week with more than half the island’s adult males on trial, including the island’s mayor, Steve Christian.