Child sex abuse survivor Kaye Maher’s fight for justice as Bendigo doctor David Miller unmasked as serial rapist
When Kaye Maher was a teen she visited a doctor for help, instead she fell prey to Bendigo’s “best” clinician, whose horrific child abuse crimes went under the radar for decades – until now.
Police & Courts
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A brave victim-survivor, who was raped by a depraved doctor when she was just 14 years old, has told how she felt like she was drowning during the horrific assault.
The GP, who raped and sexually abused multiple victims during medical examinations at a Bendigo clinic can finally be unmasked after a long Herald Sun investigation as David Frederick Miller.
Now one of his brave victims is speaking out.
Kaye Maher grew up in Bendigo as a quiet child who loved sport and reading. But at age eight, a member of her extended family began to sexually abuse her.
Fearing she was pregnant as a result, Kaye sought help from a doctor in 1977.
“I was 14 years old and in utter terror,” said Kaye, now 60. “That’s how I ended up in that clinic with Dr David Frederick Miller.
“He told me that I was not pregnant, and that he would teach me how to have sex without getting pregnant.
“He used me for his own pleasure.
“It was like I had fallen into deep water and put my hand up for help, only instead of saving me the hand that arrived just pushed me further down.”
Miller ordered Kaye’s mother to wait outside. He then molested Kaye in her grey and white school uniform.
After the appointment ended, Kaye’s distress was obvious and she soon disclosed the rape to her mother.
The family contacted Kaye’s regular family doctor for help only to be told: “Oh, don’t be silly, doctors don’t do that sort of thing.”
Kaye retreated into silence.
Then in 1983, The Age newspaper reported that Dr Miller had been found guilty of molesting a 13-year-old patient in similar circumstances. He was sentenced to 15 months’ jail.
The reporting described Miller as “a caring doctor who was generous with his time”, adding that the judge accepted “Miller was the best general practitioner in the Bendigo area” and “it would be an enormous waste of his skills” if he were struck off the medical register.
Kaye, then 20, was emboldened by the conviction and sought out a counsellor.
But again she was not believed.
“(The counsellor) said ‘No, I think you’ve misunderstood what he did to you, it was probably just a standard internal examination’.”
It would take another eight years for Kaye to muster the courage to try again.
This time she was supported and decided to report her rape to police. But the following year, in 1993, Victoria Police told her it was “not in the public interest to pursue the matter”.
“I thought ‘what the hell does that mean?’” she said.
When the DPP reviewed the matter, it also concluded there was no reasonable prospect of conviction.
Devastated, Kaye was forced to accept the case was going nowhere.
But months later the phone rang. On the line was Detective Greg Murphy, who told Kaye two sisters had come forward with similar allegations about Miller.
Even though the sisters’ case resulted in an acquittal, Kaye’s case was reopened in the process.
This time it was a judge who aborted the case.
“Miller told the court that records of my visit in 1977 had been destroyed and (because of an existing precedent) it was deemed prejudicial to Miller to have to stand trial if he didn’t have access to those records,” Kaye said.
“It was just beyond belief. I was told ‘that’s the end of it’.
“I couldn’t believe that records could just disappear.”
Refusing to accept it was over, Kaye rang the criminal investigation branch and the clinic that had allegedly destroyed her records.
The clinic then gave her the shock news: her files might still exist, and no one had even tried to locate them.
“I was told there was no record of any prior attempt to locate my records,” she said. “Not the CIB, not the prosecution – no one had tried to locate them.
“I was absolutely furious because there’s so much invested, and all I had to do was make one phone call.
“By the next business day I had a copy of that medical record in my hand.
“A trial has been aborted over this. Right then, I knew then that the police really screwed up.”
Armed with her medical notes, Kaye lodged a complaint about the botched police investigation with the ethical standards department. The police denied any negligence and the ESD made no adverse findings.
“So me being Kaye, I then lodged a complaint with the ombudsman about the ESD, and that found that the ESD hadn’t even bothered to take my statement.
Meanwhile, by 2004 another two more victims of Miller had come forward.
The first was a 16-year-old girl who in 1980 reported back pain to the doctor.
She had seen him since age six, and had also revealed sexual abuse to him.
Miller asked her to fully undress, including her underwear; he weighed her, then sexually assaulted her.
The next was an 18-year-old who in 1979 had visited Miller complaining of a persistent bladder infection. He then raped her.
“It took from 2004 to 2007 (for those three matters) to get to trial,” Kaye said. “I thought, is this ever going to happen? How does he get to play the system like this? How does the system allow him to play it, and play these games?”
By 2007 Kaye was 44. She had been fighting for three decades.
The day before trial, Miller entered a guilty plea to the three counts against the three teenage patients.
His lawyers argued he should not serve jail time and “offensively” the DPP also did not recommend prison.
The judge, however, took a different view, and sentenced Miller to six months’ jail.
“Some time was better than no time,” Kaye said.
“It didn’t make up for everything, but it was better than nothing.”
Now, after the removal of a suppression order, the Herald Sun can reveal that since 2007 another seven women have come forward.
Last month a jury found Miller committed 13 offences against the women.
“He has escaped a period of custody while we’ve had to struggle for decades for what has happened to us,” Kaye said.
“Whether he’s lived a good life, a happy life or whatever I don’t know, and I don’t really care. But he’s lived a life of freedom, and that doesn’t seem fair.”
Kaye is now speaking out as part of the LetHerSpeak campaign to highlight the flawed criminal justice system.
She has waited 46 years to tell her story in full.
“I want people to understand,” she said.
“I lost a lot, and I was so fearful of so much, and that’s what he did and what he’s done to so many. But one thing he hasn’t taken away from me is my fight.”
On Kaye’s arm she displays a tattoo. It reads “le firinne’’ – Irish for “with truth”.
Below it, another tattoo of a soundwave – a recording of Kaye’s own voice saying the words “I speak”.
“With truth I speak,” she said. “I get frustrated when I look back, and I think, did the medical board stuff up here? Did his colleagues stuff up?
“Where were the warning signs? Where was the accountability? Where did it go wrong and how?
“At 14 I just wanted to be held like a baby. At 20 I just wanted to numb my brain.
“Later in life, I wanted to be heard. And that’s harder than it sounds.
“But what I want to say to survivors is if you’re going down the path of survivorship, it’s your path to walk down.
“It’s not anyone else’s, it’s yours.
“And you can take that in whatever direction you need to take. It is not a one size fits all.
Kaye has also asked the Victorian government’s Restorative Justice program to engage with Miller on her behalf. She wants to meet him face to face to ask just one question: Why?
Nina Funnell is a Walkley Award winning freelance journalist and the creator of the #LetHerSpeak and #JusticeShouldntHurt campaigns. Know more? ninafunnell@gmail.com
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