New Zealander gives up knighthood after guilty pleas

A well-known New Zealand businessman who was found with hundreds of child sex abuse images has given up his knighthood before it was stripped from him

WELLINGTON, New Zealand -- A well-known New Zealand businessman who was found with hundreds of child sex abuse images gave up his knighthood Tuesday before it was stripped from him. Ron Brierley last month pleaded guilty to three charges in an Australian court, sparking a rarely invoked procedure to strip him of the honor he received more than 30 years ago. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said her intention was to remove the title from Brierley if he hadn't written first to relinquish it. Ardern said Britain's Queen Elizabeth II had been informed, and that Brierley will longer be able to use the honorific “Sir." “I think its a sad day for the children of New Zealand and, indeed, the world, when someone is found guilty of possessing such horrendous images,” Ardern told reporters. “It is only right that there are significant consequences for that because as a country, we have to reject anyone that thinks that is okay.”