Author: Press Room
The man accused of murdering Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming in Nelson in the early hours of New Year’s Day can now be named. He is 32-year-old Hayden Donald Jason Tasker of Motueka. Until now, he had interim name suppression, which lifted today. Tasker is facing a raft of charges including murder and attempted murder, which he has previously pleaded not guilty to. The charges relate to the incident shortly after midnight on New Year’s Day in Buxton Square carpark in the central city. Fleming and her colleague Senior Sergeant Adam Ramsay were struck by a vehicle while on foot patrol.…
Two Japanese warships sailed into Wellington Harbour this morning as part of a ceremonial port visit to the city. The ships, helicopter destroyer JS Ise and destroyer JS Suzunami, were on an Indo-Pacific deployment and had arrived in the capital from Sydney. “The intent of the deployment is to improve the JMSDF tactical capabilities and to strengthen cooperation and understanding with allied and partner navies in the Indo-Pacific, as well as contribute to the peace and stability of the region,” an NZDF spokesperson said. HMNZS Canterbury, returning from the recent Exercise Talisman Sabre in Australia, escorted the two ships into…
The names of four more electorates will be changed for the next general election.The Representation Commission, who outlined proposed changes to electorates in March this year, have now finalised boundary adjustments to 49 general electorates and three Māori electorates.Nineteen were unchanged. It said the main areas of change were in Auckland, the Bay of Plenty, Christchurch and the lower North Island.The loss of an electorate in Wellington was also finalised, with Ōhāriu, Mana and Ōtaki being replaced with two new electorates named Kenepuru and Kapiti.After hearings and submissions were made on the proposed changes in June, the commission today announced…
South Dunedin’s Hillside Workshop has produced 500 rail wagons in just over a year. KiwiRail chief metro and capital programme officer David Gordon visited the Hillside Rd workshops yesterday and congratulated its team on reaching the major milestone. The workshop marked the production of its 500th rail wagon since production began in March 2024. He said the goal was to assemble a total of 1500 wagons before the workshop would transition to focus on wagon maintenance and refurbishment. The Hillside Workshops were KiwiRail’s main heavy maintenance facility in the South Island where it maintained locomotives and wagons and built brand-new…
A Christchurch man has been sentenced to 18 months jail for poaching 1432 sea cucumbers. Jason Murray Nix, 55, learned his fate in the Christchurch District Court yesterday for two charges under the Fisheries Act. He was also banned from all fishing for three years. Nix received a total sentence of 30 months’ imprisonment as he was also sentenced on separate police charges. His equipment, including two boats and a car, was forfeited to the Crown. In November 2023, Nix and another man were stopped by police on other issues, and his vehicle was impounded due to other legal matters.…
Two men have been arrested after allegedly “scrambling” to hide guns, drugs and cash in the engine bay of a car in rural Auckland. Police – including the armed offenders squad – yesterday carried out a search at a property in Patumāhoe following a report of a person acting in a threatening manner. Officers arrivede to find a man in the garage area attempting to hide items, Inspector Matt Hoyes said. “This person was quickly taken into custody without incident.” A second man was then seen “also scrambling to hide a number of items”.“He failed to follow police instructions and…
Seven of those who participated in the Government’s military style boot camp for young offenders reoffended to a threshold that required their return to a residence during the 12-month pilot, Oranga Tamariki (OT) revealed today. And currently, two of them are in a youth justice facility and one in prison.Today marks the end of the 12-month pilot, introduced by the Government after the 2023 election as an attempt to reduce youth offending and turn the lives of young offenders around. It involved a group of young men participating in physical education and drills during a three-month residency phase, followed by…
An investigation is underway after human remains were discovered at a beach, east of Ōpōtiki earlier today.Police said they were called to Waihau Bay around 11.50am. The bay is about 100km to the east of Ōpōtiki, near Cape Runaway.”The remains have been identified as human, and enquiries will determine how old these remains are,” police said. “This will be followed by a formal identification process, which may take some time.”Anyone with information was asked to contact police via 105.
Sir Michael Hill, one of New Zealand’s most successful businessmen and most generous philanthropists, left an indelible mark on the South. Mike Houlahan and Philip Chandler look back on his eventful and colourful life. As catchphrases go, it isn’t much. “Michael Hill. Jeweller” did little more than accurately describe the man who first said it in the early ’80s in a stilted debut television commercial inspired by the awkward but effective personal advertisements fronted by Wellington appliance store owner Alan Martin. Michael Hill kept on saying the phrase, over and over again — “it was all in the pausing” he once said, in an attempt to…
The Education Ministry has canned a reader for junior children because it has too many Māori words, infuriating Te Akatea, the Māori Principals’ Association.The association’s president Bruce Jepsen said the decision not to reprint At the Marae was racist and white supremacist.The ministry told schools At the Marae, did not fit the sequence that young children were now taught to decode words using the structured literacy approach.However, it had been re-sized into a “big book format” that teachers could use to read with pupils.”The decision was guided by phonics sequencing and decoding suitability, rather than a defined word-count threshold,” the…