Two a penny

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Lawyers for John Campbell and four other TV3 staff today argued in court they should not be summonsed as witnesses in a possible trial of two men charged with stealing bravery medals from the Waiouru Army Museum.

Police want the High Court to compel Campbell and fellow journalists Ingrid Leary, Carol Hirschfeld, Hannah Story and Zoe Duffy to reveal the identity of an informant they interviewed in February 2008, around the time that 96 medals stolen from the museum in December 2007 were returned.

Today’s hearing before chief high court judge Tony Randerson debated the application of a law which means journalists do not have to reveal their sources, unless there was a clear public interest.

The interview, in which an informant confessed to being involved in the burglary, was subsequently re-shot and broadcast with an actor delivering the lines.

Journalists had an important public watchdog role and that included talking to people who had important information to reveal but who would feel compromised if their identity was revealed, he said. .

As a fallback position, Mr Miles said the testimony was not necessary as prosecutors already had enough information to put the accused before a court.

Forcing the TV3 staff to testify would have a chilling effect, stopping people in such cases in future coming forward with important information, Mr Miles said.”

Mr Miles rejected suggestions the law was more to protect whistleblowers who went to media rather than people who may be admitting to a crime, saying the right to protect sources should only be overturned in extremely serious cases.

“If the Crown already has a case it thinks is good enough to put before a jury, it doesn’t need this top-up.

“This is not a case where the media is carrying out the function of being public watchdog, which is reason we have this protection in the first place,” he said.

But police lawyer Lance Rowe disagreed, saying the law was put in place to protect whistleblowers more than any other groups.

He said that under the law journalists could never promise absolute confidentiality to a source “unless they’re also promising to go to prison for contempt of court”.

“What is it exactly that’s being protected here?”

Mr Rowe said that the revealing of the identity of the person TV3 interviewed could play a major part in the prosecution and was therefore in the public interest.

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Mr Miles said TV3 was prepared to hand over transcripts of both the original interview with the informant and of the “interview” with the actor that was eventually broadcast

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Slippery fugitive William Stewart is styling himself “Billy the Hunted One” and appears to be enjoying his new-found notoriety.

A Teddington farmer, whose property was broken into by the 47-year-old, showed Stewart’s table-top calling card yesterday.

Stewart, who broke into the farm’s smoko room and helped himself to a meal the weekend before last, had carved his thanks into the dining table.

Stewart has been on the run since early February.

“Thanks guys, Billy the Hunted One,” he wrote.

He has five warrants for his arrest and is thought to have committed a string of burglaries and car thefts while on the run.

He has not been seen since he picked up hitchhikers in Hororata more than a week ago.

Police believed his latest crime was to swap a stolen car for a 2008 Hilux in Waddington, central Canterbury, on Tuesday.

“He helped himself to a nice meal of hot pies and coffee and wrote a thank-you note carved into the table.

The Teddington farmer, who declined to be named, said Stewart had been “sleeping rough” in the hills towards Gebbies Pass behind the property before he ventured down to the farm’s sheds.

“It was more that he had been watching and seeing where the keys were kept,” the farmer said.”

The fact that the door had not been forced but was opened using keys hidden on the property was unnerving.

The farmer said it was clear Stewart was “having a lot of fun and games”.

After carving his thanks, Stewart stole one of the farm motorbikes and blasted through a police cordon towards Governors Bay early on March 22.

However, police had called his antics “silly”.

However, police had called his antics “silly”. .

The Teddington farmer said Stewart, who had popped up in Tai Tapu the following day he evaded police in Governors Bay, obviously had some bushcraft skills as it was a long hike over the hills

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Afternoon nightmare at the Manor

The Friday, 27 February 2009

JONATHAN CAMERON/
TO THE MANOR BURNT: Due to a water shortage, firefighters had to use water from a school pool to extinguish this blaze at the historic Manor Cafe in Sanson.

An exploding LPGcylinder is thought to have started a massive blaze at a landmark restaurant near Sanson, drawing fire crews from around the district in an attempt to save the historic wooden building on State Highway 1.
Fire service shift manager Murray Dunbar said the two-storey building, which was badly damaged, was "well alight" when the crews arrived. .
Mr Dunbar said that, at one stage, all internal firefighting was stopped and crews withdrew to attack the blaze from above.
The fire is thought to have started when a gas bottle exploded inside the building which also offers backpacker accommodation and a nighttime maze horror attraction called "Nightmares".
There were no reports of anyone inside the building. Because of a water shortage, firefighters used water from Sanson School swimming pool.

. Several fire crews remained at the scene last night

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Airbus crash victim remembered

– Monday, 22 December 2008

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LEST WE FORGET: The remembrance service for Air New Zealand Airbus victim Jeremy Cook took place at Wigram Air Force Museum in Christchurch yesterday.

There is a point in every funeral when the crowd gets a collective lump in its throat and every eye fills with tears.
At a remembrance service for Air New Zealand Airbus victim Jeremy Cook in Christchurch yesterday, it was when his elderly mother took the podium.
Mothers should see the start of their children's lives but it was a cruel and unnatural thing when they saw the end, she said in a voice cracking with emotion.
"This goes beyond the natural order of life," Beryl Wride said.
The service concluded with a fly-past by a DC3 in honour of all the victims of the tragedy.
Cook, 58, who died in the Air New Zealand Airbus crash off the coast of Perpignan, France, last month, was remembered by a crowd of over 200 friends, family and work colleagues at the Wigram Air Force Museum yesterday.
Among the flying machines he loved, the speakers recalled a Civil Aviation Authority inspector who was diligent about safety but also a sharp-witted man known for his quick mind and sense of humour."
Beryl Wride said her son's mechanical bent made him "really love the job he was doing".
One friend recalled a noisy carload of hoons yahooing in a Lada had prompted Cook's observation that: "These cars just seem to get Lada and Lada. .
"How much better that he went swiftly to his death in full flight rather than he grow old and not be able to do what he loved, chained to this Earth," she said.
The bodies had yet to be identified.
French authorities announced yesterday they had recovered a sixth body of the seven people who died in the crash.
Yesterday, Air New Zealand chief executive Rob Fyfe praised the response of the French to the accident.
Yesterday, Air New Zealand chief executive Rob Fyfe praised the response of the French to the accident.
Clive Cook said Cook's passion for "machines of all kinds" was "legendary".
Wride said her son was mechanically minded from an early age and had a life-long love of cars, motor bikes, aircraft and engines.
"He took the mickey constantly, but he was never mean.
Sister Maggi Wride said her brother could appear solitary as he tinkered away on projects in his garage but the over-riding impression of the father-of-two was one of a jokester who could not resist a laugh.
His wife and two children were "the centre of his universe", she said."
Maggi Wride said Cook was a devoted family man and husband.
The DC3 was a familiar plane to Cook from his time spent working in Papua New Guinea.
The loss had devastated the family, leaving "a Jeremy-shaped gap" in all their lives.

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Climber had ‘no chance’

Saturday, 06 December 2008

Rescue came too late

Japanese mountain guide Kiyoshi Ikenouchi had no chance of surviving unprotected against the elements on Aoraki/Mt Cook, veteran climber Mark Inglis says.
Mr Ikenouchi, 49, was found dead, wrapped in a sleeping bag on the mountain face yesterday morning, an hour after his friend Hideaki Nara, 51, was flown to safety.
Mr Inglis, who lost his legs to frostbite in 1982 after spending 13 days in a crevasse in the same area, said the men would not have lasted long without their tent. The men had to abandon their tent near the summit on Thursday when it was crushed by snow..
"It's frustrating to think that [rescuers] came so close to saving the other man . It's a tragedy really," he said.. It went from a situation where they were nicely hunkered down and well equipped, but once they lost that tent it turned from a survivable situation to an extreme one. "[Mr Nara] was very lucky to survive."
At the mercy of 130kmh winds, Mr Ikenouchi kept talking to Mr Nara till he went silent about 1am yesterday.
"It's a reminder of how phenomenally harsh Mt Cook and New Zealand mountains are.
Mr Inglis said the men would have been lucky to hear a helicopter let alone realise the emergency provisions had been dropped and he compared the winds they would have felt to standing beside a speeding freight train.
Though a pack of emergency supplies – that included food, cookers, warm clothes and a radio – had been dropped right behind their tent on Wednesday, the men were not aware it was there. If it got hold, it would blow you right off the mountain.
"The wind reverberates right through you. ."
Conservation Department area manager Richard MacNamara said the rescue team was physically and emotionally exhausted after six days on standby.
The Japan Mountain Guides Association said he had been a professional guide in Japan for 10 years.
Mr Ikenouchi's family was reported to be planning to fly to New Zealand.
He is the 69th climber known to have died on New Zealand's highest peak. He had climbed Mt Aspiring in 2001 and Aoraki/Mt Cook in 2003.

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Rescued climber in ‘remarkable’ condition

at Mount Cook Village – Friday, 05 December 2008

SURVIVOR: Hideaki Nara is brought to Christchurch by Westpac Rescue Helicopter after his mountain ordeal.

Rescued climber airlifted to Christchurch

The climber rescued from Mt Cook/Aoraki this morning after a week-long ordeal which claimed the life of his guide is in "remarkable" condition, Christchurch Hospital staff say.
Hideaka Nara, 51, was airlifted to hospital this morning suffering frostbite, buthis climbing companionKiyoshi Ikenouchi, 49, perished overnight, just hours before the rescue helicopter arrived.
Christchurch Hospital staff saidNara was still undergoing tests this afternoon but he was in "remarkably good" condition.
The pairendured seven days at 3700m on the country's highest peak in ferocious weather conditions which prevented earlier rescue attempts.
Ikenouchi and Nara are understood to have lost their tent yesterday and may have lost a sleeping bag as well, leaving only one between them.
Despite suffering frostbite to his hands and face,Nara was able to walk to the helicopter.
The men spent last night in the open as their tent either became buried in snow or blew away, Police Inspector Dave Gaskin said.
But itmay not have made much of a difference in the end, as the pair were already very well equipped, he said.
Supplies were dropped near their camp yesterday, but Gaskin said rescuers confirmed this morning the pair did not know they were there."
Senior Constable Brent Swanson said an improvement in weather this morning had made the rescue possible.
"Indications are that, if anything, they were over-equipped and that may have been one of the reasons why they were very slow in the first two days of their trip.
"The outcome wasn't 100 per cent, but it was 50 per cent.
He said he was comfortable with the decisions made during the week…''
Pilot Nigel Gee said it had been a "text book" rescue thanks to better weather conditions..
It was "extremely hard" to know that Mr Ikenouchi died within hours of rescuers reaching him, he said.
DOC area manager Richard MacNamara said the week of waiting had been very stressful for the search team."
Mr Ikenouchi – who helped in a rescue on the mountain five years ago -is the 69th climber known to have died on New Zealand's highest peak, and the seventh Japanese.
"The only good thing to come out of it is that at least there is some closure for the family.
The slow progress meant they were caught out by a mountain storm and forced to bivouac at high altitude.
The pair were attempting Mt Cook's Grand Traverse, climbing from the Hooker Valley to the South Peak, summiting from there, before heading down to Plateau Hut.30am.
The conditions finally cleared this morning and the rescue team flew in by helicopter at 5.
"It's pretty perilous sort of stuff," said Gaskin.
"It's pretty perilous sort of stuff," said Gaskin.
– with