Two a penny

.

Krisitn Dunne-Powell believes Tony Veitch’s team tried to “break” and intimidate her with a smear campaign to dig up dirt and discourage her from giving evidence.

Veitch, who was earning $500,000 a year in his high-profile broadcasting roles, amassed a powerful team to defend the assault charges, hiring a private investigator, a top media adviser and a senior legal team, including a $900-an-hour Queen’s Counsel.

“And when they found that wasn’t going to happen and I was holding my ground, he blinked first.

“I believe they wanted me to break, they wanted me to pull out, they wanted me to not make depositions on Monday,” Ms Dunne-Powell told The .

Team Veitch comprised lawyers Stuart Grieve, QC, and Doug Alderslade, celebrity media minder Glenda Hughes, and former police officer turned private investigator Brian Sloan. . Six other assault charges were dropped in a plea bargain.

Veitch pleaded guilty on Thursday to one count of injuring Ms Dunne-Powell with reckless disregard after he kicked her as she lay on the ground, breaking her back.

“I did some investigating and I went and I dug and I went through records and I went through disclosure and you know what .

Veitch confirmed he investigated Ms Dunne-Powell as he prepared to defend the charges…

Asked if he was digging for dirt, he said he was seeking “evidence”. I had a good time and I found stuff,” he said.

He cited “legal constraints” for not doing so.

“There are things that I believe haven’t been made public that probably should have and there’s things about that night that I would love to be able to tell you,” he told TV One’s Close Up.

Ms Hughes said yesterday that the investigation was “standard practice”.

Team Veitch subpoenaed Ms Dunne-Powell for her 2008 phone records. What we were obviously examining for in the evidence is inconsistencies in her story.

Ad Feedback –>
loadAd(’300×250′,’STORYBODY’,300,250);

“We obviously went through all the evidence and we checked it, and that’s what the investigation was about.”

Ms Dunne-Powell said it was a “horrible feeling” to have Mr Sloan snooping around digging for dirt.

“There is a huge difference between what is normal process and snooping around and dirt-digging.

“It did feel intimidating.

She stopped going to her favourite haunts after he was seen there.”

But she is adamant she was not running scared.”

But she is adamant she was not running scared. “I was going ahead for depositions and I was prepared for what they were going to do to me.

“I had had to accept that it was going to be public and it was going to be humiliating and just devastating. But I was going to do it.

“That was really about me accepting that nothing I’ve ever done, nothing I’ve ever done in my life, was that bad and nothing has been deserving of this.”

She said she accepted the plea bargain because it was important to her that Veitch admitted the assault.

“Him saying he was guilty was much more powerful to me [than the judgment of a jury of 12 strangers] because he was there.”

Auckland journalist Stephen d’Antal, who had spoken to Ms Dunne-Powell about the case before she complained to police, was served with a court summons by Veitch’s defence team.

He believed Team Veitch was running a campaign to intimidate Ms Dunne-Powell and her supporters.

A private investigator had knocked on his door at 9.30 one night to deliver a court summons and he believed another court witness was visited even later at night.

“It just seemed very deliberate to me,” he said.

“I think it was trying to unnerve and unsettle the prosecution and Ms Dunne-Powell to try and get her to back down.”

.

Three Benneydale siblings were groomed for a life of crime and had a “horrendous and violent upbringing”, a court has heard.

Judge Phillip Connell made the comments in the Te Kuiti District Court while sentencing Joshua Cloke, 25, sister Kelly Cloke, 24, and their younger brother, Chazas Cloke, 22, on burglary charges on Thursday.
Kelly Cloke’s lawyer, Andrea Jones, said her client had a tumultuous background which, in turn, contributed to her impulsive behaviour.
The trio had earlier admitted the burglary of an industrial building in Te Kuiti last year, adding to an extensive list of convictions.
Judge Connell said the Cloke siblings had a limited education and were “groomed by adults to become career criminals”.
She featured in the in 2002, graduating from the Youth Court to the District Court as a 17-year-old. Kelly Cloke was convicted on a range of other matters. He said Joshua and Kelly Cloke’s offending, in particular, were aggravated by their extensive criminal history.
Joshua Cloke, who has 38 previous burglary convictions, took exception to the judge’s comments and was removed after a series of outbursts. .
Kelly Cloke was jailed for nine months, and Chazas Cloke, who admitted to being the group’s ringleader, was ordered to complete 360 hours of community work. He later returned to apologise to the judge and was sentenced to 12 months’ jail. All four were ordered to pay $550 reparation.
A co-accused Richard Wi, 18, was sentenced to 100 hours’ community work.

Ad Feedback –>
loadAd(’300×250′,’STORYBODY’,300,250);

.
Searchers find body near Te Anau

By MARK HOTTON – Thursday, 22 January 2009

Searchers looking for a missing Ultimate Hikes guide on the Greenstone Track have located a body.
Te Anau police were unable to say whether it was the missing man and could not confirm the identity of the body.
A search began last night about 7pm for the guide after he failed to return for dinner as planned.
The search party included a helicopter which conducted several sweeps of the area as well as a search team on foot. He had been working near the MacKellar Lodge, north of Te Anau, but had not been with a hiking group.
The track is in the Greenstone Valley. . It is the second lodge in from the Greenstone carpark.
Searchfor missing guide
A search began earlier todayfor a missing Ultimate Hikes guide on the Greenstone Track, near the MacKellar Lodge, north of Te Anau.
Queenstown-based Ultimate Hikes operates guided walks on the Milford, Routeburn and Greenstone Tracks.30pm.
Trojan Holdings director Mike Davies, which owns Ultimate Hikes, said the guide was working on his own yesterday and failed to return at dinner time as he had previously indicated by radio at 3.
The alarm was raised at 7pm last night and a search launched.
He had not been with a hiking group. Senior Ultimate Hikes management were flown in to join the search party at 8pm. Senior Ultimate Hikes management were flown in to join the search party at 8pm. The search is being coordinated by Te Anau police.
The search was called off around 10pm and resumed again at 4am earlier today.
It is the second lodge in from the Greenstone carpark. The track is in the Greenstone Valley. Queenstown-based Ultimate Hikes operates guided walks on the Milford, Routeburn and Greenstone

.
Crisis, what crisis? says millionaire developer

By TONY WALL – Sunday, 04 January 2009

Mulit-millionaire realestate agent, property developer and racehorse owner Don Ha is promising to pay all outstanding bills following accusations he has been slow to pay sub-contractors, some of whom say they had a miserable Christmas because they didn't get paid.
One South Auckland builder who worked on a Ha development said many families were suffering. . "He's promising this and promising that.
"He's threatening to put the company into liquidation if anyone pushes him, then no one gets any money. He asked not to be named because he was still hoping to receive his money."
But Ha denies there is any dispute and says he will honour all outstanding debts. It's getting heated.
Ha, who arrived in New Zealand from Vietnam as a penniless refugee and amassed a fortune estimated by the National Business Review at $50m, has built dozens of new homes in poor areas of South Auckland, some of which have not sold. He claimed he had not been affected by the economic downturn because he did not take risks and avoided taking out second mortgages. Only a handful of the properties sold at the auction and Ha was criticised by fellow agents when it was revealed that more than 20 were owned by him.
Last month he organised a "mega-auction" where 100 properties were put on the block. In conjunction with the Sunday Star-Times he ran a competition to name the horse, and it was eventually named Sun Ruler.
Ha rose to national prominence last year when he bought a colt by Zabeel out of the champion mare Sunline for a record $2m.
The Star-Times has learned that Ha took possession of a Maserati sports car worth close to $200,000 in 2008, though it is on finance.
Ha also sponsored the $200,000 City of Auckland Cup at Ellerslie on New Year's Day and said that was proof that he was not in financial trouble.
A source who is owed money but did not want to be named for fear of not getting paid said Ha had always been good at paying bills but had missed payments in the past few months.
It is understood one of Ha's development companies owes several hundred thousand dollars to one firm for a development in Mangere and has missed several large payments. He is behind but he's been making payments.
"I believe he will pay. A lot of people out there are having cashflow problems, he's not the only one. He is trying and is paying, albeit slowly. "No one's complained, everyone's happy."
Ha denied any dispute. There is an agreement that we will settle in the New Year, in January, they are happy with that. There is an agreement that we will settle in the New Year, in January, they are happy with that."
One of Ha's contractors speculated that he was suffering from the economic crisis, but Ha said he had been insulated from the crisis because he had no second mortgages.
"I know a lot of companies out there that can't pay their bills … that's not me. I don't have any second mortgages or finance company that finances me so I don't have that problem. If anybody has disputes with me they can come and get their money. As far as I know no one is not happy with me. I don't owe millions of dollars to anyone.
"I know it's tough out there for everybody, but not for me. I don't take that much risk."
He said if workers hadn't been paid it was probably because their employers, firms which had been sub-contracted to carry out work on his developments, were in trouble.
Property developer Rick Martin, of the Cornerstone Group, said Ha would have to be the only person in the industry who had not been affected by the economic downturn.
"You'd have to have fairly unusual circumstances for someone in the property industry not to be affected."

.
Pain continues long after the crash

By JO McKENZIE-McLEAN – Thursday, 01 January 2009

FRUSTRATION: Alice Downie says the psychological effects of her predicament have been hard to deal with.

People injured in road accidents are often forgotten in holiday road-toll reports, but the aftermath can be life-changing.
Alice Downie has more reasons than most to celebrate this holiday season.
The 29-year-old Christchurch mother-of-three held an "I survived party" on the first anniversary of her Boxing Day crash on State Highway 1 close to Tinwald. She is alive.
It left her wheelchair-bound, nursing a broken nose, fractured eye socket, nerve damage to her face, bruising to her brain, a broken elbow, two smashed knees, a broken femur, two broken ankles and fractures in her right foot.
Downie, of New Brighton, was returning from dropping her seven-year-old daughter to her father in Timaru when she was involved in a head-on crash.
She spent a month in Christchurch Hospital and was told she would not be able to walk again for a year. "I thought by a year I would be back to being normal, but it's far from that, really.
"They said at the beginning it would take a year, but I didn't imagine it would," she said. ."
Downie still uses a wheelchair or a walking stick.
"I'm still in quite a lot of pain and, walking around, my ankles get really sore. The things you take for granted, like to stand up from a sitting position, are still quite hard for me," she said."
Downie still requires a nanny to help look after her children, has to make regular physio trips to Burwood Hospital and is still on medication."
Downie still requires a nanny to help look after her children, has to make regular physio trips to Burwood Hospital and is still on medication. The biggest thing is not having much energy.
"It plays havoc with your body and head space.
"It is quite isolating. That's still really apparent. It's frustrating because you just can't do what you used to and live how you do normally. You just want to be back to normal.
Her daughter refused to travel to Timaru to visit her father for Christmas, she said."
The psychological effects had been harder to deal with than the physical pain, for not only her but her family, she said. "It's almost scarier the fact it wasn't a drunk driver or someone acting foolishly because you could justify it.
"She has point-blank refused to go, so it's caused trauma for her, not wanting to go anywhere in case something happens again," Downie said."
Downie recently met the other driver involved in the crash, an Auckland woman, through a restorative justice programme."
Downie recently met the other driver involved in the crash, an Auckland woman, through a restorative justice programme.
She had hoped the meeting would bring closure but found the process "traumatising".
"It really stressed me out and I felt through the whole process of it they didn't want to really hear about the effect it all had on my life," Downie said. "It was all about money. Instead of being all about how it's messed up my life, it was more about what I have lost financially.
"For me, I took pictures of my kids and said, `This is what I have lost out on, basically being a parent to my children. That's my biggest concern'."
Downie had decided to focus on the positives. "I just feel really lucky I have a really supportive family. I could not imagine what it would be like for people with no support network."

.
Judas sheep has followers and detractors

– Tuesday, 16 December 2008

Scientific advances are turning the black sheep of a family into the Judas sheep.
New Zealand police have just obtained their first conviction through familial DNA testing – a controversial technique that sees scientists take samples from crime scenes and run them through DNA databases for full, as well as partial, hits.
A full hit means the test has found the likely offender.
Like the Judas sheep leading the rest of the flock to slaughter, that relative and their past criminal conviction could now send a kinsman to prison. A partial hit means a family member or relative of the person with that match is likely to be the culprit.
A British woman who gave a sample after a minor infraction unwittingly paved the way for police to arrest her brother, who had raped and sexually brutalised women for 20 years.
The breakthrough in forensic technology has seen police overseas solve long-standing cases through the misdeeds of others.
In the Christchurch District Court yesterday, the familial link led to Wayne Jarden pleading guilty to two rapes from 1988 and 1996.
Police expect to resolve other cases through familial testing, although they believe the technology will be used sparingly.
Jarden's brother, Kevin Moana Jarden, was sentenced to preventive detention in March 2004 for sexual crimes involving several young girls.
They warn the technique could see innocent people from large families routinely questioned for the misdeeds of relatives. .
They also fear transfer of DNA – the inadvertent contamination of a sample with someone else's DNA — could expose many innocent people to unnecessary scrutiny. Because of adoption, they may not even know those relatives existed.
New Zealand police contract forensic work to the Crown-owned entity Environmental Science and Research (ESR), which has been able to carry out forensic familial DNA testing for just over a year.
New Zealand police contract forensic work to the Crown-owned entity Environmental Science and Research (ESR), which has been able to carry out forensic familial DNA testing for just over a year.
"We're very mindful that we don't want to use and abuse that particular ability.
"It's only a handful of cases where we would want to," Walker said."
Jarden broke into a St Albans house in 1988 and dragged a 27-year-old woman into her dining room, where he tied her to her table with strips of material cut from a duvet on the washing line. We will only use it where it's serious offending, often historical, where we haven't been able to find the offender, and there is a need to try every avenue. During the attack Jarden tied a pillowcase over the woman's head with such force that she thought she would suffocate. He then lashed her legs to the table using belts he found in the house, before raping her. Despite the woman's pleas for mercy, Jarden raped the woman for several minutes before telling her not to tell the police.
In 1996, Jarden knocked on the door of a 90-year-old woman's single-bedroomed council flat, told her that he was her grandson, and barged his way in. She died three years after the attack.
The attack left Jarden's frail and elderly victim badly injured.
Jarden's DNA was not in police databases, meaning the cases remained unsolved until the development of familial DNA testing.
Jarden's DNA was not in police databases, meaning the cases remained unsolved until the development of familial DNA testing. A scan for partial matches in the database recorded hits on two of Jarden's relatives, meaning police could then pursue Jarden – a man who many years before they had considered as a possible suspect for the St Albans attack.
Yesterday, Jarden was remanded in custody for sentencing on April 3. He may be a candidate for preventive detention, a sentence reserved for the most serious offenders.
Civil Liberties chairman and Wellington lawyer Michael Bott said he had concerns about familial testing, and there needed to be a profound debate about its use before science ran ahead of society's views on human rights.
"There needs to be proper and due debate in a considered forum. There are a number of issues with familial DNA: not just the ethical issues, but there are a number of issues with forensic science and familial DNA. The worry is that if you haven't got an exact match, it's more of a guess, and what you have is a process of net-widening."
Bott is not alone in his concerns, and in both Britain and the United States doubts about the technique have been raised.
In Britain, where police have wider powers to collect DNA, fears have been raised that the state could move to hold a genetic record of every citizen, as well as visitors to the country — a possibility human rights groups have called chilling.
In the United States, where some states have banned the use of familial DNA testing, a major concern has been one of race.
A Columbia Law Review article on the science says it is not "racially neutral", as disproportionately high arrest and conviction rates for African-Americans and Hispanics mean people of that ethnic background are more likely than other demographic groups to be added todatabases, meaning innocent relatives are more likely to be investigated by law enforcement.
Bott said the science meant New Zealanders were becoming their brother's keeper.
"One of the great issues is that if the familial DNA process becomes accepted, if practised routinely, effectively you would be subjecting hundreds of New Zealanders innocent people who happen to be relatives of people in effect to life-long genetic surveillance."
The argument that if you had done nothing wrong you had nothing to fear was "the argument of Stalin and Big Brother", Bott said.
"The state is snooping on you is the point. Potentially, until you are cleared, you are a suspect … we are hocking off our civil liberties on the altar of law and order."
Walker said familial DNA testing was expensive and very manual and time-consuming, meaning police had restricted its use to serious offending where the crime was proportionate to the effort needed to secure a conviction.
"To be quite honest, it hasn't been particularly successful on the handful of occasions it has been used. There haven't been a handful of resolutions because it is obviously reliant on there being a family member in the database, and the database only has 1.5 per cent or thereabouts of the population of New Zealand in it. It's a very small database, so, while it is available to us, there are no guarantees," Walker said.
"It's not one that is going to be used in general investigative work, it's solely almost as a last resort-type situation where we see the need to resolve the crime because the nature of it is such that we have to look at that type of high-end work.
"It's not the first technique we'll use. It's something we'll try if everything else hasn't worked."

.
Neo-nazi a double killer

The Saturday, 06 December 2008

Mother tells of living five years in tears

"Abhorrent" neo-nazi white supremacist beliefs sparked the hate-killings of two men on the West Coast, it can now be revealed.
Hayden Brent McKenzie has had at least 21 years added to the four years he has already served in prison, before parole is possible.
The killings rank McKenzie alongside Graeme Burton as one of the few New Zealanders to have committed two unconnected murders.
First McKenzie killed a family friend he labelled a "faggot", and later he pinned the arms of Korean tourist Jae-hyeon Kim, staring into his eyes as another man allegedly choked the life out him. He was not caught till May 2004.
McKenzie, 31, is four years into a life term for the murder of eccentric homosexual James "Janis" Bambrough in 1999. In each case McKenzie led police to the body years after it had been buried.
Justice Simon France has lifted suppression orders that stopped McKenzie's dual role being exposed.
The sentence begins immediately, meaning McKenzie will serve at least 25 years.
McKenzie was sentenced in the High Court at Wellington yesterday to a second life sentence, this time to serve at least 21 years before parole is possible, for Mr Kim's murder in October 2003.
Crown lawyer Chris Lange said finding the body was of real value for Mr Kim's family, but the judge said it would have been unnecessary if not for other things McKenzie had done.
The non-parole period is four years longer than the Crown sought, in part because the judge viewed McKenzie's help in recovering Mr Kim's body as remedying a wrong, rather than being something to be "overly lauded".
His part in the killing of two people because of his abhorrent supremacist beliefs meant he represented a danger to which the public should not be exposed without a change in his attitude to the value of human life, Justice France said. He said McKenzie may be in jail for the rest of his life.
Mr Kim, 23, a South Korean economics student on a backpacking holiday in New Zealand, was picked up hitchhiking close to the Buller Bridge out of Westport by McKenzie and two other men in October 2003.
McKenzie sat apparently unconcerned as Mr Kim's mother broke down and beat her fist on a table as she told of her grief at losing her son in such a senseless way in a foreign country. Another man is yet to stand trial for his alleged role, but it was said that Mr Kim was grabbed in a choker hold.
McKenzie pretended his car was stuck and the others got out to push.
McKenzie grabbed Mr Kim's arms to stop his resistance. McKenzie said "Nein blut", German for "No blood".
Mr Kim's body was searched for money, then stripped and left in bush to be buried later. Police say McKenzie stared into the victim's eyes till he stopped struggling and fell to the ground. He was arrested in June this year and pleaded guilty to murder in October. .

.

.
Teacher, pupil hurt in fracas

By HARRIET PALMER – Thursday, 04 December 2008

A 15-year-old girl at Waitara High School has been suspended after a violent altercation with a female teacher on Wednesday.
Both sought medical help after the incident which the school says ended only when a student was pulled off the teacher by another student in the Year 10 class.
Police have not laid charges but they are investigating the incident.
While the school has accused the pupil of assaulting the teacher the father of the student claims the teacher was in the wrong. Both parties have complained to police.
"She shoved the teacher and continued to shove the teacher to the point she actually knocked the teacher to the ground and the teacher was on her back on the floor with the student thumping her.
Yesterday Waitara High School principal Jenny Gellen said the event had traumatised teachers and students, alleging the teacher had sustained serous injuries.
"That's when the teacher grabbed the student by the head yes, and tried to get her to the ground."
Ms Gellen said the confrontation began after the student refused to remove non-regulation socks. But the student was over her thumping her, if you imagine you were lying on the ground with a student over you thumping you repeatedly, you grab the student.
Ms Gellen said the student was suspended yesterday and her future at the school would be decided after a board of trustees hearing early next week. Then she had other pieces of clothing confiscated and became angry while trying to retrieve them from behind the teacher.
"She is an older teacher who has never, ever, ever had any problems like this.
She would not name of the teacher or explain the extent of her injuries except to say the were "serious". She is extremely well respected by the students and the staff and is absolutely passionate about our students," she said. She is extremely well respected by the students and the staff and is absolutely passionate about our students," she said. .
She said he verbally abused and threatened both her and the school. At home yesterday the student told the she was allegedly pushed and held by the teacher resulting in cuts, bruises and a sore, swollen neck.
But the student and her father said the school had not handled the incident well and the teacher should be held responsible.
"She said I was pushing her when I was leaning over, reaching. The incident has left her in a neck brace which she hopes will be off before the summer holidays."
The student said the tussle continued with the teacher refusing to let go of her until she "started getting angrier and I took a few hits at her". I got upset in front of the whole class that I had pushed her and then I tapped her and sat her back down on her seat, reached over again to get my stuff and she grabbed me and threw me into the overhead projector."
She said she woke up in pain yesterday and had been to the doctor twice.
"My friend told her to let go of me and she let go and ran out of the classroom and tripped and knocked some desks over. "It's not fair, if your parents can't hit you why should teachers have rights?"
Her attitude to the school was that they had "not been good". "It's not fair, if your parents can't hit you why should teachers have rights?"
Her attitude to the school was that they had "not been good".
"I don't want to go back" she said.
The student's father was furious over the incident.
"Teachers are supposed to have self-control. Excessive force has been used here by a grown up on a minor and it doesn't matter where it's going to go, I'm going to take this adult to court.
"No one has got a right to lay their hand on a child in their care."
He said if his daughter had been telling the truth about the incident the teacher had no right to take her clothing off her.
The father described his daughter as someone good around the home who took care with her schoolwork and was non-violent.
"She's not a liar. She's got a mouth on her but she's not a liar," he said.

.
Trusts feel the pinch as crunch hits

By ESTHER HARWARD – Sunday, 30 November 2008

The NorthIsland's biggest community funder has halved its grants pool after losing $155 million since April in the global financial crisis.
ASB Community Trust's chief executive Jennifer Gill told the Sunday Star-Times the trust planned to cut funding from $61m in 2007 to $44m this year, but has now decided to spend just $33m and expects "more drastic" cuts next year.
Gill said the 30% drop in world equity markets was affecting close toly all 12 community trusts – except for TSB Community Trust, which wasn't deregulated with the rest of the country's trustee banks in the mid-1980s.
"Anybody who relies on endowment funding to deliver grants to the community will be affected.
Gill said community groups would be hit hard." Community groups would have to look at sharing office space, resources and equipment, and harnessing more volunteers, she said. It's going to affect the family trusts just as much, it may well affect local authorities.
ASB Community Trust funds projects that reduce poverty and disadvantage, protect the environment, preserve heritage, support art and culture, encourage sport, boost recreation and improve educational outcomes in Auckland and Northland. . It has $1 billion worth of investments.
The trust's losses follow Bay of Plenty community funder BayTrust's announcement that it was freezing grants.5b invested.
On Wednesday, BayTrust announced it was temporarily suspending grants following a fall in investments from $130m to $114m. Southland Community Trust is understood to have also been hit hard. This has affected 54 organisations so far. This has affected 54 organisations so far.

.
Trusts feel the pinch as crunch hits

By ESTHER HARWARD – Sunday, 30 November 2008

The NorthIsland's biggest community funder has halved its grants pool after losing $155 million since April in the global financial crisis.
ASB Community Trust's chief executive Jennifer Gill told the Sunday Star-Times the trust planned to cut funding from $61m in 2007 to $44m this year, but has now decided to spend just $33m and expects "more drastic" cuts next year.
Gill said the 30% drop in world equity markets was affecting close toly all 12 community trusts – except for TSB Community Trust, which wasn't deregulated with the rest of the country's trustee banks in the mid-1980s.
"Anybody who relies on endowment funding to deliver grants to the community will be affected.
Gill said community groups would be hit hard." Community groups would have to look at sharing office space, resources and equipment, and harnessing more volunteers, she said. It's going to affect the family trusts just as much, it may well affect local authorities.
ASB Community Trust funds projects that reduce poverty and disadvantage, protect the environment, preserve heritage, support art and culture, encourage sport, boost recreation and improve educational outcomes in Auckland and Northland. . It has $1 billion worth of investments.
The trust's losses follow Bay of Plenty community funder BayTrust's announcement that it was freezing grants.5b invested.
On Wednesday, BayTrust announced it was temporarily suspending grants following a fall in investments from $130m to $114m. Southland Community Trust is understood to have also been hit hard. This has affected 54 organisations so far. This has affected 54 organisations so far.