Stories by Anneke Smith

As the country prepares to debate proposed hate speech reforms, Al Noor Mosque is being targeted with fresh threats of violence.

Health experts say they are mystified over the government's reluctance to enforce mandatory mask wearing and QR code scanning under alert level 2.

Four prominent politicians have been enshrined in surprisingly-flattering puppet caricatures at Wellington's Backbencher pub.

The Minister of Trade and Export Growth Damien O'Connor says he hopes to make solid progress on free trade agreements on his visit to the UK and EU next week.

The man who murdered the British backpacker has been named as Jesse Kempson, and it can now be revealed he has been convicted of a raft of sexual violation offences.

Grace Millane's killer has lost an appeal against his conviction and sentence but still cannot be named after a bid to the Supreme Court to keep his identity secret.

A man who raped a woman in an Auckland motel has been jailed for three and a half years.

Jarome Fonua, 26, was among a dozen people arrested after a series of gang raids last April that seized $4 million worth of assets.

A man has been jailed for seven and a half years for subjecting his ex-girlfriend to months of physical, sexual, emotional and financial abuse.

Substantive arguments on an application for continued name suppression were heard by Judge Deidre Orchard in the North Shore District Court this morning.

Four men charged over the death of a man in Manurewa's Jellicoe Park will go to trial next year.

The sportsman named in a criminal drug syndicate trial will have continued name suppression after the application was filed, and a decision could take some months.

The top District Court judge has announced a fresh approach to the way the country's busiest jurisdiction operates.

Man who stabbed ex-wife to death in West Auckland found guilty of murder.

A man convicted of raping a woman in an Auckland motel has lashed out at the judge who found him guilty.

The Crown says a man verbally abused and emotionally blackmailed a woman before raping her, but his lawyer says the pair had consensual sex.

A woman who says she was raped by a man in an Auckland motel has been accused of fabricating her story.

A man who threw his stepson at a sofa, causing injuries that later killed him, has been jailed for nearly six years.

The two people charged in the New Zealand Foundation case have pleaded not guilty and elected trial by jury.

The former flatmate of a man on trial for stabbing his ex-wife to death says the accused was "fixated" on killing the woman and showed a box full of weapons.

A man accused of killing a 10-month-old baby boy in Manurewa last month has pleaded not guilty.

A man accused of murdering his ex-wife with a hunting knife in broad daylight on a suburban West Auckland street has gone on trial.

A man accused of physically and sexually abusing his ex-girlfriend has been found guilty on all of the charges he faced.

The judge presiding over the trial of a man accused of physically and sexually abusing his ex-girlfriend has reserved his decision.

The lawyer for a man accused of physically and sexually abusing his ex-girlfriend has pressed his accuser over recollection of violence frequency.