1. Past catches up with drug kingpin
An international drug kingpin who fled New Zealand while on bail more than a decade ago has been convicted of smuggling huge shipments of Ecstasy to an Auckland godfather of crime.
The Herald can also reveal that Rokas Karpavicius was locked up in Spain on drug trafficking charges while on the run from New Zealand authorities, but freed for lack of evidence before he was eventually caught and extradited back to the other side of world.
Rokas Karpavicius lived in luxury while on the run.
2. Man, 89, charged over 216,000 deaths
The main gate of the Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz I, Poland. Photo / AP
A decade after a court ruling allowed him to live out his quiet, middle-class life in the US, an 89-year-old Philadelphia man faces possible extradition to Germany on charges he aided in the killing of 216,000 Jewish men, women and children at a Nazi death camp.
Johann "Hans" Breyer, a retired tool-and-die maker, is being held without bail on allegations stemming from his suspected service as an SS guard at Auschwitz during World War II.
US marshals arrested him on Tuesday local time outside his home in northeast Philadelphia, acting on a warrant signed last week by a federal magistrate.
3. Bought for £100, tipped to fetch $900k
Family member Ian Squire at the house owned by sisters Rehutai Gundry, 90, and Fay Gundry, 88. Photo / Dean Purcell
A tiny, almost untouched 100-year-old cottage with its original toilet and bath still under the house will likely sell for close to $1 million, despite needing a major renovation.
Sisters Rehutai Gundry, 90, and Fay Gundry, 88, lived at the two-bedroom home all their lives until recently moving into a resthome.
Their brother Ian Squire, who is selling the 80sq m property at 66 Palmerston Rd, said they are thought to have been one of the first Maori families in the Birkenhead Point area.
The house, built as a working man's cottage for the nearby Chelsea Sugar Refinery, featured in local history books A History of New Zealand Architecture in 1991 andBirkenhead: The Way We Were in 1993 because it was the only house in the area in its original state.
Until three years ago, the house did not have an inside toilet or shower.
4. Teacher admits assault on pregnant woman
Terynne Dunn
A Whangarei teacher has admitted kicking her estranged husband's pregnant partner in the face at a junior rugby match.
The violence erupted when the teacher, Terynne Whitney Mills-Barber Dunn, 28, was talking to her estranged husband Warren Dunn, and the pair was joined by Mr Dunn's partner Rauwinia Wycliffe, who was 14 weeks pregnant.
Dunn had given birth to Mr Dunn's child six weeks before the confrontation that resulted in her arrest.
5. The Diary: Does John need a woman?
John Campbell. Photo / Greg Bowker
Is trouble brewing behind the scenes at MediaWorks about the state of current affairs on TV3? A well-informed source tells The Diary there is a level of concern at "very senior levels" about daily current events show Campbell Live and whether adding a female co-host could be a solution.
- nzherald.co.nz, NZ Herald, AP, Northern Advocate