Inmates miss court due to snow

Two inmates being transported from a Wellington jail for a brief Napier court sitting  missed the fixture when the van was delayed by icy lower North Island road conditions yesterday.

In the High Court, Justice Forrest Miller went ahead with the procedural hearing, and the pair were remanded, along with five co-accused, for a pre-trial hearing on October 26.

The prison van was understood to have left Arohata Prison about 4am, and Justice Miller was told as the callover for the group started that it was still about 50km away from Napier.

The callover was for people arrested last December after the police Operation Prince drugs investigation, alleging links between Hawke's Bay methamphetamine dealing and the Hell's Angels gang in Auckland.

Their trial, on a charge of conspiring to supply methamphetamine and individual charges including supplying methamphetamine, has been tentatively set to start at the end of April next year, almost 17 months after the arrests.