The names of all involved remain suppressed until the man’s next court appearance, which is scheduled for July 9.
Police said earlier that the man and the deceased had all been living together and that they were not looking for anyone else.
One child was dead when emergency services were called to the house about 6am on a Sunday. The woman and the other child died after being taken to hospital.
Lawyer Elizabeth Hall today entered not guilty pleas to all three charges on the man’s behalf.
A three-week trial has been scheduled to start on August 30, 2027.
Justice Karen Grau told the man, who had a heavily bandaged left hand, that he would need to appear before the court in person at his next appearance.
Justice Grau was sitting in the Wellington court with another audio-visual link to the Napier courthouse, where Crown prosecutor Clayton Walker was situated and family members looked on from the public galley.
A statement released on behalf of the family on April 22 said they were “heartbroken and devastated by the tragic loss of our loved ones in Hastings”.
“They were deeply loved and will be missed beyond words,” the statement said.
Ric Stevens spent many years working for the former New Zealand Press Association news agency, including as a political reporter at Parliament, before holding senior positions at various daily newspapers. He joined NZME’s Open Justice team in 2022 and is based in Hawke’s Bay. His writing in the crime and justice sphere is informed by four years of frontline experience as a probation officer.
