Police today apologised for arresting a Tokoroa woman more than five years after she lost her job when she was wrongly charged with conspiracy to commit arson and two years after the police watchdog found the investigation was botched.

For many of us, Tokoroa is a place you drive through... quickly. But the timber town has heart, and house prices to make Auckland eyes water, writes Bruce Morris.

A student had a knife held to his throat by a man who threatened to cut off his fingers and kill him if he didn't give him $100 to buy P.