News & Events

OPINION: As the ink dries on the Royal Commission’s report in abuse in state care, what must it be like for survivors to witness the Government’s direction on boot camps for young offenders? ‘Boot camps’ serve only one real purpose – they allow politicians intent on ignoring evidence to propel a vision that something is…

Late last year, former Marist Brother Charles Afeaki changed his plea, mid-trial, and admitted to 13 charges of sexual abuse of two 11-year-old boys in the 1970s. Former Marist Brother Charles Afeaki will be sentenced in May for his abuse of two 11-year-old boys in the 1970s. The wealthy Marist Brothers will pay out just $45,000…

When I first plunged back into postgraduate studies, I had no idea it would lead me here – to new perspectives that have unravelled not only my previous academic understandings, but also, understandings of myself, my identity, my intentions, and the world around me. From the confines of traditional, biomedical conceptions of mainstream psychology, to…

A Marlborough sports coach facing a raft of charges relating to sexual offences against children has had four more charges laid against him. The new charges relate to alleged events that happened between July 2014 and August 2022. The new offences are carrying out an indecent act on a child aged 12, and three charges…

A major police investigation into abuse at Gloriavale has identified more than 100 potential victims of crimes spanning about four decades, Stuff can reveal. The previously undisclosed and ongoing investigation, dubbed Operation Mathius, began in 2021, and followed another investigation that brought to light offending involving 60 people at the West Coast fundamentalist Christian community. Operation Mathius was launched…

Charles Afeaki, a Marist Brother and schoolteacher, was prolific in his sexual offending against his pupils in the 1970s. This month, he stood trial again on charges which have ruined his victims’ lives. Steve Kilgallon reports. Charles Afeaki walked slowly into courtroom 16 of Auckland District Court leaning on a cane. He was 81 years…

“From that day on, I was terrified,” an alleged victim of sexual abuse by Marist Brother and schoolteacher Charles Afeaki told an interviewing police detective. “I stopped learning at that class, I stopped learning at that school. I stopped learning forever.” Three hours of police video interviews with the complainant were shown to the court on the…

A female teacher at Auckland’s Dilworth School has been struck off the teacher’s register, after her sexual relationships with two students three decades ago came to light. The discovery was made in 2020 after police began investigating historical sexual abuse at the school. It’s alleged Julia Brown, who began teaching at the school in 1995,…

A Victorian jury has delivered a stinging rebuke to the Catholic Church, awarding $3.3 million to the victim of a notorious paedophile after the church argued compensation should be only $250,000. The Supreme Court case is the first time a civil trial against the Catholic Church has been tested before jurors. On Friday, the jury…

Best known for their door-to-door evangelising, Jehovah’s Witnesses are on a quest to save the ‘wicked’ from damnation. For victims of sexual abuse within the organisation, however, that quest has seen perpetrators shielded from justice. Amy Parsons-King has met several survivors as part of an investigation for The Spinoff. These are their stories. Everything changed…