Police watchdog scathing of former top cop Andrew Coster on McSkimming case

Other allegations about Jevon McSkimming include he misused a police credit card, made use of police property to further a sexual relationship, and threatened to provide an intimate visual recording to other people if the woman made a complaint about him

Jesus wept, it just gets worse…

Former top cop Jevon McSkimming admits having child exploitation, bestiality images on work devices

…and worse…

Damning report into police ‘rot’ leaves uphill battle to restore trust

During his nearly five-year stint as police commissioner, Andrew Coster made much of the importance of policing by consent.

“We rely on the support of most of the community to be successful, and that depends on the way we operate and on the extent to which people feel that they can trust us and that what we’re doing is appropriate,” Coster told E-Tangata in a 2023 interview, having previously sparred with opposition MPs in defence of the concept.

It is darkly ironic, then, that Coster’s tenure will now be defined by the serious damage that he and his leadership team have done to public trust in NZ Police, after a scathing report into how the force handled claims of sexual offending levelled against disgraced former deputy commissioner Jevon McSkimming.

When the alleged victim lodged three formal complaints through an online reporting portal in April 2024, she would have hoped to have her concerns taken seriously and investigated.

Instead, as the Independent Police Conduct Authority concluded, the police response was “characterised by inaction and an unquestioning acceptance of Mr McSkimming’s narrative of events” – that of a consensual affair that had ended badly and led to a campaign of harassment against him.

Not only were the woman’s allegations not properly investigated, she was herself arrested and charged with violating the Harmful Digital Communications Act, with the case only dropped in September this year.

Among those criticised by the Police Conduct Authority is Coster, who failed to disclose his knowledge of McSkimming’s relationship with the woman and the misconduct allegations when part of a panel that ultimately appointed him as a statutory deputy commissioner in 2023.

After a senior officer raised concerns in September 2024 about the failure to investigate the allegations against McSkimming through the usual police complaints process, Coster brushed them aside as anonymous and “sent from a variety of email addresses with made-up names”.

…Coster hid details of all of this from Mark Mitchell the Police Minister FFS!

McSkimming’s bestiality and child sex porn was only exposed after he was investigated for the complaint made against him, if there had been no investigation, that may never have come to light.

The cover up and the bewildering attempt to prosecute the woman who made the complaints just compound this nightmare.

The current move now is to claim, ‘a few bad apples’, but with a wider investigation of police using work devices to watch porn alongside the case of police falsifying breath tests…

Extent of police falsifying breath tests ‘unfathomable’ – employment lawyer

One of New Zealand’s leading employment lawyers says she’s never seen anything on the same scale as the investigation into 120 police officers who were involved in falsifying alcohol breath tests across the country.

Employment lawyer Barbara Buckett says the number of staff and the fact it occurred across the country points to wider problems within the organisation.

“There must be something there that police have to look to in terms of its own leadership and its own culture within the organisation, because it needs to ask some hard questions about accountability, consistency and environment which contributed to the behavior, if it’s to this extent.

“That’s what seems to be unfathomable, the number and the geographical spread of it.”

RNZ earlier revealed about 120 staff were under investigation after 30,000 alcohol breath tests were “falsely or erroneously recorded”.

…there is a real problem inside the NZ Police.

We have pretended for a very longtime that there was no corruption in our Police Force, that illusion has been shattered this week.

I have seen Police corruption in this country, time and time and time again but even I’m surprised by the scale of this.

The danger is that we now have Cartel linked organised crime in NZ and they specialise in blackmail and using these very types of abuses of power to gain leverage over Police and Detectives.

The NZ Police force grew out of the Mounted Constabulary, their job was to protect white settlers by beating the snot out of Māori at the edge of the settlement. NZ has always turned a blind eye to heavy handed police tactics because these heavy handed police tactics kept them safe at night, but with so little in the way of genuine oversight over the cops, corruption quickly follows.

The IPCA is a joke, it is barely any scrutiny and the only reason this has exploded in the way  that it has is because the cover up is so extreme there is no way for even the IPCA to fuck it up.

Real independent oversight with powers of investigation is way over due.

This is a reckoning.

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Bahahahahahahahahahaha, ACT fail to give their gun nut supporters machine guns…

‘So relieved’: Gun control advocates on Arms Act rewrite

Gun control advocates have breathed a sigh of relief after the coalition unveiled its long-awaited overhaul of the Arms Act.

The rewrite contains many changes, though most are relatively minor that either tweak or tighten existing gun regulations.

Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee fought to widen access to military-style semi-automatic (MSSAs) firearms but failed.

…suck it!

Suck it!

Suck it!

Suck it!

ACT have utterly failed and been pushed right back on their desire to allow their gun nut fetishists access to their favourite machine gun of choice.

No more AR-15s for ACT Party gun fruits.

The Gun nutters put McKee into ACT and put enormous amounts of money into ACT coffers to change the laws so they could get their machine guns and this destruction of their cause means their attempts are over.

Their attempt to pretend fake stalking competitions would allow these machine guns back into the country was always a joke, and as ACT lose more political ground to NZF, their power gets weaker and weaker.

ACT have nothing to show for their time in office other than race baiting Universities, if they manage to pass the Regulatory Standards Bill, that has been promised to go as soon as labour take office.

This is an enormous blow to ACT and I’m loving every painful moment.

‘Suck it’ gun nuts, no sociopathic toys for you.

Hahahahahahahahahahhahaha!

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Labour – 33.3

National – 30.2

Greens – 9.2

NZF – 9.1

ACT – 8.6

MP – 3.3

When even the tainted Taxpayers’ Union Poll (Curia is not in the professional Pollsters standards collective) is saying Labour are beating National, you know shit just got real.

It’s all margin of error stuff right now but the trend is for Labour on the up.

No surprises that Māori Party have fallen over or that Labour took from the Greens for their targeted Capital Gains Tax.

There’s no way I believe ACT are that high when they are invisible.

The rumour mill however are all now leaning towards a National Party leadership spill.

Much plotting was done at Jim Bolger’s recent funeral which is ironic.

The phone calls are happening and the numbers are being taken.

The National Party factions realise 3 things.

1 – It has to be Luxon and Nicola Willis who go because it is Nicola’s insane economic direction that is killing them and Luxon’s wooden performance that its drowning them.

2 – It can’t be Erica because the National Party Mandarins know that we know.

3 – The compromise line up is Bishop as Finance with Louise Upston as leader.

With National now pushing a policy as overwhelmingly negative as Asset sales and with ACT losing their gun nuts, all Labour need to do is appear half rational.

This is a terrible Poll for the right to limp into the election year with.

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the Government have finally announced their response to soaring Meth use with a $30million project that includes new powers for organised crime, more money for rehabilitation and a focus on marine surveillance – will it be enough…

Praise as government launches plan to combat methamphetamine

There is widespread support for the government’s new action plan to combat methamphetamine use, with the Drug Foundation commending its “health-focused interventions”.

A mental wellness provider from Northland is also welcoming the news, saying it’s a “fantastic start”, and the chairperson of the Ministerial Advisory Group on Transnational and Organised Crime saying it was positive that multiple ministers were involved in order to address the issue in its “totality”.

On Sunday, the government announced what Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith called a “comprehensive action plan to combat methamphetamine harm in New Zealand”.

It is the result of the prime minister’s ‘meth sprint team’ made up of the ministers for justice, police, customs, courts and mental health, who were tasked with tackling the issue.

That came after a drastic rise in consumption of methamphetamine last year. RNZ investigated what community providers needed in response, which was largely more funding for grassroots solutions.

For almost a decade I have been blogging about the impact of the 501s on the domestic organised criminal landscape in NZ.

While politicians of every hue have claimed our gangs were the worst, turns out they were horribly wrong because the 501 syndicates have brought a level of criminal sophistication and uber violence from the Australian underworld that has seen murders and stand over tactics by the 501 syndicates as they have moved to take over the meth trade.

NZ has horribly dropped the ball on the new realities of organised crime.

The 501s use counterintelligence tactics adopted from South American Cartels, and they sell a cheaper, purer meth than the domestic gangs can sell.

What’s new now is the Chinese shadow banking infrastructure that allows syndicates to pay for drugs directly from Cartels.

The reality about the new FBI base in Wellington is an acknowledgement that we are out of our depth here and need FBI expertise to track these new criminal infrastructures.

501 syndicates talking to South American cartels will be intercepted by GCSB in co-ordination with the new FBI Base who will then turn the intel over to domestic Police so that we can side step laws to not spy on NZ citizens.

A point of meth in America costs $5, in NZ it is $100! That level of profit margin is a supply and demand equation that we can’t beat so the focus needs to go on the demand as much as the supply and on this front, the $30million is underwhelming.

The Government are committing to $30million over 4 years to tackle meth, of that around $2.5million per year will be spent on rehabilitation.

We currently spend $235million per year on addiction and it costs $18 000 for a 30 day rehab.

We know meth addiction can take up to 12months – meaning the 2.5m is a pittance to protect whanau and community from the carnage of meth.

The plan is a good first step because much of what will be done is hidden beneath the surface but it does highlight how utterly out of touch we have been over the 501s and their impact on the domestic gang landscape.

The counter intelligence tactics, criminal sophistication and uber violence combined opens NZ institutions up to corruption.

Take the McSkimming’s scandal. It’s this very type of situation that syndicates would use to blackmail officials, we are going to see far more senior detectives being bribed and customs officers being blackmailed by the syndicates and we don’t ahem any real answers to that problem.

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Watching Luxon and Winston attack each other over the economic meltdown they have created is just glorious…

Luxon brushes off Winston Peters’ asset sales attack

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has waved away New Zealand First’s criticism of National’s economic plan, saying Winston Peters has many entrenched views.

…firstly, how bad has shit gotten that all National have left is selling our public assets to cover up the disaster of their austerity program?

They have underfunded public services while borrowing billions for tax cuts, landlord tax loop holes, gas and oil subsides, tobacco subsidies and Michelin Star programs.

Their decision to destroy Labour’s infrastructure pipeline has had a cascade effect throughout the economy that has seen 73 000 flee the country and the destruction of 30 000 jobs in the construction sector.

National’s response to this is mass importation of cheaper labour from exploited migrant workers while allowing multi millionaires to buy $5million mansions.

Look.

NZ is 3 huge sparsely populated Islands.

We simply don’t have the population density for free market dynamics to generate the competitive advantages that they can provide, NZ has ALWAYS required the State to step in as the foundation stone.

National and ACT want to kick that foundation stone out from under us and pretend that’s not economic vandalism.

Unemployment reached a 9-year high of 5.3 percent, it’s 10.5% for Māori, 12.1% for Pacifica and 15.2% for 15-24year olds while an increasing number of disillusioned job seekers are opting out of joining the workforce altogether.

Winston is one of the best political players in the game, to date he has leaned heavily into culture war conspiracies to hate on the Trans, hate on the vaccines, hate on climate change, but he is smart enough to know that his knuckle dragging supporters can’t eat their hate and that the economy is suffering right  now.

He will have watched what happened recently in America and the crucifixion of Republicans in the most recent elections.

For example, of the 480-plus contested races in Allegheny County, which includes Pittsburgh, Republicans only won 11.

In Georgia, Democrats ousted two Republicans on the Public Service Commission, the party’s first capture of a non-federal statewide office in Georgia since 2006.

In Connecticut, Democrats took control of 28 towns from the GOP.

In New Jersey, Democrats won their biggest majority in the General Assembly since the Watergate era.

Much of the attention last Wednesday NZT focused on the Democrats’ big United States election wins in the Virginia and New Jersey governor’s races, as well as in the New York mayor’s contest.

But the party also won hundreds of lower-profile state and local contests – often swamping Republican incumbents with overwhelming turnout.

…I love this comment by a Republican strategist…

“I think we need to heed what the voters are telling us – they want us to focus on pocketbook issues, which is part and parcel of how Trump got elected in the first place,” Nicholas said.

“Perhaps we have run enough ads on the trans issue for a while.”

…Winston is sensing the same change in NZ.

Hating on the trans and the woke is fine and dandy while you have money in your pocket, but not even demented NZ First voters can pay the bills with their spite.

Winston is pivoting, he will know the numbers are being run on Luxon’s leadership and he is beginning his campaigning now.

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There is a dreadful disconnect between the Government’s policies and the extreme weather events that are generated by climate change that are hitting NZ.

Climate denier Trolls scream the extreme weather events are all natural.

Bullshit.

The planet continues to dangerously heat thanks to human pollution.

The Polluters employ Bot armies to denounce anyone who points this out and fund Think Tanks to constantly strangle any environmental policies.

We are seeing that in COP30 where 2000 polluter advocates are stopping any changes.

NZ is heating up, this means more fires, more extreme droughts and more land erosion when extreme rain hits those droughts.

What’s the Government’s response (other than bullshit Methane targets and prevent Climate Commissioner Oversight?), why cut Emergency services of course…

Emergency response roles on the chopping block with Government merger

FENZ aims to save $50m a year: ‘We can’t keep doing everything for everybody’

…cutting emergency responses when there is going to be a massive jump in emergencies is so inanely counter productive, but that’s the short term focus of Right Wing Governments who don’t believe climate change is real in the first place.

We need a massive upgrade of Civil Defence and far more resources spent on ensuring our infrastructure has the flexibility to withstand these types of extreme weather events.

We need RSAs and Maraes to be built up into Community civil Defence Hubs and we need a solar panel campaign to ensure a flexible electrical grid alongside better battery cell towers.

We need a Civil Defence that is far better resourced than they are now with permanent clean up crew staff on stand by because this doesn’t get better right?

The 230km hour winds we just experienced only get worse, as heat continues to pour into the atmosphere because of human made pollution, the extreme weather gets worse and worse, we need a new Civil Defence regime that reflects the reality of what we are seeing.

Dr Bryce Edwards highlights that the recent local council elections had lobby groups like ‘The Local Government Business Forum’ — a coalition including Business New Zealand, the New Zealand Initiative, and Federated Farmers — openly calling for voters to elect candidates with “commercial and financial acumen” and a “pro-growth and pro-development mindset”, part of the problem here in NZ is that business lobby groups can mask their polluter interests with dark Ag money that the wider electorate can’t see.

The reason the astro-turf alt-right are so focused on undermining local councils and Government is because the polluter interests that fund these groups want a Government so undermined that when the realities of climate change finally get into the heads of muddle NuZilind, there isn’t a Government with the capacity to do anything about the Polluters.

Most right wingers refuse to believe in climate change because in their ignorant tiny lives this is just another culture war issue where their feelings matter more than the actual science.

They refuse to believe in it because Left wingers are for it!

The danger for the polluters and the alt-Right is that with every passing year, the scientific evidence for climate change only gets stronger and the extreme weather becomes impossible to ignore, what this will do is force the political class to take the issue seriously.

There is a tipping point where even the climate deniers can’t ignore the realities of what we face.

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