{"id":254503,"date":"2026-01-27T18:02:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-27T18:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/254503\/"},"modified":"2026-01-27T18:02:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T18:02:11","slug":"charges-dropped-against-former-university-of-otago-pro-chancellor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/254503\/","title":{"rendered":"Charges dropped against former University of Otago pro-chancellor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"vwaNpWtPaxhXkxNi\" style=\"display:none\">Judge Parsons said it was on that basis there were grounds for the charges to be dismissed, and Aitken was acquitted.<\/p>\n<p class=\"vwaNpWtPaxhXkxNi\" style=\"display:none\">Interim non-publication orders lapsed at the conclusion of proceedings.<\/p>\n<p class=\"vwaNpWtPaxhXkxNi\" style=\"display:none\">Aitken had previously pleaded not guilty and had been on bail since the charges were filed in November 2023.<\/p>\n<p class=\"vwaNpWtPaxhXkxNi\" style=\"display:none\">Court documents show the charges relate to alleged offending in Dunedin between August 1993 and August 1995.<\/p>\n<p class=\"vwaNpWtPaxhXkxNi\" style=\"display:none\">Ben Tomsett is a multimedia journalist based in Dunedin. He joined the Herald in 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Judge Parsons said it was on that basis there were grounds for the charges to be dismissed, and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":254504,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[74,9092,1558,1873,6376,28157,6788,147189,2740,20053,111,43,139,69,1118,28703,9629,147188,147190,17703,1528,3608],"class_list":{"0":"post-254503","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-after","9":"tag-against","10":"tag-been","11":"tag-charges","12":"tag-dismissed","13":"tag-dropped","14":"tag-dunedin","15":"tag-exuniversity","16":"tag-former","17":"tag-lawyer","18":"tag-new-zealand","19":"tag-news","20":"tag-newzealand","21":"tag-nz","22":"tag-of","23":"tag-offending","24":"tag-otago","25":"tag-prochancellor","26":"tag-redeemed","27":"tag-sexual","28":"tag-university","29":"tag-were"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254503\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}