{"id":320415,"date":"2026-03-09T09:19:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T09:19:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/320415\/"},"modified":"2026-03-09T09:19:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T09:19:11","slug":"senior-first-responder-facing-child-exploitation-charges-continues-to-keep-name-a-secret","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/320415\/","title":{"rendered":"Senior first responder facing child exploitation charges continues to keep name a secret"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Christchurch<\/p>\n

\nThe man appeared via audio-visual-link at the Christchurch District Court on Monday.
\nPhoto: RNZ \/ Nate McKinnon\n<\/p>\n

A senior first responder facing child exploitation charges has elected to have a judge-alone trial.<\/p>\n

The man, whose name and occupation are suppressed, has pleaded not guilty to five charges relating to the possession and exportation of child exploitation material brought by Customs last year.<\/p>\n

The man appeared via audio-visual-link at the Christchurch District Court on Monday.<\/p>\n

He had previously elected a trial by jury but has now opted for a judge-alone trial.<\/p>\n

At a court appearance in September, it was revealed the man had been fired from his job<\/a>.<\/p>\n

His lawyer Craig Ruane said the man’s employment had been terminated because the charges “brought his employer into disrepute”.<\/p>\n

Ruane said his client had highly developed skills in his industry and publication would hinder him from obtaining employment.<\/p>\n

Judge Elkin agreed to extend the man’s interim name suppression until his trial because publication would cause extreme hardship.<\/p>\n

The man is on bail ahead of his next court appearance in April.<\/p>\n

Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero<\/a>, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The man appeared via audio-visual-link at the Christchurch District Court on Monday. Photo: RNZ \/ Nate McKinnon A…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":87245,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[48,47,42,43,49,46,44,45,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-320415","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-audio","9":"tag-current-affairs","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-podcasts","13":"tag-public-radio","14":"tag-radio-new-zealand","15":"tag-rnz","16":"tag-top-news","17":"tag-top-stories","18":"tag-topnews","19":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320415","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=320415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320415\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87245"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}