NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / New Zealand

Rotorua man who impersonated police officer fails in bid to appeal convictions

Kelly Makiha
By Kelly Makiha
Multimedia Journalist·Rotorua Daily Post·
5 Jun, 2024 05:00 PM5 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

Te Pāti Māori calls allegations 'baseless', Auckland is leading the decline in housing and dangerous building notice extended by one month after man rips it up.

A Rotorua man who was convicted of two counts of impersonating a police officer has lost his bid to have his convictions quashed. The young man, who used flashing lights to try to pull over a car in one incident and broke up a fight claiming to be an off-duty police officer in another, was found with a car similar to an unmarked police car that had flashing lights installed and was festooned with aerials. Kelly Makiha reports.

Luke Irvine dreamed of working in emergency services.

He had a car that had a “striking resemblance” to an unmarked police car and was equipped with flashing amber lights on the front grill and rear and front windscreens.

It also had aerials around the car and a police-style radio installed in the vehicle’s console.

At his home he had a police scanner. He had become known to emergency services for arriving at the callouts they attended.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Court documents recently released detail the case of the now 21-year-old from Rotorua, who has taken his case to the High Court at Rotorua to appeal his convictions by Rotorua District Court Judge Greg Hollister-Jones on January 18 this year.

Judge Hollister-Jones convicted Irvine after he earlier pleaded guilty to two counts of impersonating a police officer in 2022 and 2023. He was fined $800.

On May 16, Irvine appealed his convictions because it was his perception his “dream” of employment with emergency services or private security firms would be terminated if he had convictions.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

In a judgment dated May 17, Justice Pheroze Jagose said Irvine suffered from type 1 diabetes and poor mental health. He was employed full-time as a loss prevention worker by a national retail chain, working to prevent thefts and shoplifting at the store in which he worked.

He said Irvine understood his dreams of working in emergency services were curtailed by his controlled diabetes. Justice Jagoze said he also understood Irvine’s applications for employment with the Department of Corrections and as a private security officer with other firms had already been unsuccessful “at least in part” because he had to disclose the active charges he was facing at the time.

He had also failed to be accepted for training as a police officer, to his “personal devastation”, and after that happened he became known to emergency services for arriving at incidents they attended.

What he did

On April 11, 2022, Irvine, who was 19 at the time, was stopped by police about 7.30pm after they saw him operating his vehicle’s flashing amber lights. Police considered he was attempting to stop another vehicle using the lights, the judgment said.

Just over a year later on July 24, 2023, Irvine was on Amohau St in Rotorua’s central city when he saw people fighting on a grass verge.

He pulled into a nearby carpark and ran to intervene in the fight. He told a security guard called in to help and a police officer who later attended that he was an off-duty police officer.

When the police officer questioned his status, his responses were initially aggressive and defensive but he was then apologetic.

A third charge was withdrawn, the judgment said.

The judgment noted Judge Hollister-Jones said at Irvine’s sentencing in January that Irvine didn’t seek to justify his offending, acknowledged it was wrong and it arose because of his desire to help people, which he felt was “like a compulsion”.

Irvine tried to get a discharge without conviction at sentencing but the judgment noted Judge Hollister-Jones said at sentencing the court would not hide matters that gave rise to charges from bodies that had a right to know.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

The judgment noted it was the judge’s view any emergency services Irvine applied to join in future had a right to know about the two charges, because those services dealt with vulnerable people and they exercised power.

“The defendant’s offending evidences obsessive behaviour and poor judgment and it is critical that if you want a job with an organisation like the police, Fire and Emergency New Zealand or as a private investigator, that those organisations know the full facts about the person,” Judge Hollister-Jones said at sentencing.

Can Irvine still achieve his dream job?

In the appeal judgment, Justice Jagose said convictions and discharges were both likely to be requested in any police vetting check.

He said it was “less resolute” that Irvine’s dream of working in emergency services or as a security guard was over.

He said the fact Fire and Emergency NZ didn’t employ anyone who had a conviction in the last seven years was a “guide only” and each application was assessed on merit. Hato Hone St John’s applicants should have a “clean criminal record” only as a “key skill” and its core values of having “open minds” suggested a wider appreciation of potential candidates, Justice Jagose said in his judgment.

Dishonesty convictions for anyone wanting to get a licence under the Private Security Personnel and Privates Investigators Act were “informative”, not determinative, Justice Jagose said.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

“Accordingly, I do not consider the consequences of Mr Irvine’s convictions are out of all proportion to the gravity of his offending. They instead are condign. The judge did not err. There is no miscarriage of justice.”

The appeal was dismissed.

Kelly Makiha is a senior journalist who has reported for the Rotorua Daily Post for more than 25 years, covering mainly police, court, human interest and social issues.


Save

    Share this article

Latest from New Zealand

Property

Watch: 'My raging backyard river' - North Shore homeowner fears stormwater torrent

11 Jul 06:00 AM
New Zealand

Watch: Shore homeowner fears raging backyard river, council says it can’t pipe stormwater

live
New Zealand

Fresh Auckland flood fears as high tide coincides with rush hour downpours

11 Jul 05:50 AM

From early mornings to easy living

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from New Zealand

Watch: 'My raging backyard river' - North Shore homeowner fears stormwater torrent

Watch: 'My raging backyard river' - North Shore homeowner fears stormwater torrent

11 Jul 06:00 AM

'Land eroding, health and safety of young kids has been at risk for the last three years'.

Watch: Shore homeowner fears raging backyard river, council says it can’t pipe stormwater

Watch: Shore homeowner fears raging backyard river, council says it can’t pipe stormwater

Fresh Auckland flood fears as high tide coincides with rush hour downpours
live

Fresh Auckland flood fears as high tide coincides with rush hour downpours

11 Jul 05:50 AM
'Serious injuries': Crash closes highway

'Serious injuries': Crash closes highway

11 Jul 05:30 AM
Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky
sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP