Two men were taken to hospital after the car they were travelling in smashed head-on into a tree in Napier.

A man who kept diaries of sexual offences against boys and later admitted them in a Napier court yesterday became possibly the oldest person sent to jail in New Zealand.

A Hawke's Bay woman with terminal cancer was among those vying for a shot at the big time at X Factor auditions in Napier.

Two teenagers walking through suburban Onekawa in Napier on Saturday afternoon were told they would be shot if they did not hand over their cellphones.

Napier's central Intercity bus terminal is being described as shambolic, chaotic, an embarrassment, a nightmare and a disgrace.

A Hawke's Bay police constable who assaulted a woman after being accused of snorting drugs during a night out has resigned from the police force.

Three Napier brothers ran through a shower of hot, falling ash to wake neighbours and rescue an elderly woman from her burning home.

An independent review has found flaws in KiwiRail's decision to close the Gisborne to Napier line and suggests the tonnage needed to keep the route viable can be achieved.

A second sea lion has died in just over a month at Napier's Marineland when 22-year-old Makea failed to recover from a general anaesthetic on Friday.

An independent report aimed at proving the economic viability of the Gisborne to Napier railway line is expected to be released to the public this week.

A 20-year-old Hastings man was stabbed nine times in an early-morning attack at a Napier house on Sunday which police say was domestic related.

As fire tore through the house leaving her with nothing more than she was wearing, Maraenui woman Sharron Paramore collapsed to the ground in shock and tears.

Police say charges are unlikely for a man at the centre of yesterday's mass search for a family feared taken hostage, as no offences are believed to have taken place.

The search is over for a mother and her two children who were feared taken hostage by a man who was reportedly armed.

A person is understood to have died in a house fire in a remote rural area north of Napier last night.

A man who was sentenced to home detention after breaking his baby's legs will now have to serve more than two years in jail, after a court quashed the sentence.

A Napier man under the influence of drugs broke into a school garage because he thought he was on the set of the Lord of the Rings and had found a shed in a forest.

A yellow plastic watch could be a crucial clue in a police investigation into a broad daylight sexual assault on an 11-year-old girl in Napier.