news

Monday's news in 5 minutes.

1. ‘Mummy would never leave you’: Family of woman missing since July speaks of heartbreak.

Mother of three Kim Richmond disappeared in the early hours of July 31 from her remote farm in the Waikato region of New Zealand.

The 42-year-old has not been heard from since, and her family are desperate for answers, the NZ Herald reports.

Richmond’s mother, Raywynne Richmond, doesn’t believe her daughter – who has now been missing for seven months – is still alive, but wants to bring closure to her daughter’s young children.

“We don’t believe she’ll be alive. We’ve thought that from the beginning because she wouldn’t do this kind of thing,” she told the NZ Herald.

“I have told my little one [Kim’s daughter] ‘Mummy would never leave you. She loves you too much. Someone’s done something and hurt Mummy.’ But what can you tell them? We don’t know ourselves.”

The family called Kim’s mobile phone for two days after she went missing. Then, the phone stopped ringing and went straight to voicemail.

A police, land search and rescue and a specialist dive squad have searched for Kim since she went missing. Lake Arapuni was lowered, but nothing was found.

The only clue in relation to her disappearance has been the discovery of Kim’s bank card, found on a roadside 160km away from her home in early October.

Raywynne is pleading for members of the public to come forward with any information.

“Even if [you think it’s nothing] it could be something. We’ve never found a single thing, not a shoe, nothing,” she said.

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Kim was last seen wearing a Highlanders rugby jersey, blue jeans, a brown leather jacket and brown leather boots.

2. Teen victim of ‘British Fritzl’ says she thought she “loved” her abuser of 21 years.

A victim of Michael Dunn, known as the ‘British Josef Fritzl’, has revealed how she loved him despite 21 years of abuse, The Sun reports.

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The victim, known only as “Julie”, was just 14 when Dunn began to abuse her. He was jailed last week for 27 years for a string of sexual abuse offences.

Julie was held captive in a cavity Dunn had built behind his fridge so she would never be found by police, and despite admitting she was “terrified” of her abuser, she told The Sun “in a strange way I’d grown to love him and couldn’t break free.”

Julie first met Dunn when she was 13, when she started visiting him after school. A few months later, when she fled from her home, she sought Dunn’s help and he asked her to move in.

“Soon after I moved in he started touching me in places he shouldn’t. Even though I was just a child I knew it was wrong but I had nowhere else to turn so I kept quiet,” she said.

Julie – now 38 – said she moved out of Dunn’s home when she was 21, but could never end the relationship. She had three children with him – one when she was 17, the second at 25 and the third when she was 29.

She reported her former abuser to the police three years ago.

“I don’t know why it took me so long. I think I’d learnt to bottle it up but then I just cracked. Everyone has a breaking point,” she said.

“Looking back I can’t begin to explain the impact this has had on my life. I’ve never been able to trust anyone or hold down a relationship.

“I think about it every day. It’s ruined my life.”

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3. A Melbourne father of two has died while returning from Mount Everest’s base camp.

A Melbourne man has reportedly died while returning from the Mount Everest base camp in Nepal, 9 News reports.

It is understood the father of two died on Saturday, after he began to experience breathing difficulties upon his descent from the high altitude camp the previous day.

The man worked for a multinational tech company, it has been reported.

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Fairfax reports the man was not attempting to reach the summit of the mountain, but had been one of the tens of thousands of tourists who trek to the base camp each year.

The man’s family has been contacted.

4. More than 1000 childcare workers set to strike on International Women’s Day.

More than 1000 childcare workers across the country are set to walk off the job on International Women’s Day to protest the pay gap between male and female dominated professions, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.

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Dozens of childcare centres are planning to close mid-afternoon on Wednesday in what will be the largest walk-off by early childhood educators.

Early childhood educators earn as little as $20.61 an hour, which is about half the national average wage.

It’s also significantly less than workers in male-dominated professions that require comparable skills and qualifications.

“It’s women’s work and it’s undervalued,” said the childcare union United Voice’s assistant national secretary, Helen Gibbons.

“It does bring people enormous joy and satisfaction but love doesn’t pay the bills.”

It is believed skeleton staff will remain on duty at childcare centres where parents are unable to pick up their children early during the strike.

5. Two Melbourne men have drowned in a lake during a ‘drunken swim’.

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Two men have drowned in a lake in Melbourne after going for a ‘drunken swim’, the Herald Sun reports.

Victoria Police Search and Rescue found the bodies of the men – one aged 29 and another 19-year-old man – between 9:30 and 10pm last night.

Police say the men had been drinking with another friend when they attempted to swim across the lake at Redleap Reserve.

“About 5.30 this evening three males who had been ­consuming an amount of ­alcohol have taken it upon themselves to try and swim across the lake here,” ­Detective Senior Sergeant Mark Smith said.

“Unfortunately, probably because of the effects of ­alcohol, two of them have got into trouble while swimming across the lake.”

The third man attempted to swim to save the others, but after feeling the effects of alcohol in the water, returned to shore and asked a passer-by to call police for help.

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Police initially spent 15 minutes in the water searching for the missing pair before a full-scale search operation was launched.

6. President Trump wants Congress to investigate his Obama ‘wire-tap’ claims.

President Donald Trump has called on the US congress to investigate his claims that the Obama administration abused its investigative powers during the 2016 election by ‘wire-tapping’ his office phones, CNN reports.

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“Reports concerning potentially politically motivated investigations immediately ahead of the 2016 election are very troubling,” White House press secretary Sean Spicer said in the statement, which he also posted on Twitter.

“President Donald J. Trump is requesting that as part of their investigation into Russian activity, the congressional intelligence committees exercise their oversight authority to determine whether executive branch investigative powers were abused in 2016.

“Neither the White House nor the President will comment further until such oversight is conducted,” he said.

The request comes just one day after the President accused former president Barack Obama of tapping the phones in Trump Tower in a series of tweets.

“Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!” he tweeted.

“Is it legal for a sitting President to be ‘wire tapping’ a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!” he added.

Despite his claims, neither Trump nor the White House has provided any evidence to back up the accusations.

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