Peters to defendant: Ensure foundation is legal

bid to reveal the pair’s identities before the last general election, the duo continue to have name suppression, which will be argued again in due course.

Neither of the men charged is a minister, sitting MP or was a candidate prior to the 2020 election. The trial is now in its third week in front of Justice Pheroze Jagose.

Principal SFO investigator John Woolford yesterday told the court how he undertook a search warrant at one of the defendant’s homes in March 2020.

Woolford, along with his team, door knocked at 6.30am to seize electronic devices and documents that may be of use to the investigation. The defendant then spoke to Woolford, explaining how the foundation had been set up and how the funds flowed, Woolford told the court.

He said it was a former director of operations Api Dawson’s idea to set up the foundation. The defendant spoke with Winston Peters about it once. Peters told the defendant to ‘‘make sure it’s legal’’, the court heard.

Under cross-examination by the defendant’s lawyer, Woolford was asked why the search warrant was executed at 6.30am.

The lawyer suggested the defendant had a discussion with Woolford about bringing the documents to the SFO, but had been delayed due to health issues.

Woolford was also quizzed extensively about the decision of the SFO director to issue a press release about the charges in September 2020, despite the defendants not being expected to appear in court until October. The defendant’s lawyer suggested it was because the general election was to be held on October 17.