Detective Carole Tipler served the New Zealand Police for 42 years until her retirement in 2014.

She joined in 1972 and she graduated first in her wing. After graduation she served in Lower Hutt, Auckland and Henderson, before returning to her home region of Taranaki.

Throughout her career with the Police Carole worked in a variety of areas, including crime prevention, records, personnel, Criminal Intelligence Section, traffic and as an Arms Officer. She also worked a Metropolitan Police Officer while living in England. Her ambition was to join the Criminal Investigation Branch (CIB) but was delayed by the Springbok Tour and becoming a mother. Twenty-five years after completing the induction course, she finally joined the CIB in 2003.

Carole retired from the New Zealand Police in 2014 and has since volunteered in Nepal at Kathmandu’s Pashupati Temple, which helps care for the elderly and helpless, and at a school in the Gorkha District, which was the centre of the earthquake that rocked Nepal in April 2015.

Robyn Brand joined the New Zealand Police in 1967. She had been in the Metropolitan Police in London for a year before she moved to New Zealand and joined the police.

Robyn was on duty during the Wahine disaster, spending over 12 hours in the morgue at night as the bodies were brought in. She says the processes have changed and developed so much since then, but on that night it was ‘fly by the seat of our pants stuff’. Most bodies were hard to identify. Staff worked continuously through the night and were on shift the following night. There was no counselling for police staff after tragic events.

Looking back Robyn says, “It’s always made me proud that I helped people. I have a strong sense of right and wrong and believed I needed to stand up for the society we could be. Joining the police helped me do that. It’s what I knew after working for the Met in London.”

In 1968 Robyn became pregnant with her first child and had to leave the police. She had two more children and she focused on them, before going into various part-time jobs. When the family moved to Tauranga she became a real estate agent.

Two of her children joined NZ Police. Her daughter Alison is an Inspector in Counties Manukau, and one of her sons is a Detective Sergeant in the North Shore, Auckland. Robyn’s husband was also a policeman for 38 years. She has seven grandchildren, six of whom are girls. Robyn wonders if one of them will become a police officer one day.

Robyn says the young women in police today are amazing and the New Zealand public is so lucky to have them.

Dorothy joined the Police in 1963, one of four women out of 100 trainees. After coming second in her Wing she was posted to Auckland and joined the Women’s Division under Betty Bennett.

She first moved into the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) to fill a temporary vacancy. She enjoyed working there but was unable to stay because the unit had their quota of 3 women already.

Dorothy was the first woman to be transferred to a suburban station, in Newmarket, but found there wasn’t a lot to do there. She managed to get transferred back to CIB in 1970, and was then promoted into the Uniform Branch as a Sergeant then a Senior Sergeant. At that time there was no training for these roles.

In 1973 she was appointed Officer in Charge (O/C) Youth Aid Section but left the Police when she had her first child in 1975.

She admires how women joining the Police today are able to do all the physical training required to be a Police Officer, as it wasn’t nearly so demanding in her day.

Donna joined the New Zealand Police in 1991. After graduating from Police College, she started her career in the General Duties Branch in Porirua, then, the Criminal Investigations Branch (CIB) in 1997.

After Donna qualified as a detective, she joined the Organised Crime Unit (OCU) in 2001. Mike Oxnam and Andrea Jopling were her mentors at the CIB, and she believed she was very fortunate to have been mentored by them.

After a few years with the OCU Donna was promoted to detective sergeant and deployed to the Solomon Islands, as Team Leader National Investigations, based in Honiara. Donna was also part of a United Nations deployment to Timor-Leste (East Timor). After roles in general duties and intelligence, she became the Community Policing Team Leader of Becora substation in Dili.

Following her overseas deployments Donna was promoted to detective senior sergeant, and she became Crime Strategy Manager. In early 2014, Donna was promoted to Inspector in the Professional Standards group.

Donna had a close-knit group of friends in and out of the Police and she spent her time with them, in a sporting capacity and socially. They liked to cycle, swim, and go to the gym together, challenging themselves and having a lot of laughs along the way. She competed in several half-ironman competitions, challenging herself to overcome her fear of swimming in open water.

Inspector Donna Howard was diagnosed with cancer in 2017, and despite a brave fight, passed away in January 2018.

Donna served with passion and commitment for 27 years.

At the time she passed away she was the Wairarapa Area Commander, a position she took up in early 2016.

She will be fondly remembered by her colleagues as a dedicated and well-respected police officer who made a substantial contribution to her local community and the New Zealand Police.

In 1973 a shortage of police in Auckland prompted a desperate mayor, Sir Dove-Myer Robinson, to find more staff to combat the high crime rate. Government approval resulted in the training of Wing 120 at an old teachers’ college in Ardmore, South Auckland.

Ali Stevenson was one of 13 women recruited to this wing. Inspector Bill Shanks was commandant, and he affectionately dubbed the new female trainees as his ‘Dolly Belles’.

Ali enjoyed her time at Police College. Close to the college was a bar at the nearby military camp, which was like forbidden fruit to the recruits because they weren’t allowed to leave campus during the weeknights.

One night, Ali recalls, a group of drunk male recruits decided to pull the fire alarm as a prank, but they didn’t realise the alarm went straight through to the Papakura Fire Station. Ten minutes later three fire trucks turned up looking for a fire. When the commandant woke he apologised to the firemen for the false alarm and dragged all the recruits out in their pyjamas to reprimand them.  It became evident the next day that none of the women had been involved, so only the men were punished.

When Ali completed her training, she was sent to Auckland Central Police Station under the supervision of Sergeant Ross Meurant. Ali’s first police duty was on the late shift, walking up and down Karangahape Road, which opened her eyes to the seamier side of life. After a misunderstanding with the owner of a strip club, who Ali had thought was a friendly business owner, an amused Sergeant Meurant gave Ali a rundown of the seedier businesses in the area. Ali recalls his lesson as ‘a 101 on Dens of Iniquity’.

Ali featured in the news when she first wore the newly issued trousers while on duty at the races. She hadn’t worn the jacket as well so got in a bit of trouble when she returned to the station.

Ali later became a Radio Operator for the South Auckland District based at Auckland Central, then worked in the CIB reception for a few months before retiring in 1987 after 14 years of service.

Prior to joining the New Zealand Police in 1962 Valerie Redshaw was in the London Metropolitan Police. Posted to the Women’s Division at Auckland Central she served there until she married.

After marrying, Valeria left Police to have children and taught at various schools in Otago and the Bay of Plenty. She attempted to re-join the police in the mid-1970s but was told the police did not employ women with children.

In 1984 she became an Education Officer at the Royal New Zealand Police College, with the responsibility for training youth aid officers and recruits and contributing to senior and commissioned officer courses. For a subsequent seven years she designed curricula for all police training, and was seconded for two and a half years to the New Zealand Customs Service as their National Manager Training and Development.

Keen to advance the status of policewomen and promote training, she was the police representative on several public sector bodies including the EEO Advisory Group, the Public Sector Training Organisation and the Government Committee for Suffrage Centennial Year. She also served on the academic board of the Open Polytechnic of New Zealand.

In 1991 she was given the task of organising the celebration of 50 years of women in policing. This inspired her to document women’s history in the service. Her book, Tact and Tenacity, was published in 2007.

In 1993, Valerie, was awarded the Suffrage Centennial Medal for services to policewomen and in 2007 she was made a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to education. Post policing, Valerie contributed to the development of the Border Service in East Timor receiving the East Timor and New Zealand Operational Service Medals. A Justice of the Peace for 40 years she ended her working career spending six years with the Royal Federation of New Zealand Justices’ Associations as their Education Officer.

She regrets not being able to return to operational policing in the 1970s after she had her children, or in the 1980s because of age restrictions, but is pleased to have been able to contribute to changes in policy that have improved conditions for other policewomen.

It was 10 July 1985 when the Rainbow Warrior sunk at its Marsden Wharf moorings in Auckland, after two explosive devices were set on her hull. The French government committed this act of terrorism in New Zealand. It is believed that at least 13 members of the French security and armed forces were involved in the incident in which a Rainbow Warrior crew member was killed.

Cushla Watson joined the Police in 1973 and by time of this event she was a seasoned and experienced detective. She was an integral part of the investigative team and worked the case from day one. Only two members of the French team, Major Alain Marfat and Captain Dominique Prieur (posing as Sophie and Alain Turenge) were arrested and held to account.

Detective Cushla Watson was the first policewoman to be sent out of New Zealand with an investigative brief. During her enquiries she visited Switzerland to check on the legitimacy of the Turenge passports which were claimed to have been issued in Lyon, France but proved to be fraudulent. She made enquiries in France, where her investigations were scrutinised and she was unable to conduct her own interviews. It was clear that higher authorities were controlling French Police actions.

In England, with the cooperation of the Metropolitan Police, she linked Gerald Andries a crew member on the yachtOuvéa to the purchase of the Zodiac boat and Yamaha motor used to plant the explosive devices. The Ouvéa was believed to have dropped the Turenge couple off on the New Zealand coast.

Cushla had postponed having her family while establishing her career but eventually took maternity leave and bore two sons. She and another detective put forward a proposal to job share to make it easier for women with children to work but flexible employment was not an option, and after battling bureaucracy and the then attitudes of the police administration both women resigned. The service lost two competent and very experienced detectives.

Inspector Paula Stevens joined the New Zealand Police in 1972.

Paula started her career in Dunedin. After completing her Police training at Trentham she worked there on frontline general duties until she was promoted to sergeant in 1978 and moved to Wellington.

After three years in Wellington she transferred to the West Coast, where she was Greymouth’s first female sergeant. During her time at the Greymouth station, she received the Commissioner’s Certificate of Merit for dedication and skill in controlling the rescue of a small fishing vessel which foundered crossing the Grey River Bar.

In 1986 Paula was promoted to senior sergeant while working in Palmerston North, and in 1990 in Wellington she was promoted to inspector. In 1993 she moved to Christchurch and worked as a shift commander, and later the operational services manager.

In Christchurch, Paula took the Armed Offenders Squad (AOS) course and passed with flying colours. She commanded the Christchurch AOS until she was appointed as the Southern Special Tactics Group (STG) Commander, based in Christchurch, where she worked for almost 8 years. Paula was the first woman appointed to the AOS and STG Command roles.

In 2000 Paula was awarded the Queen’s Service Medal in the New Year Royal Honours List, in recognition for her dedication to the service and her excellent operational and management skills. Later that year she was deployed to East Timor as the New Zealand Police contingent and the nature of her work led to her receiving a New Zealand Police Commissioner’s Silver Merit Award in 2002. In 2003, she was deployed to the Solomon Islands.

In 2005 Paula returned to Police National Headquarters where she worked in the Pacific Islands Chiefs of Police (PICP) Secretariat until she resigned from police at the end of 2007. During her time with PICP she developed programmes for member services in conjunction with UNAIDS and she helped develop the PICP Women’s Advisory Network, involving 21 countries.

Jackie served in the New Zealand Police between 1972 and 1978 and returned temporarily in 1981.

During a very cold winter in 1976, when a skirt was still mandatory for policewomen Jackie wore her husband’s trousers when she worked the late shift. There was at that time debate as to whether or not women could wear trousers but her practical-minded sectional sergeant allowed her to wear despite reservations from another senior officer.  

Two years after leaving the Police Jackie returned to duty temporarily as a constable, during the 1981 Springbok Tour. In 1986 she became a non-sworn member of the Hamilton and Morrinsville Police Stations, where she worked until a restructuring in 2012.

Jackie was the first non-sworn member of the New Zealand Police to receive a silver merit award. She and her husband, Allan Cantley, received the award for their actions during the 1993 Morrinsville Station Siege, when Larry Hammond entered the station taking several hostages while armed with a crossbow, knives and 14 homemade explosives.

Prior to immigrating to New Zealand in 1964 Angela was a policewoman in Birmingham, England. She was initially posted to Wellington where she found the work very limited. She remembers how amazed people were when she and another policewoman arrested a burglar.

Angela was the first policewoman in Porirua, and later, in Tauranga. In 1968 on the day of the Wahine disaster she was assigned duty on the Eastbourne side of Wellington Harbour. Besides assisting survivors, she helped in the task of retrieving bodies of those who had drowned. She also spent some days sorting and recording property that had been recovered and reuniting it with their owners.

In 1969 she transferred to Auckland to fill a vacancy in the Youth Aid Section, where she found her niche working with young people. After a period working in Tauranga, Angela returned to Auckland to continue in Youth Aid. She was promoted to senior sergeant in charge of the Youth Aid Section.

1979 ended on a sombre note with the loss of the Air New Zealand DC10 on Mount Erebus. While no policewomen took part in the recovery process several were involved in the identification phase of ‘Operation Overdue’. Angela was appointed Officer-in-Charge of Inquests. Her responsibility was to ensure that bodies matched up with particulars of passengers who had been on the flight. Because several passengers were from overseas she often worked with interpreters when preparing files for the coroner. She attended court for all the cases.

When community policing became the principal focus of the service it provided an area of specialisation where policewomen could use their communication skills to benefit others. Angela was promoted to Inspector and appointed Community Relations Coordinator for the Manukau District. Her job was to liaise with other departments, organisations and ethnic groups, fostering good relations between them and police. She was also responsible for overseeing community constables, Youth Aid section, crime prevention and programmes in schools as well as facilitating Neighbourhood Watch in the area.

Always keen to promote the advance of women in the service she chaired the Auckland Committee for the celebration of 50 years of policewomen in New Zealand. In 1981 she was awarded the QSM for services to young people and the handicapped.