Police have suspended a woman from driving for six months after she was allegedly detected exceeding the speed limit by more than 45km/h on the Hume Highway, Jugiong with unrestrained children in the car.

About 4.45pm (Sunday 6 December 2015), police from the Gundagai Highway Patrol were conducting stationary speed enforcement on the Hume Highway at Jugiong when they detected a silver Kia Sportage allegedly travelling at 163km/h in a 110km/h zone.

Police stopped the vehicle and spoke to the 25-year-old female driver. The officers noticed two girls, aged eight and nine, in the back seat attempting to fasten their seat belts. They also saw a boy aged seven in the front seat without a seat belt.

The woman was breath-tested and returned a negative result.

Police issued a speed infringement notice and an infringement notice for each unrestrained child.

Police continue to appeal to all road users to obey basic road rules to avoid tragic consequences.

“The alleged irresponsible actions of this driver are exactly what we continue to warn against,” Assistant Commissioner John Hartley of the Traffic and Highway Patrol Command said.

“This could have ended in tragic circumstances in a split second. Speeding and having children unrestrained in a vehicle is completely unacceptable. The driver should have acted as a role model to the children she was driving but instead, she put them in harm’s way,” Assistant Commissioner Hartley said.

NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione will officially dedicate a Memorial Rose Garden at the Police Academy in Goulburn this week, in honour of Mrs Beverley Ann Moroney.

The Commissioner will be joined by former NSW Police Commissioner Ken Moroney, members of the Moroney family, friends, and colleagues, for the dedication ceremony on Thursday morning (10 December 2015).

Following the dedication, Education & Training Commander, Assistant Commissioner Michael Corboy, and Commander of the Aviation Support Branch, Superintendent Mark Noakes, will join Commissioner Scipione to unveil the PolAir 1 display, at the entrance to the academy.

Every time entrepreneur Frank Burke is on radio talking about resurrecting the Old Hume Highway the station plays Route 66, an anthem to North America’s famous highway.

But Mr Burke wants Australian music to promote the original route from Sydney to Port Phillip Bay in Victoria for fatigued drivers and tourists.

So he approached Geoff Mack who wrote “I’ve Been Everywhere”, a hit song released in 1962, to tweak the original with the chorus: “We are going everywhere on the Old Hume Highway.” The original singer, Lucky Starr, has re-recorded the classic track, managing to fit in the 86 towns along Australia’s most famous highway without missing a beat.

“We’re Going Everywhere” aims to raise awareness of communities bypassed by the new highway, such as Gunning, where Peta Luck and her daughter Laura Murphy bought the Old Hume Highway cafe in 2014.

The Luck family is descended from early European settlers in Gunning. Mrs Luck left the public service to re-connect with her community through the cafe, and says 50 per cent of trade comes from locals, the other 50 per cent are travellers from all over Australia.

“They turn off because they are sick of the service centres that just have McDonalds or KFC; they have heard we have great coffee in Gunning,” she said. “They get lamb burger with salad, lamb, Greek yoghurt, mint jelly and Spanish onion.”

Lots of grey nomads, car, motorbike and cycling clubs and commercial travellers wander in under pressed-metal ceilings looking for something other than pre-packaged fast food,.

“We do have a fair number of people who specify they want real Australian food. We employ 10 in this cafe, some are casuals who only get a couple of shifts a week, the little 14 and 15 year-olds. We get a lot of travellers who value that and want to be part of that,” Mrs Luck said.

A cafe since the Gunning bypass, the shop was a haberdashery and general store. The 1995 highway bypass emptied Gunning of much of its commerce, coinciding with a dark chapter for the village before a farmer’s wife, Melinda Medway, opened the Merino Cafe and later the Old Hume Cafe, resurrected the village’s famous lamb burger, and lured traffic off the new dual highway.

“After the trucks left, the town slowed down, the drought was terrible, we had [incurable sheep-wasting] Ovine Johne’s disease, some farmers were suicidal. On our property we buried 300 sheep,” Mrs Medway said.

A New Zealand company’s failed attempt to open a new service centre near the town was the last straw. “We thought we’d make the whole town a service centre to create employment,” Mrs Medway said.

A man is due to face court today after being charged with the sexual and indecent assault of a child.

Last month, police were made aware of a man who had allegedly indecently and sexually assaulted a girl on a number of occasions over the course of a four year period. At the time of the offences, the girl was aged between 11 and 15.

Detectives from the Child Abuse Squad’s Wagga Wagga office conducted an investigation into the matter and yesterday (Thursday 3 December 2015), they arrested a 27-year-old Mount Austin man.

He was taken to Wagga Wagga Police Station and charged with:

– Five counts of indecent assault of a person under 16 years of age; and;

– Three counts of sexual intercourse with a child.

The man was refused bail and is scheduled to appear before Wagga Wagga Local Court today (Friday 4 December 2015).

The Child Abuse Squad is comprised of detectives who are specially trained to investigate crimes against children, including sexual assault, physical abuse and serious cases of neglect.

Anyone with concerns about suspected child abuse or exploitation should call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or use the Crime Stoppers online reporting page: https://nsw.crimestoppers.com.au/. Reports can also be made to the Child Protection Helpline on 132 111.

Information you provide will be treated in the strictest of confidence. People should not report crime information via our Facebook and Twitter pages.

A man has suffered critical head injuries after falling from a staircase at a hotel in Albury overnight.

About 12.50am (Tuesday 1 December 2015) emergency services were called to a hotel on Dean Street where they found a 45-year-old man at the bottom of a stairwell suffering serious head injuries.

He was taken to Albury Base Hospital where he remains in a critical and unstable condition.

A crime scene was established and police from Albury are conducting a full investigation.

Early investigations suggest he may have fallen from the top of the staircase to the concrete floor below.

Police are investigating after two men were stabbed in Goulburn yesterday.

About 10.40pm (Saturday 28 November 2015), emergency services were called to a home on Ballanya Avenue, Goulburn, after reports someone had been stabbed.

Officers from The Hume Local Area Command attended and found a 35-year-old man with wounds to his arm, leg, chest and back.

He was treated at the scene before being taken to Goulburn Base Hospital.

Another man, aged 29, presented himself at Goulburn Base Hospital with a wound to his neck.

The two men are known to each other.

A crime scene was established at Ballanva Avenue and examined by specialist forensic officers.

Later the same day, the men were released from hospital and taken to Goulburn Police Station.

Both men were charged with affray and reckless wounding, they were given conditional bail to appear at Goulburn Local Court on Wednesday 16 December 2015.

A teenager has been seriously injured following a mountain bike accident near Wagga Wagga yesterday.

About 10.45am (Saturday 28 November 2015), emergency services were called after reports a 16-year-old girl had fallen from her bike at Pomingalarna Reserve.

Officers from Wagga Wagga Local Area Command, with assistance from NSW Ambulance Paramedics, attended.

The girl was treated at the scene before being airlifted to Canberra Hospital where she remains in a serious but stable condition.

Inquires into the incident continue.

Tesla has declared the Sydney to Melbourne route along the Hume Highway complete, with the establishment of its latest Supercharging station in Gundagai.

The Gundagai facility, located next to the iconic ‘Dog On The Tuckerbox’, joins facilities in Goulburn and Wodonga which launched last month.

Along with a temporary site in Euroa, Victoria, the Hume Highway is now populated with Superchargers to the point where a Tesla Model S owner can achieve a virtual ‘non-stop’ trip from Sydney to Melbourne (or vice-versa).

Unlike the wall-mounted or plug-in chargers supplied with each new Tesla, the Supercharger can achieve a ‘half charge’, or up to 270km of range, in around 30 minutes. Tesla Superchargers are free to use for Tesla owners for the life of the car.

Therefore, even owners of the 60 or 70kWh Model S variants, which offer the shortest range, can safely travel between Superchargers and top up with electric juice along the way – eliminating the need for an extended stop to recharge the battery pack.

An extended stop is also possible should the driver so choose, and a full charge can be achieved in just over an hour; depending on the variant.

With the Gundagai facility established, Tesla owners can also include a trip to Canberra in their Sydney to Melbourne route but Canberra itself is yet to see any Superchargers (although Tesla ‘Destination Charging’ is available in Canberra).

To celebrate the milestone in Australia, Tesla organised a ‘Supercharger Rally’ to encourage owners to try out the new Sydney to Melbourne facilities on route to Gundagai for the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

From here, the electric vehicle-maker plans to continue its East Coast Supercharger network with new facilities to eventually connect Sydney to Brisbane. Stay tuned for more.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars of luxury cars have gone up in flames after a truck carrying BMWs caught fire early on Friday.

When the Jugiong and Berremangra Rural Fire Service brigades responded to a triple-0 call regarding a truck fire on the Hume Highway around 4am, they got to work.

Despite their efforts, the B-double car-carrier laden with the precious European cargo was completely destroyed.

Diversions were established around the fire site on the Hume, just north of Jugiong, as the RFS began the clean-up and detectives initiated investigations into the fire.

Traffic diversions from the Hume Highway sent motorists onto the Burley Griffin Way through Cootamundra and Harden.

A man suspected of being linked to an outlaw motorbike gang has been charged over Monday’s dramatic police chase on the Hume Hwy.

Victoria Police’s anti-bikie Echo Taskforce and the Special Operations Group tracked down the 25-year-old man along with two other suspects — a man and a woman — at Murchison East last night.

The suspects were intercepted by heavily-armed police at the intersection of the Goulburn Valley Hwy and Dargalong Rd.

The Mooroopna man was questioned and charged overnight with theft of motor vehicle, two firearms offences and possession of ice.

He was bailed to appear in Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on January 22.

The woman, 28, from Newcombe, is expected to be charged on summons with theft and drug offences.

While the 35-year-old man, from Spotswood, remains in custody for further questioning.

The police helicopter had gave chase to a stationwagon which was seen driving erratically on the Hume Hwy on Monday.

Officers lost sight when the car entered Tullamarine Airport.

The car, allegedly stolen from a Torquay address overnight on November 18, was later found abandoned in the multi-level car park.