A Hawke's Bay mechanic says he found two women - one unresponsive, the other trapped and covered in blood - as he rushed to the scene of a serious crash near Hastings yesterday.

A jury is now considering the fate of an former St John officer accused of sexually assaulting four women in the back of his ambulance.

A Hastings primary school is in lockdown, with pupils told to stay indoors, as police search for a gunman in the area.

Staff at a Hastings motel say the mother of a six-month-old boy ran screaming from her room after her son's unexplained death yesterday.

A masked and armed robber left a Hastings service station empty-handed after his demands were refused by the attendant.

At least one Fire Service crew was remaining overnight at the scene of an acid spill on a manufacturing site in the Whakatu Industrial Park between Napier and Hastings.

Two men have died after a car crashed on a rural road and rolled 600m down a bank near Te Hauke, south of Hastings.

A man accused of sexually assaulting an 87-year-old Hastings woman in her home has had an interim name suppression order further extended.