In the five months since her house was destroyed, Tod Adams has been at war with government agencies because the Fires Near Me app suggests her home was not affected.

I knew very little about this film before I saw it, but I'd heard some pretty positive rumblings. The Rocket was awarded the People's Choice gong for Best Feature at the Melbourne International Film Festival (Victorian audiences are no slouches when it comes to cinema) and it was shot in Laos with a predominantly non-professional cast, which I found intriguing.

Brisbane's Dead Puppet Society adult puppet show, The Harbinger, reaches deep into gothic fairy tale territory with a touch of Orwellian danger thrown in for good, and frightening, measure.

A lack of detox beds in large regional centres is preventing people from getting rehab, a special commission of inquiry into ice hears.

A teenager pleads guilty to manslaughter, saying he is "honestly sorry for what I have put everyone through" and admitting he fatally punched a university academic at a Hobart nightclub in 2019.

The Israel Folau fiasco has sucked oxygen and money from rugby at a time it can ill afford it, following years of disasters for the sport. The resulting mess has highlighted just how far the sport has fallen, and how much is at stake, writes Mary Gearin.

A Melbourne man on trial for planning terrorist acts allegedly told others he wanted to "go around cutting throats in the city centre", a court is told.

A worker who mistreated six elderly residents at a Melbourne home was suspended three times but allowed to continue working after he passed an elder abuse questionnaire, the aged care royal commission hears.

A police car may have reached speeds of up to 154 kilometres per hour during a pursuit that ended in the death of Raymond Noel Thomas in Melbourne's inner north, a court hears.

The aged care royal commission hears chronic short-staffing is compromising the care of nursing home residents, leaving some workers to question whether they want to stay in the sector.

A court hears Harold Mitchell was "pushing" for Tennis Australia to sign a contract for the broadcast rights of the Australian Open with Channel 7 when he was the sports body's director in 2013.

There's more to shearing than just clipping wool, as these young hands learned at a shearing camp outside of Broken Hill.

Musical therapist and violinist Greta Kelly uses the power of music to take people away from their daily worries. This is why she felt compelled to get in touch with Choir of Unheard Voices.

Jailed Cardinal George Pell will front Victoria's highest court today to appeal against his child sex abuse convictions, arguing proper process wasn't followed at trial and a reasonable jury could not have found him guilty of the crimes.

A teenager molested by Christian Brother John Laidlaw in the 1980s tells a Melbourne court he thought he was being "punished by God" when he was sexually assaulted at his family home, as the former teacher pleads guilty to abusing six boys over two decades.

When farmer Alistair Gabb fell into depression his doctor prescribed him medication and referred him to a psychiatrist for 10 free therapy sessions but it was far from enough.

A jury hears of the moment the woman accused of causing a crash that killed four people in western Victoria realised the deceased were "probably grandmothers" as well.

Jesse Blackadder

A court hears a former NSW Northern Beaches baseball coach allegedly kept torture tallies, diaries naming victims, footage of alleged assaults and was in possession of child pornography.

A man charged with the manslaughter of Valmai Birch, 34, at her NSW south coast home eight years ago is accused of hogtieing her and causing her death by asphyxiation or other means, before putting her body in a wheelie bin.

Police evidence presented to Wollongong Local Court reveals allegations of violent physical abuse against a 12-week-old baby.

A jaded war photographer forms an unexpected friendship with a South Sudanese refugee whose village he has photographed, in this ambitious new Australian film.

The 2016 killing of a Canberra man is portrayed as a "cold-blooded plan", designed to silence him over an earlier machete attack, on the first day of an ACT Supreme Court trial.

The crown alleges Mark Jones waterboarded Bradley Breward with a hand towel, by placing it over his face and pouring water over it, and also put a plastic shopping bag over his head twice for 40 seconds each time.

Former drug squad detective Paul Dale wanted to speak to gangland bosses Tony Mokbel and Carl Williams nine days after he was arrested for the burglary of a drug house, the royal commission hears.

The details of a secret recording of a conversation between accused Adelaide wife killer Peter Dansie and his son are revealed in court.

Two years after Troy McLean was fatally stabbed in a road rage incident, his family tells an Adelaide court of its heartbreak, with his son hoping his father's killer goes to jail forever.

A coroner's inquest hears a drug-addicted Adelaide car thief whose body was found weeks after he crashed a stolen vehicle was an expert at hiding from police.

The fiance of a 27-year-old man killed in one of Australia's worst mining disasters is still heartbroken, saying the "pain is still there" on the 30th anniversary of his death.

The body camera of one of the officers killed in Wednesday's Melbourne freeway truck crash captured Richard Pusey telling Leading Senior Constable Lynette Taylor, "you've f***ed my f***ing car" as she was dying, a court has been told.

Regional children with congenital heart disease must move to Brisbane to be closely monitored after critical heart surgery. One mum is petitioning for change.

Transforming a hearse into something resembling a Transylvanian castle on wheels is not something you can Google for instructions, but artist Karl Claydon made it work.

Drugs including ice are readily available and "coming through the front door" of a South Australian jail, an inquest into a fatal overdose of a prisoner finds.

A South Australian man killed his close friend when he landed on top of him during a drunken fight, causing an internal cyst to fatally rupture, a court hears.

A NSW court hears a man accused of killing his girlfriend, Carly McBride, sought sex with another woman the day after the alleged murder.

When Kate Disher-Quill was given hearing aids at the age of 10, she felt disconnected. Now the 31-year-old photographer has drawn on her experience to tell the stories of people like her in a book, Earshot.

A NSW court hears 81-year-old David Allen Esling, charged with the attempted stabbing murder of his wife of 54 years in April, had formed a suicide pact with her.

Toddler William Tyrrell, who vanished from his foster grandmother's home in the sleepy town of Kendall almost five years ago, was likely abducted by someone who chose to "act on their desires", an inquest into his disappearance hears.

A wooden cross marked "2014" the same year that William Tyrrell went missing was among several false leads found during a large police search for the toddler around Kendall on the NSW mid-north coast, an inquest hears.

An inquest into the disappearance of toddler William Tyrrell hears an SES volunteer who was involved in search efforts for the toddler on the NSW mid-north coast, did not respond to police questions.

The former chief investigator who led the investigation into the disappearance of three-year-old William Tyrrell on the NSW mid-north coast is accused of misleading a neighbour during a police interview two years ago.

Whitegoods repairman Bill Spedding tells an inquest into the disappearance of William Tyrrell he was having coffee with his wife on the day the toddler vanished, before revealing the "devastating impact" of the police investigation on his life.

A Kendall resident says he is certain he saw William Tyrrell being driven away by a blonde woman in a car at high speed moments after the toddler vanished from the New South Wales mid-north coast almost five years ago.

Lou Brown used meditation and shear effort to clip about one sheep a minute for eight hours and claim the new world record.

A man accused of deliberately running over and killing a stranger had post-traumatic stress disorder after an assault nine years earlier, a court has heard.

DAILY BRIEFING: A Tasmanian shark attack victim commemorates a year since the incident, cattle deaths hearing delayed and basketball stars arrive in the state.