Sunday's news in under 5 minutes.

Here is today’s news wrapped for you in under five minutes.

1. A student has sued her former teacher for $1.2 million after seven years of sexual abuse.

A 27-year-old woman, who can only be identified as “B”, has sued her former maths and sports teacher, a reported “sexual predator”, for years of sexual abuse.

The Daily Telegraph reports that the teacher, Darryl Reineker, was jailed in 2001 for grooming the girl for a sexual relationship, when she was just 14.

In the landmark case, B sued Reineker for personal trespass in the NSW Supreme Court. She argued that her former teacher impregnated her twice, caused her to have suicidal thoughts and and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Justice Christine Adamson ordered Reineker to pay B more than $1.2 million in compensation for the irreparable damages he caused her.

In her evidence, B testified that she first met her former teacher at 12, when her parents moved to Moree. Following her troubles with maths, it was alleged that Reineker offered to tutor B in maths and he quickly began to make sexual advances towards the young girl.

In 2002, the court heard that Reineker’s sexual behaviour escalated after he convinced her to have sex with him in a classroom, which became a regular practice on afternoons and weekends.

On B’s 15th birthday, the court heard, Reineker came to her family home and had sex with her in her bathroom. Following this escalation, B began to a destructive course of self-harm.

The court also heard that when B was 17 years old, Reineker threatened to take her life unless she aborted her pregnancy. B agreed. Later that year, B miscarried with another one of Reineker’s babies.

It was only in 2009, after Reineker has followed B when she moved out of town, did a boyfriend finally convince her to file a report with the police.

In suing Reineker, B claimed that she has suffered poor self-esteem, relationship troubles, unemployment, and nightmares as a result of the incidents.

After Justice Adamson delivered her verdict, she stated, “He abused his position of trust and authority. He groomed her and then exploited and corrupter her for his own sexual needs and desires.

“She has been deprived of a normal adolescence and the opportunity to discover and enjoy sex in an appropriate way.”

2. A daughter has watched her father be mauled to death by a shark in Hobart.

A man in his 40s was diving with his daughter when he was attacked by a shark yesterday morning near Maria Island.

Police have not yet revealed the identity of the man, who was a well-known scallop-diver, but say his daughter became concerned after her father did not resurface when she returned to the boat.

Inspector David Wiss told reporters, “His daughter became worried and went down and checked on her father, [when] she saw a very large shark; she saw her father being attacked by the shark.”

A senior ranger on Maria Island said that there were reported sightings of a great white shark, around 4.5 metres in length on Friday, despite the President of the Scallop Fisherman’s Association of Tasmania saying that reports of sharks in the particular were rare.

3. A 12-year-old boy has been praised after saving his siblings from a house fire.

Three children were in their family home yesterday afternoon when a destructive house fire started.

Just after 1pm yesterday, emergency services were called to the house in Canberra’s south. Three children were in the home at the time, but were all able to escape uninjured after their older brother evacuated them when he first noticed smoke.

The fire is thought to have started in a bedroom and spread to the roof with smoke filling the rest of the home. Due to the quick action of the teenager, neighbours were alerted and the damage the fire caused was significantly limited, firefighters said.

4. Members of traditionally male-only gyms in battle over whether to permit women.

It’s been a year since the first female member of the 177-year-old Tattersall’s on Elizabeth Street, Sydney first joined their gym.

However, many only-men’s clubs and gyms are taking unprecedented steps to remove the rules and encourage women to join their gyms. The attempt to change gym rules was first proposed in 2013 when women could not buy memberships, up to $3000 in cost, or be part of the staff.

Surprisingly, most of the resistance to removing the ban on women comes from younger age groups.

Prior to Tattersall’s disposing of the rule, a member of the club hacked into the Tattersall’s database and emailed every member begging them not to allow women into the men’s only club.

Still, an overwhelming majority of the club voted in favour of allowing women to join their gym, with only two members quitting in result.

But, the no-women ban in clubs and gyms is still rampant across the nation, where owner’s are refusing to change their policies.

Court of Appeal President, Justice Christopher Maxwell, this week strongly criticised these men’s clubs for taking such a backward position on gender inclusive policies.

Among the most popular no-women gym is the Australian Club in Sydney, which is the oldest private club in the southern hemisphere. Some of its members included three generations of the Packer family, and Cardinal George Pell AC, Malcolm Turnbull and Peter Cosgrove.

In Melbourne, The Savage Club also only allows men to frequent their premises, with Senator George Brandis a proud member.

5. Shelter dogs are getting second chances in unusual environmental conservation jobs.

Highly energetic shelter dogs have long been left behind in shelter homes, with their more docile doggy-pals the first ones to be adopted.

But the program, Rescues 2 the Rescue, founded in Washington DC, is changing this by offering energetic dogs a chance to do scent-related work.

The group has partnered with Working Dogs for Conservation and the International Fund for Animal Welfare and are being trained to find hidden wildlife and plants in the environment. Trainers say that the dogs can also sniff out poison and harmful species, that help to preserve the environment.

Rescues 2 the Rescue hope that their new-found skills with increase the dogs’ adaptability, saying that rescue dogs have so much to offer.

“I hope we are saving lives, both dogs and wildlife,” saying Carson Barylak from the IFAW.

If you have a news tip, we would love to hear it. Email us at news@mamamia.com.au

For more news, you might want to read…

‘I am addicted to pretending to be other people online.’

Rosie Batty: Mark Latham is “uninformed, ignorant” and “misogynistic”

‘Landmark’ Fair Work ruling over family violence victim sacked after husband allegedly abused her