pursuit he allegedly swung a policewoman around by the handcuffs as she was attempting to restrain him. The charges were later dismissed by the Taupo District Court, Judge McGuire saying: "the result however, is that I am left uneasy over whether police prosecutorial power was used wisely and fairly in this instance...". However a high court judge subsequently ruled that the judge erred and police could detain a driver while carrying out checks, although he did not require that the charges be relaid. On 16 June 2011 Alan Duff declared himself bankrupt, owing creditors NZ$3.6 million. As of March 2013 he was living in France and visiting New Zealand several times a year. Writing Duff began to write full-time in 1985. He tried writing a thriller as his first novel, but it was rejected. He burned the manuscript and started writing Once Were Warriors (1990), which had an immediate and great impact. The novel is written in juxtaposed interior monologues, making its style stand out from other works. It was winner of the PEN Best First Book Award, was runner-up in the Goodman Fielder Wattie Award, and was made into the award-winning film of the same name in 1994. One Night Out Stealing, appeared in 1991 and was shortlisted in the 1992 Goodman Fielder Wattie Book Awards. Duff was awarded the Frank Sargeson Fellowship in 1991, and began writing a weekly—later bi-weekly – column for The Evening Post, syndicated to eight other newspapers. In this, and in his 1993 analysis, Māori: The Crisis and the Challenge, he has developed his ideas on the failures of Māoridom, castigating both the traditional leadership and the radical movement for dwelling on the injustices of the past and expecting others to resolve them, instead of encouraging Māori to get on and help themselves. The blame for Māori underperformance he puts squarely back on Māori, for not making the most of the opportunities given them. State Ward started as a series of episodes on radio in 1993 and was published as a novella in 1994. In the 1995 New Year Honours, Duff was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire, for services to literature. The Duffy Books in Homes scheme, co-founded in 1995 by Duff and Christine Fernyhough, with commercial sponsorship and government support, aims to alleviate poverty and illiteracy by providing low-cost books to underprivileged children, thus encouraging them to read.