Gunman exchanges shots with officers
A Waikato police officer found himself staring down the barrel of a military assault rifle at the end of a police chase yesterday.
Then the gunman started shooting.
The policeman dived for cover on a dark rural Morrinsville road and rang for backup, which arrived within a minute. Then three officers found themselves being shot at.
The two backup officers returned fire, but by yesterday afternoon, the gunman was still on the loose, potentially still armed with what is understood to be an AK47.
None of the officers was injured in the incident. It is unknown if the gunman was.
Two people - a man and woman aged between 25 and 35 - who were in the red Holden Commodore with the gunman, are being spoken to by police.
‘‘This is quite frightening,’’ Waikato district commander Superintendent Bruce Bird said yesterday afternoon.
‘‘It is an attack of an intensity on a police officer that I have not come across in 40 years of my service.
‘‘I think everybody should be vigilant.
‘‘We just don’t know what the mindset of this offender is.’’
He said the armed offenders squad was searching for the gunman.
The lone police officer came across the late-model red Holden speeding in central Morrinsville about midnight, Bird said. ‘‘The police officer gave pursuit for a short distance and the vehicle that was being pursued stopped and engaged with that police officer with a substantial amount of gunfire.’’
After stopping the red Holden a kilometre out of town, the gunman got out the driver’s side door and began shooting at the officer, Bird said.
‘‘The police officer withdrew immediately from the scene and as he did so, came under further fire from the offender.’’
Within a minute, another police car with two officers arrived and the ‘‘attack intensified’’, Bird said.
‘‘A substantial number of rounds were exchanged between police and the offender.’’
About 30 shots were fired, with at least 15 shots piercing the front windscreen of a police car.
One of the other two people in the vehicle was found at the scene and the second was located in Morrinsville early yesterday.
‘‘We’re still making inquiries as to the relationship between them all.’’
It was unknown if the offender was still in the Morrinsville area.
Not long after midnight, a Morrinsville mother woke to gunshots being fired outside her children’s bedroom window and when she rang police she was told to grab her children from their beds and move to a safer part of the house.
‘‘I was told to stay low and if the kids’ bedroom was by the road, we were to go and move them to a room with the least windows,’’ said the woman, who declined to be named.
Armed police and dog handlers searched the woman’s property at dawn in the hunt for offender, she said.
‘‘It was practically right outside from us,’’ the woman said after she had left her house under police guidance early on Sunday.
‘‘We rang it in, unsure of what was happening, and they said on the phone we needed to lock all doors and stay low.
‘‘Not long after that, we had an officer show up on our doorstep letting us know what was happening and what we needed to do.’’
‘‘We had armed police at our gate all night right from the start, so that was good.
‘‘We are OK - a little shaken, but are fine.’’
At daylight, she packed up her four children and left for a family member’s home.
Police told other residents in the area to turn the lights off, lock the house and not to answer the door.
Bird said the officers showed extreme bravery in an intense situation, and commended them for their actions.