WOMAN WITH GUN DEFIES POLICE

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31726, 9 July 1968, Page 24

WOMAN WITH GUN DEFIES POLICE

(New Zealand Press Association) HAMILTON, July 8. Fifteen families in Ngaruawahia had to find other accommodation tonight as police removed the occupants of houses surrounding the house in Newton Street where a woman is holding police at bay with a double-barrelled shotgun.

The woman, her face seen to be painted black, has her two daughters aged five and two and her husband in the house.

Dressed in black and wearing a bandolier of shotgun cartridges round her waist, she has fired several shots today, one of them in the direction of members of the Hamilton armed offenders squad. Newton Street is In total darkness tonight apart from floodlights which police erected about 5 p.m. to illuminate the home.

The woman, aged about 32, refused to leave the house today despite pleas by policemen using loud hailers. The drama began at 9 a.m. after police Sergeant B. Walk-

er and Constable P. White approached the home. They came in response to a call by a neighbour, Mr N. Farrell, who said the woman with her family had approached him early this morning and had waved a shotgun in front of him. Two Policemen The two policemen later approached the woman at her home but left quickly when she pointed the shotgun a them. The armed offenders squad from Hamilton was then called and it arrived at about 10 a.m. The Rotorua section of the armed offenders squad was called shortly afterwards. With tracker dogs, members of the squad, armed with .303 rifles and .38 revolvers, were stationed near the house. Newton Street was sealed off. Appeals were then made to the woman through loud hailers but she refused to leave the house. She appeared frequently on the verandah of her home and screamed at policemen nearby

A nightshift worker, Mr G. Latta, the son of Ngaruawahia’s Mayor, said he heard police hailing the woman. He lives in Newton Street only three houses away. He said that police asked the woman if there was anything they could do. “I want him back,” she said, according to Mr Latta. “She did not make it clear and I did not hear properly who she meant by ‘him.’ When the police asked her where ‘he’ was she answered that the police had him. “The police then asked: ‘Here?’ “I could not catch what she said as she was getting into a bit of a rage. The police then stopped firing questions at her,” said Mr Latta. Police early in the afternoon took her brother to the house in the hope that she would leave the home and give herself up. Negotiations failed. The police officer in charge. Detective Inspector J. A. McCarthy, said the police had no fears for the safety of the husband and children.