Body found after mystery taxi attack

Press, 6 October 1980, Page 1

Body found after mystery taxi attack

PA Auckland The body of a middle-aged man was found in an isolated bush area at Greenhithe, near Auckland, early last evening.

The body had n:‘: been positively identified late last evening, but the Auckland police had earlier been searching for a Te Atatu taxi-driver, Daniel Claude Harkins, aged 55, and seemed satisfied the body was his. Mr Harkins’s bloodsplattered taxi had been found abandoned in Rame Road, Greenhithe, at 11.30 a.m, yesterday. Because of the amount of blood found inside the taxi, and on. the bonnet, the police were treating their investigations as homicide, said Detective Inspector P. J. O’Donovan. The body was found in bush at 5.45 p.m., two hours after 20 searchers began their task. In cold, gusty winds the searchers were covering an area of about 10 hectares, and the body was found just on nightfall, more than Ikm from the abandoned taxi. Mr O’Donovan said that the body was found at Waipuia Place, an overgrown and isolated sub-di-visiori area.

He said . that Mr Harkins’s taxi had been seen at the end of Rame Road, near a boat jetty, at 1.30 a.m. wl ’’ its lights on full. Residents had reported hearing what sounded like a boat being dragged, and a marine motor starting soon afterwards. The taxi had received a call about 11.30 p.m. on Saturday evening to pick up a fare outside a hotel in Fort Street, Auckland. Mr O’Donovan said that he was anxious to hear from the passenger, or from anybody else who might have been, picked up by Mr Harkins at a taxi rank, or hailed him in the street. He said that the police had not ruled out the possibility of robbery, as coins had been found scattered on the floor of the taxi, and he said that all. inquiries were being carried out as murder inquiries. The area search got under way at 3.45 p.m. yesterday, after three teams of searchers had

been briefed. The search was an “over-all quick look,” a more intense search will be made today. House-to-house inquiries were also made yesterday, as the police tried to piece the murder puzzle together. Three C. 1.8. detectives were busy for more than an hour, investigating bloodstains found on the footpath outside the local Greenhithe dairy. It was not known whether the stains were connected with the murder inquiry, and after extensive questioning of residents it was discovered that the stains had occurred after a dog had badly cut its paw. Mr Harkins has been described as a quiet man, who had driven taxis as a second job at week-ends for the last two or three weeks. He, his wife, and his two ■ daughters had lived for 19 years in the Te Atatu home he had built himself, said a neighbour, Mr D. J. Palmer. A positive identification of the body is expected today.