Armed siege ends in man’s arrest

Press, 9 April 1981, Page 2

Armed siege ends in man’s arrest

PA Dunedin A police dog pursued and trapped a man at a road block on Tuesday night to end a 24-hour armed siege at the Kawarau Gorge. The man fled from a car at the road block and was found in an orchard. He was taken to the Cromwell police station and then to Dunedin, where he appeared in the District Court. The man, David John McFadyen, aged 26, was charged with driving while disqualified at Mosgiel on November 27, and at Saddle Hill on December 22. He was also charged with possessing cannabis. Pleas of guilty were entered on those three charges by

McFadyen’s counsel, Miss S. C. Bathgate. Sergeant A. Bremner said other charges would be laid, and Judge Murray remanded McFadyen in custody to April 16. During the siege, shots were fired in the gorge and a combined armed offenders squad from Dunedin and Invercargill was called in. McFadyen was holed up in thick bush and managed to elude the police in rough terrain, in spite of being sighted several times. Twenty-five men, two dogs, a helicopter, and an aeroplane searched the area. Motorists entering the Kawarau Gorge were warned by the police not to stop until they had passed the Roaring Meg River.