Police may have murder car

Press, 23 July 1986, Page 1

Police may have murder car

Christchurch detectives have found a car which they believe may have been used to carry the body of Dale Puru,whose stabbed and battered corpse was found at Waimairi Beach last Sunday. Police forensic experts will arrive from Wellington today to examine and take tests from the vehicle, which was seized in Christchurch yesterday.

The officer in charge of the case, Detective Inspector Roger Carson, last evening described ; the . finding of the car ds a significant breakthrough in the three-day-old homicide inquiry. “Things are galloping along. It is looking good;” he said. ' No arrest had been made by last evening, but Mr Carson said the police were confident of one. Extra detectives from other centres will arrive in Christchurch today to help the inquiry, which yesterday involved a gang, believed to be the Christchurch Black Power group. Detectives interviewed members of the gang and visited its headquarters. A C. 1.8. spokesman said that gang members had been helpful to the police. They had confirmed that they knew the dead man, but said that he had not

been a member of their group. ( “We believe that he <Pur.u) ,may have had affiliations with a-“ North Island gang,” the spokesman said. ’ Dale Puru, also known as Dale Kingl, had been released from prison only three weeks before his death. On March 19 he had been jailed by the District Court in Christchurch for three months on a charge of unlawfully taking a car. He was formerly of Hamilton. Mr Carson said that the police had had valuable assistance from the public in the hunt for Dale Puru’s killer. “A lot of people have come forward with . information regarding his movements, his activities, and his background, which had enabled us to build up a much better profile of him than we had,” Mr Carson said.