KEY POINTS:
A Manurewa man has been arrested in connection to the hit-and-run of a nine-year old boy on Wednesday.
Counties Manukau Police communications manager Angeline Barlow said the 41-year-old man had been charged with reckless driving causing injury, failing to stop and ascertain or render assistance, and driving while disqualified.
The man appeared in Manukau District Court this afternoon and was bailed to reappear on August 3.
Tawhiri Moka is in a serious but stable condition in Starship hospital's intensive care unit after being dragged about 15m underneath a white Mitsubishi Pajero as it smashed through a fence near his Auckland home on Wednesday afternoon.
He suffered a split liver, a heavily bruised lung, a broken leg, and ligament damage to his neck and back.
The boy's father earlier alleged the driver of the car hit his son deliberately in retaliation for an incident in which the boy's friend had been cheeky to the driver's son.
Tawhiri's father, Jerry Moka, told the Herald that when his son regained consciousness yesterday morning, he told his family he was running from the Pajero and that he believed its driver had targeted him.
Mr Moka said Tawhiri was on the footpath on his way home to Manurewa after walking a friend to another house when he was mown down on Shifnal Drive.
Tawhiri said the friend he was walking with had been "cheeky" to another boy minutes before the crash.
"He'd seen the truck coming and he went to run," Mr Moka said.
"He reckons that the guy was chasing him with the truck because one of his friends got cheeky to this other boy.
"They reckon he told his dad and they came following up in the truck."
Mr Moka was teaching Tawhiri's 5-year-old brother to ride his new bike about 4m away in the family's driveway when the truck came towards them at speed.
"I saw it flying and wiping out those fence posts like nothing."
He grabbed his youngest son and the pair leaped away as the truck flew past them, facing backwards, and stopped at his letterbox before being driven off.
Mr Moka found Tawhiri lying unconscious and bleeding among smashed wooden fencing.
"When I saw that truck coming through those fences I don't know how the hell he could still be alive," Mr Moka said.
Tawhiri's shoes were found about 15m away, indicating he was hit and dragged by the Pajero.
Tawhiri's mother, his older brother, 11, and sister, 7, ran out of their home when they heard the noise, and were horrified by what they saw.
"They're pretty freaked out at the moment," said Mr Moka.
He said one man ran from the Pajero and the other drove it away.
The neighbour whose 10m fence was smashed in the crash, Kenneth Provan, said he heard the crash and came rushing outside before running back inside to call 111.
"I just heard the crunch and I came out and I thought a girl had hit my car," he said.
"I saw somebody lying down and the man came running out screaming that it was his son.
"Everybody came out screaming and shouting ... [Tawhiri] was in and out of consciousness ... They were devastated."
Mr Provan said Tawhiri was a "nice little boy".
- Additional reporting NZPA
