Blind man upset at delays in investigation

Police are denying they are too busy to investigate a complaint from a blind Hamilton man who alleges $1600 was taken from his account by his former flatmate.

Steven Donnelly, 38, who is in the New Zealand blind cricket team, said his bank cards went missing the same day as the flatmate in July.

A total of $1600 was missing from his accounts, along with about $900 of unpaid rent.

He reported the theft at the Hamilton East police station and was told his flatmate was known to police, The Waikato Times reported.

He was also told fraud was not a priority and police were too busy to deal with it.

Sergeant Neil Fenwick told the paper Mr Donnelly's case was at the bottom of about 100 files and it could be a couple of months before police got to it, if at all.

Mr Donnelly had also been unable to access CCTV footage of the ATM withdrawals to see who it was who took the money.

"I'd like them (police) to let me know that they've done something about it, and they're not just going to let them get away with $1600," Mr Donnelly said.

Head of Hamilton CIB Detective Senior Sergeant Chris Page said police were investigating Mr Donnelly's complaint and video stills from CCTV footage were obtained eight days after the complaint was laid and attached to the file.

"Unfortunately, competing priorities mean we haven't yet arranged for those stills to be seen by the complainant's family," Mr Page said.

Mr Page said they had a robust system for managing investigative workloads and all complaints were taken seriously.

"We're constantly facing challenges around workload. Because of this we critically assess each investigation file to ensure consistency of service for each complaint."

Investigation workloads were actively managed to ensure no evidence was lost and work was prioritised appropriately, Mr page said.

"There'll always be complainants who want their case dealt with before someone else's, but we have to be fair to all."

- NZPA