Cops tracing source of thrown bottle

Police stumped for clues on the thrower of a beer bottle which smashed a woman's face will visit bottle shops to track down the source of the weapon.

Mary Loader, 65, was hit square in the face with a half-full glass bottle thrown from a car while walking in Papamoa, Bay of Plenty, on April 10.

Three weeks on, and despite widespread publicity of the case, police have no direct leads on the young man who threw the missile.

Detective Sergeant Darryl Brazier said police had extracted a DNA sample from the bottle, but it had no matches in their database.

The next step was to identify where the bottle of Lion Ice beer was sold. He said it had been established when the bottle was made, and that information would hopefully allow them to find the liquor store it was sold in.

Police are also investigating CCTV footage from businesses in the area but Mr Brazier is still hoping the attacker will have the conscience to approach police.

"But the longer it takes for someone to step forward the worse it looks for the people in that vehicle."

The bottle was thrown from a light-coloured car with four young men in it.

Mr Brazier added that since the publicity around the attack, police had received at least 10 reports from the Western Bay of Plenty of similar types of brazen behaviour.

"It is disturbing to know how many people have had missiles thrown at them from cars. We're really lucky no one else has been seriously hurt."

He said police believed the beer bottle was thrown deliberately at Mrs Loader, who was knocked to the ground.

She required three hours of reconstructive surgery at Tauranga Hospital and had five titanium plates inserted in her face to set a fractured cheekbone and a broken nose.