Auckland police use new powers to disrupt Head Hunters gang activity

• Auckland police used new powers to issue dispersal notices to Head Hunters members and associates.
• Two people, including a teenager, face weapon and drug charges after an armed traffic stop.
• Assistant Commissioner Paul Basham said more than 400 arrests have been made since the Gang Act’s implementation.

Auckland police have handed down dispersal notices to three patched gang members and their associates for the first time.

Police say the Head Hunters gang members cannot associate with each other for seven days and were forced to leave the area immediately.

Two people, including a teenager, are also facing weapon and drug charges.

Assistant Commissioner Paul Basham said the new arrests are the latest in more than 400 completed since the end of November when the Gangs Act came into effect.

Basham said police were called to Toroa St, Torbay, on Friday afternoon after a report of a firearm.

He said a group of offenders left in three vehicles and two of them were spotted soon after entering the Northern Motorway at Oteha Valley Rd.

“Our staff carried out an armed traffic stop on the on-ramp and extracted occupants of both vehicles.”

He said all six were extracted without incident and detained.

Three of them were patched Head Hunters, while the others were associates.

Basham said a search of the vehicles uncovered a loaded handgun and cannabis.

A 28-year-old man is facing firearms offences and has been remanded in custody to reappear in the North Shore District Court.

An 18-year-old man was summonsed to the North Shore District Court for possessing cannabis.

All six were given a dispersal notice.

“It goes to show that the new tools available to all of our police staff is assisting in holding gangs to account when members, or associates, are committing violent offending,” Basham said.

He also said this was not the only milestone for the Gangs Act, as they celebrate 403 charges for insignia breaches under the new law.

More than 4000 charges have been laid against gang members over the same period.

“It’s still early days but anecdotally we are seeing that new powers are meaning gangs have been forced to re-think their behaviour in public.

“We continue to encourage this high level of compliance and good judgment as we move forward.”

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