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Businesses in the Auckland beachside suburb of St Heliers are calling for regular police patrols following a random and unprovoked stabbing at the local Four Square store last night.
Police said they were called to reports of a highly intoxicated man running with a knife in a convenience store in St Heliers Bay Rd at about 7.30pm.
The man hit out at two people with the knife. One victim, a man, received minor injuries, police said.
"It appears as though he has injured someone with the knife, who was taken to hospital to get treated," police said.
Peter Jones has been working on a safety plan for the St Heliers Village Business Association. Photo / Greg Bowker
The man arrested by police, aged in his 20s, will appear in court tomorrow.
Orakei councillor Desley Simpson said her thoughts are with the victim as he recovers and reached out to the Four Square owners who are shocked and doing all they can to support their staff.
She urged local residents not the let the incident affect support for hard-working retailers, saying they need support more than ever.
"I know the police are stretched and if I could wave a magic wand I'd have more policy and easier ways to access crime prevention funding.
"That's in the hands of central government. They really need to step up and show they understand and are proactively assisting, not just creating barriers," Simpson said.
A Foodstuffs spokeswoman said the police and ambulance staff were quickly on the scene, but this was little comfort to Peter Jones, who has been working on a safety plan for the St Heliers Village Business Association.
Last week, the association presented the plan to beef up security in the shopping village after 11 ram raids and burglaries in the past three months.
The association sought funding for six fog canons, four bollards, and 25 planters from $6 million allocated from the proceeds of crime fund to the Retail Crime Prevention Programme.
Jones said after a lot of work the application was declined because the programme only applies to individual businesses.
What businesses need, said Jones, is 12 police patrols a day, four during the day and eight at night on top of the five private patrols the association funds.
"On top of the five we pay for we'd have 17 patrols. Our problems would go away. If you are going to go and knock something off you are going to get caught.
"We put up a proposal to help the police ... and they kicked it for touch. My view now is 'just do your bloody job guys', do the patrols, stop the problem," Jones said.
A local witness to last night's incident, who only wanted to be known by his first name Bob, said he was at the Four Square just moments before the stabbing incident.
The witness saw a man with a Stanley knife as he was walking towards the beach. Photo / Sylvie Whinray
He said after leaving the store and walking towards the beach he saw a guy in a black T-shirt and black cap hanging around outside the ASB ATM on Tamaki Drive.
"It looked like he was on drugs. He was holding a Stanley-type knife in his hand watching a group of young girls in their late teens walk into the area just inside the bank where the ATM is.
"As I kept walking I overheard a member of the public on the phone to Police, reporting him at 7.08pm," said Bob.
Foodstuffs NZ head of public relations Emma Wooster said the incident at the Four Square St Heliers was completely random and unprovoked involving a customer in the store.
"This is a terrible thing to have happened, we're extremely thankful no one was seriously injured and we're doing all we can to support the customer who was hurt and the team members in the store at the time," she said.
Wooster said Foodstuffs has a continued and high focus on keeping staff and customers safe, saying violence or abuse of any kind is never tolerated in their stores.
"While random incidents like this one may not always be preventable, this sad event shows just how much we must continue our focus on safety, using all the tools and measures we have available to help us to keep our teams and customers safe every day," she said.
