KEY POINTS:
The father of a young Englishman, shot in the head while rabbit hunting on Saturday, has been through a rollercoaster of emotions since finding about the accident.
Ian and Helen Purchase arrived New Zealand on Tuesday to be beside their son Matthew, 21, who is in critical condition at Waikato Hospital.
Mr Purchase said he had experienced "all the emotions you could possibly go through".
"It's just been from numbness to complete emotional shock and despair to resigned acceptance. It's been a complete rollercoaster of emotions that you would never wish on anybody."
The agricultural exchange student was shot while sitting in the back of a ute during a hunting trip with six others on a south Waikato farm.
A 48-year-old Danish tourist has been charged with careless use of a firearm causing injury.
Mr Purchase said he hoped it would send a message about gun safety.
"If he's now been charged and it makes people sit up and take notice and be more careful with guns in the future then obviously it's got to be the right thing to do.
"Matthew's been handling guns since he was a very small boy. He's always had instilled in him an absolute, religious sort of emphasis on safety with guns and I had no worries at all about his ability to handle a gun and never expected anything like this to happen to him."
Since a two and a half hour operation to remove bullet fragments on Wednesday, Matthew had shown signs of improvement.
"He's still critical which is a big worry to us, but we have seen over the last 24 hours some small signs of improvement. This morning he was able to hold his mother's hand and open one eye very briefly," Mr Purchase said.
"I think his physical fitness has pulled him through, it's a big shock to the body to be shot in the head.
"We expected the worst and were told to expect the worst when we got here and we were quite frankly surprised that he actually pulled through and I think the doctors were too.
"He's still critical which is still a big worry to us, but we have seen over the last 24 hours some very, very small signs of improvement. He's coming off the sedation slowly and this morning he was able to hold his mother's hand and open one eye very briefly.
Matthew was following in his father's footsteps on the exchange programme. His father had signed up 27 years ago, working on a dairy farm near Palmerston North.
"He was having the time of his life over here. He was living his dream," Mr Purchase said.
The couple's other children Simon, 23, and Rachel, 19, arrived in New Zealand this morning.
The family said they expect to be here for months before Mr Purchase was well enough to return home.
Detective Sergeant Kevan Verry, of Tokoroa CIB, said a 48-year-old Danish tourist had been charged with careless use of a firearm causing injury.
He appeared today in Tokoroa District Court, where he was released on bail to reappear on February 5.
Police were still investigating the shooting, but were not seeking any other people, Mr Verry said.
- NZPA
