Girl, 8, shot in city park

An 8-year-old relative of three sport stars has relived the moment she was shot while playing at an Auckland park.

Ness Vagana, niece of former Silver Fern Linda Vagana and former Warriors Joe and Nigel Vagana, was waiting to go on the flying fox at Marlborough Park in Glenfield when a pellet from a slug gun pierced her leg.

Surgeons who operated at Starship hospital found it stopped a centimetre short of going all the way through her thigh and out the other side.

"I thought it was a bee sting ... it really hurt," said Ness, who ran to her mother, screaming in pain.

Her mother looked for nails protruding from play equipment and asked other children if they had thrown anything, but couldn't find the cause. Her father Sonny said Ness, the oldest of five siblings, was "bawling" when she came home. He discovered the problem when she asked him to put a plaster on after she had a shower.

"When I went to do it I thought the wound was a bit strange," he said. "I figured it out straight away. I said, 'I think this is a slug gun pellet'.

"It went into her thigh, right through and stopped about a centimetre from the other side," said Sonny.

"When I found out I was angry. My boys were there at the park too, they are 2 and 3 and they were standing right next to her."

Police have arrested two men in connection with the incident on February 20.

Stephen James Hepburn, 38, has been charged with firing an airgun and wounding Ness, and a 19-year-old has been charged with being an accessory after the fact.

Hepburn was denied bail when he reappeared in the North Shore District Court on Thursday.

It is understood the men were flatmates and their house backed on to the park. Sonny said the police report alleges the pellet was pointed, of a kind used to kill birds, rather than the rounded type commonly used for target practice.

Ness had two stitches and the wound has healed.

Linda Vagana said she was angry about the shooting but relieved her niece's injuries weren't more serious.

"My reaction was, 'What the hell was a bullet doing in her leg?' We're just fortunate it didn't hit her in the head or get someone in the eye," she said.

"Playgrounds are supposed to be a safe haven for kids and the last thing you think about is someone around the corner with a firearm."

Ness said she didn't want to go back to the park where she was shot.

Sonny was looking forward to an Easter family gathering at a West Auckland park today.