KEY POINTS:
Police have dealt with seven killings this year - nearly one every two days.
The most recent victim, a 45-year-old man, was found dead in a Christchurch house yesterday morning.
His death followed that of 77-year-old North Shore woman Doreen Reed who was fatally stabbed as she lay
in her bed during the weekend.
National Crime Manager Detective Superintendent Win van der Velder said police were concerned by the number of violent deaths in such a short time, but things were not "out of control".
"The large proportion of them are name and address stuff, in other words the team is dealing with them on the spot and offenders are being arrested."
Mr van der Velder said nearly half this year's killings were domestic-related and that was an issue police and the Government were working on.
None of the cases was connected, and while they would cause a spike in the statistics, it was too early to say if it was the start of a trend.
A similar spike had occurred in South Auckland last year when police handled eight homicides in three months.
The recent homicides were not placing the same load on police staff, because they were in different parts of the country.
"It's not anything we can't manage, as is reflected by the results," Mr van der Velder said. "We have brought six of the seven to successful conclusions."
Police National headquarters cannot provide monthly statistics for homicides, but news clippings reported one in the first two weeks of last January and three for the month.
The National Party's police spokesman, Chester Borrows, said he was not surprised to hear of this year's homicide rate of nearly one person every two days.
Mr Borrows said New Zealand had a higher murder rate than England and it was time an independent study was commissioned to look at why this was so.
* About 40 police are still working on the only unsolved homicide case of the year, that of 10-year-old Zimbabwean immigrant Charlene Makaza, who was suffocated in her bed in Christchurch on January 6.
2007 HOMICIDES
* Jan 1: Gareth Te Huia stabbed to death in Kawhia. His friend Perry Tuwhangai, 41, has been charged with murder.
* Jan 6: 10-year-old Charlene Makaza suffocated in her bed in Christchurch. Unsolved.
* Jan 6: Karl Kuchenbecker shot dead. Graeme Burton charged with murder.
* Jan 10: A 58-year-old man is charged with murder after a woman's body is found at a flat in Kemp St, Wellington.
* Jan 14: Doreen Reed found dead in her bed on the North Shore. A 15-year-old arrested.
* Jan 14: 52-year-old mother Denise Rosemarie killed at her Waitara home. A 51-year-old man arrested.
* Jan 16: 45-year-old man found dead in Christchurch. 33-year-old man charged with murder.
