KEY POINTS:
The man accused of the murder of two girls who died after being mowed down by a car outside a Christchurch party appeared in court this morning.
There was no application for bail or name suppression and the 22-year-old factory worker was named as local man Lipine Sila.
He is charged with murdering Jane Ada Young and Hannah Perkins Rossiter, both aged 16.
They were among a group of 10 people hit by a car outside a 20th birthday party in Edgeware Rd, St Albans, about 10.45pm on Saturday.
Sila showed no emotion as he made a brief appearance at the Christchurch District Court, where he was remanded in custody without plea to reappear again later this month.
The public and media galleries were packed for the hearing.
Two people remain critically ill in intensive care at Christchurch Hospital and three are in a serious but stable condition.
Two other victims were treated yesterday, and five people have been discharged from hospital after receiving treatment.
Hundreds of teenagers had gathered at the house, which had signs outside advertising the party during the day. A neighbour, who asked not to be named, said: "There's been a few parties in the 13 years we've been here, but nothing like this. It was wall-to-wall kids."
Witnesses told the Herald a fight broke out in the street before someone involved got into a car parked nearby and drove down the wrong side of the street before hitting the partygoers.
"The description [from the police present] was 'like a war zone'," said Inspector Andy McGregor. "It was pandemonium. There was broken glass everywhere and yelling and screaming."
James, 16, a partygoer, told the Herald he saw the car coming and got out of the way, but others were not so lucky. "I saw a guy in front of me get hit. My legs are still shaking."
Witness Clayton Jamison said he saw people being thrown in the air after the car hit them.
Police later found a red Honda Integra at the scene of another apparent crash in nearby Westminster St.
Officers were first called to the birthday party about 8.30pm to remove gatecrashers, said Mr McGregor.
"There were probably 300 people at the party inside the [flat]. At that stage there didn't seem to be any disorder out on the street."
Police returned about 10.40pm and were being equipped to go in and break up the increasingly tense gathering, and an extra 200-300 people loitering outside, when the car struck the group in the street.
Under a hail of bottles and stones, about 20 police began moving forward from their "safe point" 50m away and soon realised people were injured. Paramedics followed police in.
"As they went through to clear the street, that's when they found the injured persons," Mr McGregor said. "As they are actually still attending to the wounded, people are still throwing bottles at them, probably not realising the gravity of the situation."
Some residents had criticised police for not breaking up the party earlier, but Mr McGregor said: "I'm quite happy with the actions taken by my field supervisor at the time."
Text messaging had alerted hundreds of gatecrashers to the party.
"It's a huge issue that we have and I don't think it's peculiar to Christchurch. People holding parties need to be careful as to who they invite."
Neighbour Christine Holt said she and her husband arrived home about 10.30pm to find drunken young people filling the street.
Prime Minister Helen Clark said today that she expected Police Minister Annette King to be briefed on the incident by Police Commissioner Howard Broad.
She did not have enough details to say if police could have done more to prevent the tragedy but she imagined residents would have been unhappy with the number of people spilling on to the street before the hit and run occurred.
"There may be some issues around crowd control, in those circumstances the police want to give some thought to," she said on TVNZ's Breakfast programme.
- with NZPA, NEWSTALK ZB
