KEY POINTS:
A 39-year-old truck driver appeared in Tauranga District Court today in connection with a shooting at Papamoa on Monday morning.
Graham Doctor, who gave himself up at Tauranga police station on Tuesday, faces charges of committing a dangerous act with intent to injure, unlawfully possessing a pistol, cultivating cannabis and possessing cannabis.
He did not enter pleas and Judge Phillip Connell remanded him on bail until April 24.
The dangerous act charge carries a maximum penalty of seven years imprisonment, while possessing a pistol could net him up to four years in jail or a fine as high as $5000 if convicted.
Lawyer Glenn Dixon said Doctor had three young children and his partner was pregnant.
Police did not oppose bail but wanted a nightly curfew imposed, which Mr Dixon did not think was warranted "given that this (the alleged shooting) was a daytime incident."
He sought a reporting clause instead.
"But if police want a curfew, I can't object to one."
Said the judge: "The problem is that police say this is a man who has a propensity for possessing firearms."
That was the reason for a curfew, he said.
Mr Dixon said he did not think his client would dispute the summary matters - the two cannabis charges - when they were called again in April at a pre-depositions hearing for the more serious counts.
According to the police summary, Doctor got into an altercation outside his home with a nearby resident when he was visiting his partner. There was a short struggle before the neighbour walked off.
About five minutes later, Doctor drove onto the grass verge outside the nieghbour's house then took off. He returned soon after, when the neighbour was standing in the front yard.
As the defendant drove slowly past, he pointed a firearm out of the driver's window, holding the gun in one hand and steering the car with the other.
The neighbour ducked behind a wooden paling fence and Doctor then fired a shot from about 25 metres away, before driving off.
Armed offenders squad members later found a .22 rifle with both the barrel and the wooden butt sawn off so that it was shaped into a pistol grip. It was hidden at another address and ammunition was also recovered.
When police searched Doctor's own house they located nine cannabis plants growing at the front of the property in an area enclosed by corrugated iron fences.
In a shed nearby, cannabis stalks, including head and leaf material, were drying between sheets of newspaper.
- NZPA
