No animosity from wife of hunter shot by mate

The wife of a Taupo man who was killed while deerstalking at the weekend says she feels "painfully sorry" for her husband's killer and holds no animosity towards him.

William Stanley Gillies, 55, was killed on Saturday while deerstalking with his friend Bernard Lee in rugged country near Lake Taupo.

Senior Constable Barry Shepherd of the Taupo police said Mr Lee mistook Mr Gillies for a deer and shot him about 9am.

Police retrieved Mr Gillies' body by helicopter early in the afternoon.

Mr Shepherd said officers had interviewed Mr Lee but had not yet charged him with any offence.

The first Mr Gillies' wife of 31 years, Bronwyn, knew of the shooting was when Mr Lee called her and told her to ring 111.

"I got a phone call at about 10am.

"He [Mr Lee] was beside himself. He asked me to ring 111 and told me he had shot my husband," Mrs Gillies said yesterday.

Initially Mrs Gillies thought her husband had been wounded.

She said she felt sorry for Mr Lee, who had been a close friend of her husband for many years.

"He has more to go through. He is a mess. I will definitely keep in touch with him. I don't hold any malice towards him. I know my husband and he was not like that."

The pair had been deer hunting together for about 40 years, mostly in the Hauhungaroa Range in Pureora Forest, about 15km west of Lake Taupo.

Mrs Gillies said her husband had lived all of his life in Taupo and she and her husband had gone to school together.

"He was the most wonderful man. He was a keen hunter, a loving father and a loving husband," she said.

"In his later years he didn't get as much enjoyment out of the hunting but being out in the bush and enjoying the surroundings."

Mrs Gillies said the men had been in the bush since Thursday.

Mr Lee's son Damien said yesterday his father was devastated about what he had done.

"He is on medication to calm everything down. He is just broken. He is not talking or anything."

Damien said his father and Mr Gillies were very close. They went to secondary school together and worked for the same company as electricians for 23 years.

"They had been hunting together since they were 15. They went on fishing trips and visited game parks together."

Damien was upset at comments made by Mr Shepherd, who told the Herald on Sunday that he did not accept the shooting was accidental.

"This was nothing but an accident. Everyone makes mistakes and this was the ultimate mistake... It could have been the other way round," he said.

As far as the prospect of being charged Damien said his father accepted he would have to "face the music".

Mr Gillies' funeral will be held at St Andrew's Anglican Church, Taupo, tomorrow at 2pm.

Meanwhile, Deer hunters are being urged to follow the number one rule during the roaring season -- identify your target.

"Unless you can see the whole deer don't pull the trigger,'' says Detective Sergeant John Wilson of the Rotorua police, who is also in charge of the district's search and rescue team.

Mr Wilson said he was disappointed and concerned there had already been a shooting fatality so early in the deer hunting season.

The season runs from March to August but is at its busiest during the next few weeks while the deer are roaring.

Mr Wilson agreed with Senior Constable Barry Shepherd of the Taupo police that the weekend's shooting was not accidental.

"The pulling of a trigger is a deliberate act. Failing to properly identify your target is at best careless, at worst reckless,'' Mr Wilson said.

He warned the thousands of deerstalkers who would be in the bush in the Central North Island to take care.

"I don't want to have to spend time over the next few weeks [the roaring season] pulling dead people out of the bush. There are other things I would rather be doing.''

- NZPA