Police admit 111 call inexplicably abandoned

An unidentified local man spent nearly an hour cleaning blood off Morrie Laing Ave. Picture / Dean Purcell

Police have admitted they accidentally "abandoned" a 111 call about fighting in a street where a man was almost beaten to death in a brawl 90 minutes later.

The 23-year-old is in a critical condition after a vicious attack in Morrie Laing Ave, Mt Roskill, on Saturday night, which witnesses say continued even after he lost unconsciousness.

The attack, which also left the man's younger brother seriously injured, involved up to 15 young people, many of whom were armed with softball bats, plastic pipes and bits of wood.

Police last night confirmed they received a call at 9.17pm from a woman in Morrie Laing Ave about fighting in a nearby park.

The details for the priority one job were noted by a call-taker at the police northern communications centre but the job was never passed to a patrol dispatcher, said Superintendent John Lyall, national manager of police communications.

Police received the second call, from a different Morrie Laing Ave resident, at 10.44pm and dispatched a unit within one minute.

The woman who made the second call saw two groups of young people fighting on the road.

As the larger group beat the 23-year-old and his 19-year-old brother other neighbours rushed outside to try to help.

Mr Lyall said it was not known whether the group fighting earlier were also involved in the later brawl.

He said an investigation yesterday found the call-taker had received the first 111 call from Morrie Laing Ave and told the caller a unit would be dispatched, "which in normal circumstances it would be".

But "for some inexplicable reason" the call-taker did not forward the job details to a dispatcher, said Mr Lyall.

It was human error and not a technology failure.

"This call-taker took about 80 111 calls that night and dealt with every one of them exactly right except for some inexplicable reason this one abandoned. It went into never-never."

Mr Lyall said police had "utmost confidence" in the person who took the first call. A priority one call is where police believe that there is a threat to life or property.
Yesterday, as police continued to investigate, a man spent nearly an hour trying to wash away the bloody traces of the violence with a hose.

Both brothers remained in Auckland City Hospital last night. The younger was in a stable condition but it was not known if his sibling, who is believed to have suffered massive head injuries including a smashed skull, would survive.