KEY POINTS:
Taranaki police want to speak with a good Samaritan who helped a 22-year-old victim of a brutal pack rape early on Christmas Day.
The young woman was attacked and sexually assaulted by a group of men in a carpark opposite St Joseph's church in Hawera, between midnight and 1.30am.
Hawera CIB Detective Constable Guy Jackson said police believed more than one man was involved in the attack.
The woman was walking alone along High St when she was grabbed.
"She has been forcibly taken down an alleyway between High St and Cornish's car park, where she was subjected to a brutal sexual assault," Mr Jackson said.
Mr Jackson told the Sunday Star Times the woman was traumatised after the attack.
Police were appealing for information from 300-400 partygoers at a nearby party.
"If anyone saw a female between 12.30 and 1.30 in the morning, saw anything, or a female approached by a male or a group of males, contact the police. There were a lot of people who may have seen something without realising," Mr Jackson said.
Police were particularly interested in hearing from a "good Samaritan" who, after the attack, waited with the distressed woman for her family to pick her up.
The man, who police stressed was not a suspect, was described as European, dressed in black, with dark, curly hair.
"He may have heard or seen something without realising it," Mr Jackson said.
He said it was important that potential witnesses who were in Hawera for Christmas talk to police before leaving town.
Police had finished examining the scene of the attack, and would send several items to ESR in Wellington for further analysis.
- NZPA
