Shot Kiwi's body home on Thursday

The body of the New Zealander shot dead in Jamaica will return home on Thursday morning.

Tiki Hunia, 27, and his wife Nickie-Jean were approached by a gunman in the yard of the guest house in which they were holidaying on Upper Montrose Rd - an expensive area known as the "Golden Triangle" in the Kingston suburb of St Andrew.

The pair lived in Hong Kong and had attended Waikato University together.

Richard Hunia, Tiki's uncle, said another uncle and Tiki's brother were accompanying his body on the flight, which would arrive home early on Thursday morning.

He said Mr Hunia's body would be taken straight to a funeral director in Whakatane ahead of his funeral on Saturday or Sunday.

Mr Hunia said the family had incurred a lot of travel and accommodation expenses following the tragedy earlier this month.

He said a trust account had been set up at Westpac where people could donate to help the family with their expenses.

"As you can understand Jamaica is not exactly across the ditch, you have to fly to LA and then across the US to Jamaica," Mr Hunia said.

He said the flight cost about $4000 per person.

"It is a really, really expensive exercise," Mr Hunia said.

He said his nephew had taken out travel insurance which could cover some of the costs but not everything.

Mr Hunia said the family did not think twice about flying to Jamaica as soon as the tragedy happened.

"I would say the family at home probably had a real bad time, especially our mother, she was a mess," Mr Hunia said.

He said now that Tiki Hunia's body had left Jamaica, the family was in a better state of mind.

* nzherald.co.nz earlier incorrectly reported that the body of Mr Hunia was arriving in New Zealand yesterday. We apologise for any offence this caused.

Trust details:

Name of account - Tiki Stardust Appeal
Bank - Westpac NZ Ltd
Bank Branch - Tauranga
Account number - 03-0435-0753159-00
Swift Code - WPACNZ2W