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The family of a 17-year-old courier driver shot dead after being caught up in a police pursuit in Auckland yesterday say he was in the "wrong place at the wrong time".
Halatau "Tau" Naitoko was driving along the Northwestern Motorway on his way back from a courier pick-up in Avondale when a man known to the police tried to carjack his van about 2pm.
Mr Naitoko's devastated family learned of his death only when the company expecting the package he was delivering called to complain that it was two hours late.
The family had been watching the story unfold on the news and had not realised the white van they were watching was theirs.
Mr Naitoko worked for his mother's Kiwi Express business. The family assumed he was stuck in traffic, and learned he was the victim only when officers arrived and asked if he had a scar on his forehead.
Police said Mr Naitoko died and a truck driver was injured after a pursuit that began following a bag snatching and carried on through West Auckland suburbs.
Auckland district commander Superintendent George Fraser could not say last night whether the bullet that killed Mr Naitoko was fired by the police.
"The situation is that we have an armed offender firing shots. We have also a situation where shots were fired by police in response and the investigation has only just commenced and we'll be working through those details."
Mr Fraser said the offender was known to the police. He was now in custody.
Last night, the Naitoko family invited the Herald into their home in Mangere.
Mr Naitoko's grandmother, Matalupe Fuimoana, said her grandson was a smiley and happy person who loved sports.
He was also an "amazing father" to his 2-year-old daughter, Stephanie.
Mrs Fuimoana said he had been looking forward to helping his grandfather with some home maintenance over the Auckland Anniversary holiday weekend.
"This morning he was cleaning his van before work. I said, 'Hurry up and finish - stop using the water', and he was just laughing." Mrs Fuimoana is stunned by the tragedy - made worse by the possibility that the police may have shot her grandson.
"For what, what did he do, he was just doing his job?" she said. "The truth is he was in the wrong place at the wrong time."
Mr Naitoko, the second oldest of nine children - six boys and three girls - was excited about the upcoming birth of a younger brother, who is due in two days.
His tearful sister Sekola, 21, said her brother had seen some "ups and downs".
"He was unpredictable, that's for sure. But at the end of the day even if [we] yelled at him, he would always make you laugh."
Mr Naitoko's aunt Tracey Sime said of her nephew: "He was really a kind boy. He was always laughing and smiling."
Police have appointed an "independent" officer from outside Auckland, Detective Inspector Peter Devoy, to head an investigation into the incident.
Mr Fraser said: "I must stress to you that this was a dangerous and continuing action throughout the entire period that police engaged. We're not dealing with one isolated instance of shots being fired. The shots being fired were of a continuous nature throughout this ordeal."
The offender also fired at police as he was being pursued in the stolen vehicle.
Mr Fraser said the car "came to a stop by the driver's own volition, mounted and went across the median barrier, and the offender attempted to obtain access to a further vehicle".
"This involved a number of vehicles, one in which the deceased was located and the second vehicle, a flat-deck truck, on which the offender was apprehended."
Police seized a .22 sawn-off rifle.
Mr Fraser was not sure if the gunman shot at the police Eagle helicopter.
He said the safety of the public was "paramount" and a moving blockade had been put in place to protect motorists.
A spokesman for Police Minister Judith Collins said she was kept "fully informed" as the incident unfolded.
Opposition leader Phil Goff said Labour MPs' hearts went out to the family and friends of Mr Naitoko. He said until all the facts were known it would be wrong to pass judgment.
He added: "Obviously, in a situation of a carjacking and shots being fired by an offender, the police are placed in a very difficult situation and we understand the stress that this situation will have created for the police officers involved."
- Additional reporting Beck Vass
