Ten-year-old held at gunpoint in robbery

Five people including a 10-year-old boy were forced to the floor at gunpoint during a bank robbery in Penrose yesterday.

Another customer fled after he tried to enter the bank and had a sawn-off shotgun shoved in his face.

Alan Young walked into the NZ Post Kiwi Bank in Station Rd and was confronted by a masked man who yelled at him to get inside and on the floor, where others were lying.

But Mr Young ducked back outside and persuaded a passerby to call the police.

"He had a ski-mask on with holes for his eyes and mouth and pointed the gun at me," Mr Young told the Herald.

"I didn't have time to think about it. He shouted, 'Get in' but my reaction was to get out and a sight faster than I walked in. I only went in to pay my phone bill."

By the time officers arrived shortly after 3pm the two men had escaped in a stolen car with a "quantity of cash".

Detective Senior Sergeant Eddie Iosefa, from Auckland Crime Squad, said police were concerned about a "prevalence of firearms used in similar crimes" over recent weeks.

However, he declined to comment on possible links between the crimes.

Neither the customers nor three staff members were injured yesterday but Detective Constable Shaun Kennaid said they were all "fairly traumatised".
The robbers crashed their getaway car and dumped it in Mt Wellington.