The Chase: mother speaks after fatal pursuit - 'we visit her grave every day'

The Chase is a four-day Herald series looking at police pursuits and fleeing drivers. Since January 2008 there have been more than 30,000 pursuits, hundreds of crashes and 79 deaths. The series runs from Monday to Thursday ahead of a joint review of pursuits by police and the IPCA which will be released on Friday.

Every day Elizabeth Harrison and her partner Wilson Nathan wake up at 7am and go to visit their daughter's grave.

Gone is their girl with a "smile that lit up the room" and a "loving nature".

Gone is Eden's chance at having a life, a family, a future.

Eden is one of 79 people killed in the last decade during police pursuits.

Eden died instantly when the vehicle she was in spun out of control and crashed into a fence not far from her family home.

The crash happened after a four minute pursuit through the suburban streets of Papatoetoe and Mangere.

The driver was 15-year-old Kara Kauri - Eden's boyfriend's sister.

Eden, according to her mother was a popular and talented teenager, intelligent and academically gifted.

But Eden was living a double life; she had joined a female youth gang named PBG - Pretty But Gangster.

As the name suggests, Pretty but Gangster are a street gang of teenage girls whose physical attractiveness masks a brutal streak.

"I know she was naughty but she had a big heart – the light has gone out of our house," Harrison told the Herald this week.

Elizabeth Harrison stands at her daughter Eden Nathan grave site in Mangere. NZ Herald photograph

"There is no sunshine or positiveness- as naughty as she was she was such a positive,smart, kind girl. She won a lot of awards at school.

"I think of her every day, every day.

"Me and Wilson wake up at seven and visit her every day at the graveyard – we have been doing that for three years.

"We thought it would be easier as time went on but it isn't – our family is broken.

"This third year has been so hard, it's dawned on us –she's not coming back… I can't pretend she's down the road and she's coming home."

Harrison wanted to see the law change on the way police pursue young drivers.

"Just think before you pursue these kids - they have no idea," she said.

Elizabeth Harrison, mother of 16-year-old Eden Nathan who was killed when the stolen car she was a passenger in crashed while fleeing police in 2016. New Zealand Herald Photograph by Dean

"It's a thrill when cops start chasing them – the rush of the adrenalin and all that so they need a procedure in place.

"But I've lost my daughter and nothing I say will bring her back…"

Harrison acknowledged the police pursuing the car her daughter was in had a job to do.

"But it's still hard for me today- three years later you know.

"I don't solely blame him - he added to it I know that… all I have to say to the officer is just think."

Harrison said the driver of the car Eden was in was still in a West Auckland rehabilitation facility with serious and permanent injuries from the crash.

Pursuits - the facts

• Since January 2008 there have been 30,950 police pursuits.

• The number of pursuits has increased steadily each year for the last decade.

• During those pursuits, 79 drivers and passengers were killed.

• Others were also killed including innocent road users.

• Police figures show that pursuits are most likely to happen between 10pm and 6am.

• Crashes are more likely at night.

• The majority of drivers are young males and many are driving stolen cars.

• In most cases the driver was killed and there were a significant number of crashes where multiple passengers also died.