Dramatic new footage of armed man's car chase before shots fired. Video / Jayant Diesh
Dramatic new footage has emerged following Wednesday’s alleged armed carjacking, with a witness capturing the moment the man shot by police was driving erratically during a bizarre slow-speed chase.
The 29-year-old man has been charged with carjacking a driver using an air rifle and pointing the airgun at other members of the public.
He was listed as being set to appear in the Waitakere District Court on Thursday, though he was hospitalised after police shot him in Lincoln Rd yesterday. There will be a hospital bedside hearing tomorrow.
Court documents show he faces a swathe of charges including failing to stop for police, driving recklessly, presenting an air gun at various people and robbing a person of their vehicle keys at gunpoint.
Now a witness caught up in the mayhem captured footage leading up the the man being shot, claiming the driver was swerving wildly between lanes on the Northwestern Motorway before yelling and screaming at police as he had his arms out the window.
The moment a man armed with an air rifle allegedly took police on a car chase before attempting to carjack a truck. The alleged offender was then shot by police.
”For minutes we were going at 10km/h and then we got through the Waterview tunnel and saw the cops had attempted to pull someone over on the left,” he told the Herald.
”But the car hadn’t stopped and was still going really slow at around 5-10km/h. He started to swerve on to the road and man it was pretty scary. He was swerving back into the line of traffic.
”He just started from the outside line weaving between them all. There were hundreds of cars behind us.”
The man who allegedly carjacked a vehicle while holding an air rifle took police on a bizarre car chase down the Northwestern Motorday.
The witness claimed the driver was hanging “out the window swearing at cops and waving his arms at them doing all sorts of crazy stuff”.
The witness told the Herald he first spotted the driver a few hundred metres after the Waterview tunnel as he made his way to the Lincoln Road off ramp.
The video taken by the witness also captured the driver’s vehicle falling apart as he swerved in and out of lanes.
”This definitely wasn’t normal, and while it was happening bits of the car were falling off,” he said.
”His front headlight fell off and bits of plastic from the front of the car were falling off. There was a little bit of smoke coming from the front tyres.”
In the video, one witness can be heard saying “I hope he doesn’t have a gun”.
Just minutes later, the man armed with an air rifle, would allegedly attempt to steal another vehicle on the Lincoln Rd overbridge.
A white truck with bullet holes in its windscreen on Lincoln Rd in Henderson, after police disabled an armed offender. Photo / Hayden Woodward
”I was worried he might shoot at the cops. That’s why we held back. I was a little bit scared, to be honest.
”But the cops were really good. They do such a tough job protecting us but at the same time getting speedy outcomes. It’s bloody amazing what they do. They kept us all safe considering what unfolded.”
Armed police respond to the incident on Lincoln Rd.
Police said armed officers were quickly on the scene, “approaching the man and challenging him.
“The man has not engaged with our staff and has run towards a truck and has climbed in the passenger side of the cab, resulting in the truck driver exiting out the driver’s door,” Superintendent Shanan Gray said.
The armed man being chased and shot by Police near the Lincoln Rd flyover at Henderson.
A Herald reporter at the scene said there were multiple bullet holes in a truck’s windscreen.
“Staff immediately provided first aid, and he has since been taken to hospital with gunshot injuries, however, these are not thought to be life-threatening,” Gray said.
