The incident occurred on Friday morning and began with a man approaching Middleton’s property, asking for a man Middleton does not know.
In the six to eight weeks Middleton and his wife have lived at the rural Kaikohe property, about half a dozen people have asked for the same man, leading them and neighbours to assume the property was used for drug deals.
The man, whom Middleton describes as aged about 25, sounded agitated.
He then reached over the fence and grabbed one of Middleton’s Rottweiler puppies, worth about $1000, and put it in his car.
Middleton said he reacted quickly out of concern for the puppy, having previously lost a litter of puppies to Parvovirus from people spreading the highly contagious disease before the young pups could be vaccinated.
“I said ‘you can’t do that, you’ll kill the puppies’ and I grabbed it back: He took a swing at me.”
Middleton said the man appeared to be on drugs and the punch didn’t connect. He managed to push the man away and put the puppy back over the fence.
But as Middleton was putting the first puppy back, the man took another puppy and again tried to punch Middleton in the face when he grabbed the puppy back.
The man then told Middleton he would come back and shoot him, but when the pensioner said he was going to call police, the man took off in his car in a panic.
Kevin Middleton says the man tried to steal two of his Rottweiler puppies, worth $1000 each.
Middleton said he called police on 111 and immediately reported the incident. Police called him back about 20 to 30 minutes later and said they would send a unit out.
But Middleton waited all day and police did not arrive.
About 4.30pm he got another call from police, explaining they had been unsuccessful tracking down the car from the registration number he provided.
Middleton said he is disappointed, both in the incident happening and in the police response.
“As a pensioner, it shouldn’t occur in New Zealand. I have very high expectations of what safety is ... You’re not expecting anyone to come up and pinch stuff and assault you.”
He believed the attempted dog theft and assault was opportunistic, rather than planned, with the offender trying to get away with it because of Middleton’s age.
But he is annoyed with the “lip service” police gave: “I still think it’s bad that police don’t bother to show up.”
The incident has left him to review safety on the block and he is wary about advertising the Rottweiler puppies for sale.
A police spokesperson said police investigated the incident, where the occupant was threatened by an unknown person, who also unsuccessfully attempted to steal animals from the property before leaving.
“No one was reported as being injured during the incident.”
The spokesperson said police exhausted all avenues of inquiry but anyone with further information can call 105 or file a report online, using the reference number 241014/4071.
Middleton is not the only one frustrated with long police response times in rural Northland. Police data from May shows the average response time to rural callouts was one hour and 19 minutes - the third-longest time in the country.
Denise Piper is a news reporter for the Northern Advocate, focusing on health and business. She has more than 20 years in journalism and is passionate about covering stories that make a difference.
