Transcript
Mary Dean's cousin Tapairu Tuakeu-Skinner lives on Rarotonga but was in Melbourne when she heard news on Facebook about the death. Her family stopped her from coming home immediately as they couldn't confirm for days that it was safe. She says police didn't even relieve their fears for Mary Dean's nine-year old son who police knew was in the care of another family.
"I'm very frustrated because the whole process has just been.. no productive communication or effective communication has been done for one week now."
The police commissioner Maara Tetava was directing the police operation. Although he had two senior officers at the base, he says he takes full responsibility.
"As leader of the police service here, that's my fault that we didn't get to the public as quickly as we could. But my top priority and the priority of my team was to get to this person as quickly as we could. I had two commanders, very senior officers back at my command centre and they were in charge of that and as I say, if we didn't get to the public as quickly as we should, my fault, I apologise for that."
Ms Tuakeu-Skinner says police did not allow the next of kin to identify Ms Dean's body, but chose a work colleague instead. Our correspondent in Rarotonga, Flo Syme Buchanan, says if police are sorry, they should now be actively engaging the family, but it's clear they are not.
"The contact with the family and communication with the family is of utmost importance and police should have appointed by now a liaison officer to support the family."
Ms Tuakeu-Skinner says they are now looking at other avenues to get information.
"There's been no consistency right from the start. They've just pushed me to the limit and I have initiated an independent investigation."
That investigator is former New Zealand Detective Inspector Mark Franklin. Flo Syme Buchanan says he told her he's also concerned about the way police stormed the house where Rimamotu was holed up.
"The standard procedure is to wait the situation out, but instead the commissioner of police with four other police officers stormed the building, kicked down the door of the house, shots were fired by the gunman. Fortunately and miraculously, no one was shot, and the police weren't even wearing bullet-proof vests."
Maara Tetava says his men don't have bullet-proof vests and he simply worked with what he had. He defended the police operation which he says was a success.
"We've never had this kind of thing happen before, I've been in the police force now for 31 years and this was the first time I've had to take my firearm out for an incident such as this. And that shows how we've taken for granted how peaceful our place is."
Maara Tetava says there will be a full police investigation. Rimamotu was able to escape a prison guard who took him out on community release to fetch tools from his shipping container. He took a gun from the container and made his way to a house where Mary Dean and her partner Roger Tauarea stayed, firing multiple shots at both of them. The family say they want the prison guard stood down. The Justice Minister Nandi Glassie defended the police actions but says errors were made by prison staff. Following the coroner's report and an autopsy, Mary Dean's body will be returned to Tokoroa in New Zealand for burial next to the graves of her parents.