Escalated gun crime expected to remain a problem for years - police

Escalated violent crime is expected to be a problem for years to come, before the results of gun control measures will be seen, New Zealand's top cop says, following Auckland's construction site shootings.

On Thursday Matu Tangi Matua Reid, 24, walked onto a construction site in lower Queen Street, where he had been working, and opened fire with a pump action shotgun.

Three people died, including Reid. Six others were taken to hospital, including two police officers.

Police Commissioner Andrew Coster said that firearms controls introduced in recent years were expected to reduce the number of guns in circulation in the community, but it would take time.

"We've known for quite some time that our firearms environment is not where we need it to be. That was something that was well traversed post the 2019 attacks in Christchurch - hence the changes to gun legislation - the firearms register went live in the last couple of weeks," Coster said.

"Overseas experience suggests that it takes up to a decade or longer to really show the real benefit of that.

"In the meantime we have too many firearms circulating in the wrong hands and that creates a range of challenges for our frontline staff - so it will improve with time, but we need to keep focused on the [problems] that we have under way."

Reid had been sentenced on family violence charges earlier in the year, was serving a five-month sentence on home detention and was wearing an electronic ankle bracelet. He did not have a firearms licence.

Coster said there was no suggestion Reid had breached his home detention conditions. He had reported to his probation officers the day before, and was permitted to travel to the construction site for work.

The incident put the spotlight on how firearms got into the wrong hands, Police Association president Chris Cahill told Morning Report.

In most cases, criminals were obtaining guns from licensed firearm owners, either by buying from them or stealing from them, Cahill said. However the new firearms register meant owners who did not secure their weapons properly could be held accountable.

"Understanding where these guns have come from is really important if we're going to prevent it in the future.

"Myself and the association have lobbied very hard around firearms control - there's been some significant changes made, and we don't expect those changes to be successful overnight."

However, after the introduction of a firearms register in Australia: "10,000 less firearms were stolen in the first year", Cahill said.

Despite opposition from some firearms owners, the Police Association was adamant that all firearms must be registered, not just some types.

"There's no way we should think that this isn't needed. We register dogs, we register cars for crying out loud. We should register our firearms so we know where they are and that they're under suitable control."

Cahill said there had also been some new developments in police resources to respond to armed incidents.

Armed Offenders Squad members, who were some of the first officers on the scene, now had immediate access to police firearms and had been trained for a new tactical response model called "offender prevention". And general frontline officers now had more specialist training in dealing with firearms, which was likely to have helped with things like site control as the event was unfolding, he said.

Two people dead, six injured

Coster said the families of the two workers who were killed were working with police and expected to make formal identifications today.

"But we believe we know who they are," he said.

By early Friday, the conditions of those who had been injured ranged from serious to moderate, Coster said.

"[It's] a terrible time for them and their families."

And, of the two police officers injured, one remained in hospital in a stable condition.

"I expect he'll be there for quite some time, he has quite a road to recovery."

Police spoke to about 70 witnesses by the end of Thursday, and said it was likely the gunman knew the people who were killed.

"We are of the understanding ... that this is related to an issue at the workplace. The team will be piecing together the fine detail of what that was, but on the surface it related to some workplace tension."

The investigation would include a post-mortem, and a detailed scene examination. Coster said the fact the site was under construction would present safety issues that police would have to work carefully with.

Auckland central left reeling as football world cup begins

The opening match of the FIFA Football World Cup went ahead at Eden Park on Thursday evening, about 4km from the where the shooting took place, despite today's shooting in Auckland.

Minister of Police Ginny Andersen said she had spoken with police about safety measures.

"I want to reassure the central Auckland businesses that the central business district is safe.

"I was reassured that not only are police integrated into the whole organisation of the FIFA World Cup, but also there's extra presence in and around that [Central Business District (CBD)], not just at that site of the fatalities, but right around the CBD," Andersen said.

The impact of yesterday's events would be wide ranging, she said.

"We have lost two lives yesterday, those people went to work and did not come home to their family.

"It has been a shocking time for Auckland CBD. And the actions of the police - the fact that they were there within 11 minutes of that phone call being made, kept New Zealanders safe, and their quick action and their bravery did save lives."

Most of the streets in Auckland central that were closed by police on Thursday had been reopened by Friday, though there were still some disruptions directly around the construction site, Police Commissioner Coster said.

Officers were prioritising finishing the site examination everywhere except inside the building that is under construction, so the rest of the area could return to normal as much as possible in the next day or two.

Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei said on Friday that there was no rāhui in place in connection to the incident.

Home detention and reoffending

Discounts to criminal sentences have swung too far in favour of offenders, with sentences being bargained down until they are low enough to be converted to home detention, Police Association president Chris Cahill told Morning Report.

"It's the discounts I'm most concerned with. There's relatively clear sentencing guidelines, but what we see is someone can start at sentences as high as seven years and then receive multiple discounts for guilty pleas, for personal circumstances, for cultural reports, for all these sorts of things.

"It seems to me when I watch them the the key goal is to get to a period of two years imprisonment, which then immediately gets converted to 12 months and home detention, and I don't think that's appropriate in all cases."

While a discount recognising a guilty plea was valuable to help streamline cases through the justice system and for the sake of victims, Cahill said discounts up to 20 percent were sufficient. However once totals were being added up, the final figures sometimes came in much higher.

"The most recent one that stood out was the gang member who got a 75 percent discount [after] hitting another gang member over the head with a hammer, 75 percent discount is just too much."

Cahill said the practice was putting too much weight on what was good for the offender at the expense of society.

Asked about whether there were issues with criminals convicted for violent offences being given sentence discounts for factors like pleading guilty, or being given home detention instead of serving their sentence behind bars, Minister of Police Ginny Andersen said it was important to look at the detail.

"The two key areas that we've seen a reduction in prison numbers is low level drug offences, such as cannabis, and also traffic offences - they're the two big decreases.

"So there has not been a decrease in violent crime receiving a prison sentence."

She said it was too early to comment on the fact Reid had been on home detention when the shootings took place. That would be considered as part of investigations into the incident, including by police and an investigation by the Department of Corrections "to detect if there were any flags that could have been missed".

"We really need to have all of the information in front of us in terms of what happened in this particular instance, to understand if the system can be strengthened...," Andersen said.

Police commissioner Coster said having more offenders on home detention inevitably meant police were more likely to deal with crime committed by them.

"Home detention was introduced about 10 years ago ... and the numbers there have grown over time. That isn't necessarily a problem, it's really about what happens with those who breach and how they're managed.

"There are a large number of people on electronically monitored bail, on home detention. Many of those sentence are served without significant issue.

"Certainly anyone who's on that sentence is going to be a higher risk of reoffending than the average person, so we do see that occurring. [But] the judgements about whether someone should be [on home detention] or in prison are not matters for police, they're for the judiciary, but that is something that we manage."