Robbers after cigarettes leave staff in fear

Inspector Wayne Ewers

A Whangarei store owner has spoken of the devastating emotional impact an aggravated robbery has had on his staff - one of the dozens targeting the ever-growing value of cigarettes.

The Northern Advocate has found at least 26 separate robberies on gas stations, dairies and liquor stores targeting tobacco in Northland since the start of 2016.

This is likely to be less than the actual number of burglaries as not all are reported by media.

The Advocate requested the number of tobacco-related burglaries from Northland police, but Inspector Wayne Ewers said the way crimes were recorded it was unclear just how many burglaries had targeted tobacco products specifically.

"We are not able to give you stats on the number of robberies targeting cigarettes/tobacco in Northland or throughout the country as police do not collate data of what items are stolen for our official crime statistic reporting."

The store owner, who did not want to be identified, said the issue of aggravated tobacco robberies was likely to get worse as the price continued to rise.

The owner said the robbery this year, which involved multiple offenders and at least one gun, had a "far, far greater" emotional impact than financial.

"It's ongoing," he said of the trauma. "You live with it everyday.

"It will take a long time for a lot of people to move past what has happened. For a lot of us this will always be in the back of our mind."

Another Whangarei store owner, who wanted to remain anonymous due to fear of being targeted, said since he was robbed he had bolstered security at the store with steel bollards and four additional security cameras.

The man said tobacco thefts had become so common he expects to be hit again.

"It's obviously not very nice having a gun pointed in your face but you can't really do much about it."

He now has 16 cameras in his dairy. However, handing over footage to police seemed futile, he said.

"[The offender's] face was covered, so police can't do anything about it."