Shots fired at a Northland community police station smashed a window and went through into the main office area.
The Ōtangarei Police Station, in Whangārei, is attached to a series of flats in Matai St and was targeted about 2.30am yesterday.No one was in the building at the time and no one was injured.
A neighbour living in a flat immediately on the other side of the station wall said he and his two-year-old daughter slept through the shooting while another neighbour just six metres away heard a series of shots but didn't think any thing of it.
Police confirmed the shots had been fired and an investigation to find the culprits was under way.
A scene examination had been completed and a glass window replaced yesterday.A hole through the wooden railing leading to the main door and a dented aluminium window frame were visible signs of the attack.
The immediate neighbour, who did not want to be named, said he was unaware of the commotion until he was woken by police banging on his door.
"I slept right through. The police were asking if I had heard anything but I didn't".
He thought the station would have been the intended target for the shots and did not feel it was aimed at him.
"It's not the first time it's been shot at."
The police did get him to check the walls of his adjoining flat to make sure no bullets had pierced the wall dividing his flat from the station.
Yesterday the shots was the talk of the neighbourhood but no one really knew who was involved or why they had shot the station.
"I heard someone yelling then heard shots. I heard what sounded like tink, tink, tink and thought they were just firing at tin cans. I didn't think much of it," said a neighbour living 6 metres away.
"I was on my phone in the room with the curtains pulled so didn't see anything."
He thought he had heard about five shots and thought it sounded like a small pistol or a slug gun.
In August 2012 four shots were fired at the building, which blasted through the window and shattered a front door glass panel.
At that time a resident said there had been growing tension in the neighbourhood, partly due to that occupation of the Housing New Zealand property.
In 2009 a Molotov cocktail was hurled at the station.
The Molotov cocktail smashed when it hit a window frame, causing the accelerant to spread on the outside of the building, with a small amount going inside.
Two officers patrolling in the area used an extinguisher from their police car to quell the flames.