Cold-blooded killer on loose

By MONIQUE DEVEREUX and PATRICK GOWER

A gunman who police say has killed two men in cold blood during robberies was last night on the loose in Auckland.

Bank teller John Vaughan, 44, had his arms raised in surrender when he was shot in the head by the masked robber in the ASB Bank's Mangere Bridge branch yesterday.

Police have advised cash-handling businesses throughout Auckland to review their security.

Police says they are 100 per cent certain the gunman is the same man who killed pizza worker Marcus Doig last week and held up the East Tamaki TAB at gunpoint on April 22. No one was hurt in the TAB raid.

Each time he is believed to have carried a sawn-off rifle. Police say he is a Maori or Pacific Islander, aged 18-25.

In at least two robberies he was wearing cut-off denim shorts, a hat and a handkerchief tied over his lower face.

Detectives are reviewing unsolved armed robberies and say the man may be responsible for others.

The South Auckland detective leading the hunt for the gunman, Detective Inspector Steve Rutherford, yesterday told the people of Auckland to "take no chances" and described the killer as a "madman".

"We have a person who is out of control and who obviously does not care about the pain or grief that he inflicts, not to mention the slaying of innocent members of the community."

Mr Vaughan's life support was turned off last night after his 9-year-old son, Ben, had said goodbye.

His friends gathered in disbelief in Mangere Bridge last night.

They remembered Mr Vaughan as a "fantastic" guy".

"He was easy to get on with and fun to be with," said close friend Debbie Pascoe. "This is so, so terrible ... I just can't believe what has happened today."

Mr Vaughan's killer entered the bank just after noon yesterday, screaming obscenities and demanding cash. He shot Mr Vaughan once in the head from directly across the counter - despite Mr Vaughan's surrender stance - before escaping with the money he had been given.

Police say the gunman was given several thousand dollars before he shot Mr Vaughan.

After leaving the bank, the gunman crossed the road and ran into a carpark behind the Coronation Rd shops. Police believe he sped off in a dark-coloured saloon.

They suspect the killer has an accomplice who drives the getaway vehicle.

Armed officers swarmed the Mangere Bridge area yesterday and a team of detectives was still hunting the gunman late last night.

Maliliga Teleiai, who works at a Mangere Bridge resthome, is one of the few people to have seen the suspect.

She was driving around the roundabout outside the bank yesterday when she saw a man wearing cut-off denim shorts running down Church Rd.

"His left arm was not moving ... You know how, when you are running, both arms move. It made me notice him because I thought there might be something wrong."

But she did not think anything of it until she tried to go into the bank and found the doors locked. At the next-door dairy a woman called out to her to say there had been a robbery and a man with a gun was in the area. "So I went into the dairy to hide until the police came. I think now he must have been carrying a gun."

Mrs Teleiai saw the man only from behind, but noticed he wore a hat that covered his hair. "It was the shorts that I really noticed."

Raewyn Thomson, who owns Mangere Bridge Stationery, found out something had happened when she heard someone banging on the back door.

She opened it to find a pregnant bank worker calling for help, saying the bank had been robbed and Mr Vaughan had been shot. The woman rang the police from the stationery shop and asked Ms Thomson to find the bank manager, who was at the hairdresser on her lunch break.

"So I sprinted over to tell her and she just leapt up and ran to the bank. She certainly left me way behind, she was in a real hurry to see if John was OK."

A doctor and nurse from the Mangere Bridge Surgery, a few doors down from the bank, helped until the ambulance arrived. Mr Vaughan was taken to Middlemore Hospital.

Ms Thomson's partner, Selwyn Johns, followed the ambulance, picking up Mr Vaughan's 80-year-old mother on the way.

Mr Vaughan moved to New Zealand with his wife, Carole, and Ben from England almost five years ago. He and Carole have since separated and Ben spends two weeks at a time with each parent. His mother, Margaret, shifted here 18 months ago to be closer to her only child.

Mr Vaughan had worked at the ASB Mangere Bridge branch for 18 months, over which time Ms Pascoe, who works part-time at the stationers, came to know him.

She and Mr Vaughan would often spend their lunch breaks together because they were both smokers. "We'd end up going for a walk around the shops at lunch a lot. He's such a great guy to talk to and we get on really well."

He had spoken a lot about the anti-robbery training, and she was sure he would not have done anything to provoke being shot.

"He always said he knew if it happened not to look the person in the eye, not to say anything, just do what they say.

"The money is not important, it can be recovered. You can't always recover a person".

Ms Pascoe, her partner, Geoff, and another couple had become especially close friends with Mr Vaughan. The group frequently socialised at each others' homes, and all were proud when Mr Vaughan did well in the New Zealand Ironman, held in Taupo in March.

"He knew he wouldn't win but he set out to do well. He trained really hard, he was so dedicated," an emotional Ms Pascoe said yesterday.

Detective Inspector Rutherford, a 30-year police veteran who has been heading the investigation into Mr Doig's murder, said Mr Vaughan had also been "unbelievably shot down in the execution of his duty".

"Anyone who gets involved in any robbery for goodness sake co-operate with the man. Don't do anything to agitate or upset him."

Mr Rutherford said 10 detectives from Hamilton and Auckland City had been brought in to help the 30 Counties-Manukau officers working on the inquiry.

"I can assure you we are doing everything that is humanly possible to identify this person."

Mr Rutherford said he was yet to hear from people in the criminal underworld who he was sure would know the gunman or his accessory.

"Have some courage and common sense and for the good of the public pick up that phone and give us the name ... If money is their motive, I will see they are looked after," he said.

Last night, Marcus Doig's father, Peter, endorsed the police plea for public help.

Mr Doig was also shot in the face by the gunman as he was handed the "pathetic" sum of around $250 during last week's robbery of the Pakuranga Pizza parlour.

The St Kentigern's College old boy was working there as an extra job to save money for an overseas trip.

Staff at the East Tamaki TAB yesterday refused to talk about last month's robbery, but company spokesman Joe Locke said all Auckland TAB outlets had been placed on alert, reminded of their security procedures and told to heighten security.

ASB Bank's general manager of personal banking, Ian Park, said the branch was very secure.

The bank's seven staff were being given counselling, and any customers in the bank at the time of the shooting would be offered assistance.