Deaf man mauled after police send dogs into home

A deaf Porirua man who is unable to speak is in hospital after being mauled by police dogs during an armed offenders squad callout.

Neighbours said the man would not have heard police demands to come out of his flat before his front door was smashed open and the dogs sent in.

Police were called to a block of four flats in Cheshire St, Cannons Creek, about 9.45pm on Tuesday, after reports of a man armed with a pistol.

It is believed the injured man had threatened a resident with a replica firearm.

Witnesses said about 12 armed police hid behind cars and in bushes around the house before storming the man's second-storey flat.

Detective Senior Sergeant Mike Oxnam, of Porirua CIB, said two dogs were sent in after the man failed to respond to calls to surrender.

"We believed we were dealing with an armed incident and responded accordingly," he said.

Yesterday the front door was still smashed and splintered, and blood stained the threshold.

The man was taken by ambulance to Wellington Hospital with serious leg injuries, but after improving yesterday he was transferred to Hutt Hospital.

Neighbour Shalom Pua said she and her two children, aged 3 and 7, were terrified after being alerted by Ms Pua's uncle who had been woken by rustling outside his bedroom window. He could see four men in black wearing balaclavas huddled around his car, she said.

"He called out, 'Hey, what ... are you doing'. The guy turned and pointed the gun straight at my uncle. He started screaming and yelling, 'It's guys breaking into the car and they've all got guns'."

Not realising they were police, Ms Pua called 111. She was furious it took the call-taker at least 15 minutes to confirm the armed men were police.

"Here I am terrified, thinking, 'Oh my gosh, there's guys breaking into our car', and I'm panicking about the safety of my children," she said.

She heard the sound of screams and dogs barking coming from next door as she waited on the phone.

Ms Pua said her neighbour was deaf and could not speak.

She said he was "a lovely, friendly man" and had been in a good mood an hour before police arrived. He had called at her house and indicated he would drop by yesterday to mow her lawns.

- NZPA