Local police were at the scene of the Long Drive Dairy shortly before 5am after receiving reports the business had been hit. Photo / Hayden Woodward
An Auckland store was broken into while workers were still inside and a dairy was ramraided in an overnight crime spree.
Police said offenders smashed windows of a shop in Pukekohe, while staff were inside, and fled with loot.
“The workers were not harmed but were understandably shaken,” a police spokesperson said.
“A vehicle used by the offenders to flee the scene has since been located in the nearby area.”
Meanwhile, a St Heliers dairy front was structurally damaged in a ram raid.
Police confirmed they are in the early stages of inquiries into the burglary of the dairy, which happened around 5am.
The shop’s front door was smashed off its hinges and glass strewn across the ground outside.
It’s understood a vehicle was used to gain entry to the shop and has since been recovered.
A friend of the dairy’s owner, Peter Ward, told the Herald the raid was the dairy’s second.
“Bloody second time,” he said.
“It’s just pretty bad, I’ve actually just moved north to get out of South Auckland.”
Ward told the Herald the offenders only appeared to be aged between 13 and 15 years old, asking rhetorically “what can you do?”
“Look at this, just look at this - that would easily be close to $10,000 worth to fix it - more,” he said.
“It’s not us, it’s the building manager who has to sort this.”
While various products were seen lying across the shop floor, Ward understood the shop owner doesn’t make as much due to not selling cigarettes.
“That’s where all the money is, they don’t sell them now because of this s***.”
Ward said the shop owner works long hours, seven days a week serving the community and called the business a “little local dairy, just dealing milk and bread”.
He believes the working environment for dairy owners isn’t fair anymore.
“No punishment is the problem: if caught, a slap and told not to do it again,” he said.
A police spokesperson confirmed the offenders had left the scene before the authorities arrived.
Businesses in St Heliers, a beachside town in Auckland, have regularly been targeted by ramraids.
They were calling for regular police patrols after a random and unprovoked stabbing at the Four Square store in October last year.
The offender, an intoxicated man running with a knife hit out at two people. One victim, a man, received minor injuries, police said.
Kelly-Anne Burns never returned after being granted short-term bail to attend a funeral.