Eight-year-old boy shooting at magpie hits school

By NATASHA HARRIS and STUART DYE

A Dunedin man yesterday took the blame after his son fired two shots into his neighbour's house and another four into the local school down the road.

Bullets from the .22 rifle narrowly missed several people.

Children arriving at Ocean View School, 20km south of Dunedin, about 8.30am were ushered into a back room by teachers while police cordoned off the area and the armed offenders squad moved in.

No further shots were fired and the rifle was recovered from a nearby address by squad officers about 9.30am.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, said he had not locked his .22 rifle away.

When his 8-year-old son saw a magpie in trees across the road, the temptation proved too much.

He scrambled around for a few loose bullets in his father's room and lined up the sights.

His first shots crashed through the window of a house across the road, rather than the tree line behind.

As the bird flew along the tree line, the boy followed it and hit Ocean View School up the road.

Two shots punched through the kitchen window of a house across the street, showering a resident with glass. One of the spent bullets fell near the house's other resident, who was seated having his breakfast.

Of the four shots that hit the school, 60m up the road, one passed between wooden louvres on the school office and within 30cm of a teacher talking on the phone.

The father said shooting lessons had been a big part of his son's Christmas break at the family bach.

"At Patearoa, we would be having breakfast at 7am ... and he would say, 'Look, Dad, there's a magpie'," the father said.

The experienced and licensed hunter said he rarely had the gun at his home, but had taken it there to clean, emptying a few loose bullets from his pocket into a container in his bedroom.

"I have done that for 30 years and never thought of the consequences of an 8-year-old finding them," he said.

"They were all circumstances that could have been managed by me but weren't."

The boy's mother was distraught about the incident.

"That's how wee boys shoot other wee boys," she said. "I have run out of tears today. I don't know what to do or even think."

The shooting occurred between 8.30am and 8.40am when the father was already at work and the mother thought her son had gone to school.

She had just left to take her daughter to school, thinking the son had set off earlier on foot.

"He has come back. He must have got to the gate and saw the magpie," his father said.

Having fired off six shots, he put the gun down and went to school.

The mother said it was obvious when the police later brought him home from school that he had no idea of the seriousness of the situation.

Sergeant Shane Fogarty said people were very lucky not to have been hurt.

Council of Licensed Firearms Owners president John Howat said the incident was a timely reminder that gun holders needed to lock away guns securely.

Shooting spree

* Two shots fired at house, showering a resident with glass from kitchen window.

* Four shots fired at Ocean View School: two through the office, one at the roof, and one at the playground equipment - it ricocheted into the staffroom window.

- NZPA