Exclusive: Slain Pakuranga Heights mum Chozyn Koroheke - 'Eastside's fallen angel'

The night Chozyn Koroheke died she was supposed to be at her best mate's for dinner.

Koroheke was on salad duty and Sheldon Cook gave her a call to hurry her up.

"I called her about an hour before it happened, I said 'where are you, you've got to do this salad', and she said, 'I'm just getting pretty and I'll come over, I'm just doing my hair'," Cook told the Herald.

Shortly after that phone call Koroheke, 22, was shot, allegedly at close range, and died in her home.

A 22-year-old man has been charged with her murder and will appear in the Manukau District Court on Tuesday.

The investigation into the alleged murder is ongoing, but police believe it is a domestic-related incident.

Cook later heard that her best friend was killed as she was painting her nails.

"She didn't arrive at my place for dinner, she wasn't answering her phone so I turned on my mobile data to ring her on Facebook; she was always online," Cook said.

"All these messages started coming through, about 15 from friends I hadn't spoken to in years telling me 'sorry for your loss' and 'I heard it was Chozyn'.

"I was like 'what the ***k is going on' and then someone sent me a link to a story ... I just broke."

Chozyn Koroheke and Sheldon Cook in happier times. Photo/Supplied by Sheldon Cook

Cook is still struggling to accept her best friend is dead.

The pair met on their first day at Pakuranga College and became firm friends.

"I found out she lived close, just through the alley and we walked to school together every day, and home," Cook said.

"If I couldn't sleep in the middle of the night I would just go straight to her house."

Both Koroheke and Cook were full-time mothers, each with two young children.

Koroheke is survived by a 4-year-old daughter and 2-year-old son.

"Chozyn loved being a mum, she was a beautiful mum," Cook said.

Chozyn Horokeke and best mate Sheldon Cook. Photo/Supplied by Sheldon Cook

Koroheke had been in a new relationship, with a man she had been seeing for around five months, Cook said.

"It's such a waste. Chozyn was one of a kind," Cook said.

"She was bubbly, she always put herself last. She put everyone else before herself.

"I don't have a car so whenever I'd ring her and ask her to take me to do the shopping she would come over and pick me up, if I was short on money she would pay the difference.

"Chozyn was a really good person. She was fun, too, so fun to be around."

Sheldon Cook and Chozyn Koroheke met at high school and have been close friends since. Photo/Supplied by Sheldon Cook

The last time Cook saw Koroheke was on April 3, the day before she was fatally shot.

"She was all beaten and battered. .. She said she had been jumped by a group of girls," Cook said.

Cook did not believe her friend, but Koroheke stuck to the story.

"Because her heart was so big, she didn't want to say who it really was," Cook said.

After Koroheke died, police went on the hunt for a 22-year-old man.

On Sunday night, the man handed himself in to the Counties Manukau Police and was charged with murder.

His father and a female friend have been charged with being an accessory after the fact of murder.

Chozyn Koroheke was allegedly murdered at her Pakuranga home on April 4. Photo/Supplied

Cook said it was a relief to hear an arrest had been made.

"I'm glad he's handed himself in, it was really good news," she said.

"It's horrible ... she was supposed to be with us, she was supposed to be safe ... I have gone from seeing her four or five times a week, almost every day, to not seeing her at all. It's a huge change.

"She used to just pop in all the time and because I'm a mum and I'm at home, often she was my only visitor."

Cook described her best friend as "Eastside's fallen angel" and said she would always remember her.

"A beautiful mum's been taken away from her babies ... a daughter, a friend ... [the person responsible] has just taken away everything," she said.

"Chozyn didn't deserve to go that way ... I hope her face haunts [the person responsible] every day."

Another of Koroheke's friends spoke to the Herald after the arrest was made.

"Chozyn was very bubbly and outgoing, she could get along with anybody," she said.

"She was also very stubborn when things weren't done her way - but she was a kind caring girl who always put other people's needs before her own.

"No matter what she was going through she always had time to see the people she cared about and would do anything to help them if in need.

"She's one of the most selfless people I've ever met, she had the biggest heart."

The woman said she and Koroheke met at a gathering a few years back, and became best friends straight away.

"We did everything together - and I mean everything," she said.

"If we weren't at her house, we were both at my house or out cruising, being young and having fun.

"There was never a dull moment with her. "

She recalled the last time she saw Koroheke.

"The last time we spoke properly she stayed over at my house for maybe two nights and hung out with our friends and my family," she said.

"Before she left home she said 'Facebook me sis, I love you'... and that was pretty much the last conversation in person that we had."

When she heard a man had been charged with her friend's murder the friend said she was relieved.

"I cried because I'm glad he... handed himself in," she said.

"Now her family, myself, Chozyn's friends and loved ones will have closure we all needed to move forward."

She said she would never forget Koroheke.

"I will forever hold all the memories me and my best friend shared, and forever have her in my thoughts," she told the Herald.

"There's a quote we use to say: 'goofy pictures and crazy times; sisters at heart and partners in crime'."