Police are refusing to reveal if they've identified the officer who fired the bullet that killed Halatau Naitoko in a shootout on Auckland's northwestern motorway.
Halatau, 17, was caught in the crossfire as police tried to stop a gunman who allegedly tried to hijack a vehicle on January 23.
The
father-of-one was driving a courier van when he was hit in the chest by a police bullet.
Stephen McDonald, 50, has been charged with 29 offences relating to events before the motorway shooting.
Inspector Peter Devoy, head of the investigation into Halatau's death, refused to tell the Herald on Sunday whether the officer that filed the fatal shot had been identified.
"No comment on the actions of any staff - these matters are sub judice," he said.
But Christchurch lawyer Nigel Hampton QC said unless the officer in question had been charged over the shooting, the matter was not sub judice.
He said the police are protecting their own.
"It has become their routine to do so. They release the names of other people under investigation, but not themselves."
While Devoy would not divulge information on the shooter, he told the Herald on Sunday a number of police officers involved in the incident had been taken off Armed Offenders Squad duties temporarily and were receiving welfare support.
Devoy said that Naitoko's death was still being treated as a homicide.
"While most witnesses have now been spoken to there remains a lot of forensic work to be completed," he said.
