A large police team is investigating the kidnapping of a taxi driver, who was found locked in the boot of his car yesterday.
Tony Brosnan, 49, from Waitara, was found in his taxi in the Urenui School grounds, north of New Plymouth, at 8.45am.
He was taken toTaranaki Base Hospital in critical condition and put on life support.
A group of workers clearing the school grounds saw the taxi, with its roof light on, parked in a car port by the school dental clinic, Detective Senior Sergeant Grant Coward of New Plymouth police said.
When they went to investigate closer they heard a noise from the boot.
"They tapped and there was a response. As a result emergency services were deployed, including the police, and the boot was opened," Mr Coward said.
"In it we found the taxi driver. He was very incoherent, distraught and very weak."
Community worker Jason Symes, who found Mr Brosnan, told the Taranaki Daily News he went over to the taxi because it was an "oddball place to park a taxi".
"When we knocked on the boot we heard a holler back," he said.
In January last year Mr Brosnan was attacked by a bottle-wielding thug while driving his taxi.
If the attacks got worse or continued he would consider quitting, he said at the time.
Following the stabbing of Christchurch taxi driver Abdulrahman Ikhtiari last year, Mr Brosnan's company, Egmont City Cabs, told the newspaper it was only a matter of time before one of the company's drivers was killed.
Egmont City Cabs owner Ted Cooper said he was in shock yesterday.
Police appealed to anyone who had seen or travelled in the 1999 white Toyota Camry taxi after midnight to contact them. The car displays Egmont City Cabs' livery, with registration number TAX1 1.
