Thread: Poaching

Second suspected sheep rustler bailed

A second man has appeared in court following an incident in Hukerenui in which fed-up farmers blocked a road to stop a pair of suspected sheep rustlers escaping.

Michael Paul Ross, a 42-year-old farm worker from Motatau, appeared in the Kaikohe District Court last week charged with possessing a .22 rifle without a licence and killing a sheep with the intention of stealing its carcass.

Ross was arrested at a home in Kawakawa where police also seized a rifle they believe was used to kill a pregnant ewe. He was remanded on bail until October 6 when he is next due back in court.

Another man, Bernard Tipene, 47, appeared in court earlier charged with theft and is due back in court on October 19. He was also granted bail.

The charges relate to an incident on September 5 when Hukerenui farmers, sick of losing hundreds of animals to poachers, boxed in a vehicle used by two men they believed had killed a ewe on a Monument Rd farm.

Police said the suspects found their exit blocked by a farmer's vehicle, so did a U-turn and were chased until they reached a one-way bridge blocked by another farmer's vehicle.



Police said one man fled with a firearm across paddocks towards a river while the other remained in a 4WD vehicle with the dead sheep.