The sad predictability of the shooting of Tom Phillips like a dog in front of his own child should surprise no one.
This Blog has predicted this very outcome for several years now.
The only blessing is the Police managed to not shoot the remaining children.
The current scramble by the cops in getting their story straight is helped by Journalists who never ask the hard questions.
We don’t even know how many shots were actually fired.
Don’t you dare fret about any of the Police being held to account for shooting Tom Phillips, NZ has an incredible track record of always finding every Cop not guilty for shooting Kiwis.
Our Police are really, really, really good at harassing young Māori, chasing young people to death in police chases and getting away with shooting New Zealanders.
NZ Police fatally shoot Kiwis at 11 times the rate of Officers in England and Wales and few are ever held accountable for those killings,
Look at the shootings from a 2022 article into the insane rates of shootings by NZ Police, look at how many shots the cops fired and look at how all of them were considered justified…
…hilariously 10 of them were shoot in the back by the cops.
Most Kiwis have no idea of those stats, that’s how powerful the culture of authority worship is in NZ.
Here is what will happen next.
There will be a whitewash report.
All the Police involved with shooting Tom will be awarded medals for bravery.
There will never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever 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It was a set up but the kids safety will be the excuse
Hearts and prayers going out to the copper that got shot.
Got no love for the piggyman but you shouldn’t get popped for just doing your job.
All the vultures will be lining up to make a book, a movie, a doco about the guy…yuck !!!
Yes all of those people lining up, ghouls!
Well I suppose you could see the police car in bits that could be a bit of a clue who shot first don’t you think.
Four holes in the windscreen (some or all of which may have been fired by an officer given the level of firearms training provided to NZ police) are a ‘car in bits’? OK, I guess. Those Skoda things are front wheel drive, they’re apt to falling apart just being driven down the road.
Jusr the vehicle to match NZ ‘s style then.
Creating a containment zone around Phillips then letting time go by might have worked but not as much fun. Poor wee kids. I feel a deep and haunting sadness for the whole horrible thing.
The police left this for two long and too many people made excuses for his behavior. Four years in the bush for his kids not good . The older girl would have started her puberty stage and was being taught to rob. If he was a Maori the police would have hunted ihim down like a dog. He was starting to get desperate why didn’t his whanau appeal to him years ago. Some aresholes blamed the mother typical bullshit,she wanted them home. We should have sent in our best to get them out with no one being killed too late now his daughter will be traumatized. Some of the hillbilly locals turned a blind eye not good even said the kids were getting an education how thick is that. Now the kids have no father and will need a lot of help to reintegration. We will find out who shot first hopefully we learn from this andcsort our custody issues and court system.
SO HOW DO YOU KNOW THIS? The older girl would have started her puberty stage and was being taught to rob.
So much bullshit, of course they learnt an enormous amount – how to live in the bush. I am not saying that any of this is right, because to be frank we don’t know any of us the whole story.
What I would like is for the bloody media the MSM to shut the fuck up. Their endless comments by psychologists who actually do not know the full story are total click bait shit.
Leave this family alone now. Leave them to grieve for their Dad who has been there for them for the last 4 years. Checking out their health, wow so far they have found to be healthy, well surprise surprise. It all pisses me off and it was bloody predictable that he would be shot and killed.
It is all terribly sad!
I know this because I am a fucken women Michal and who do you think we saw on the cameras out on the jobs he did, it wasn’t a ghost it was the oldest daughter
I suggest then that as a ‘fucken women’ you do some research some females don’t start into puberty much older than that, but you know…
Pathetic teaching his daughter to rob. Honest to goodness.
Court issues relate directly to the Westminster System. You cant sort out the judicial arm without sorting the legislative and executive as well.
Nothing will be learnt. It’ll becbusiness as usual. The lawyers make too much money and the judges have an inherent bias to uphold.
Super intelligent A.I will disrupt the system and put a lot of lawyers and judges out of business. Even General A.I will do a better job.
Can’t wait til it makes politicians and preachers obsolete too!
With you on this CIPa, yep Martyn this issue is clearly a blind spot for you. Stupid analysis clouded by your own emotional experience, pretty obvious, you probably should not bother commenting as you seem to cloud your experience with family courts, women and police with what has happened here. However, too many disturbed people armed with knives etc are getting killed by police. Right on that issue. However pretty clear this instance was not one of them Tom was a serious fucked up person dragging his kid into crime and firing a weapon is on him. Just luck his kid didn’t get killed. Save your sympathy for the copper who got shot, his kid that didn’t who was with him when he started firing his gun for fucks sake, and also the two others left in the bush. What a fucked up dick.
Amen
It seems odd that you claim Martyn has a blind spot when you’re evidence free allegations shows the bias that you hold. You should consider this “And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?” Before passing judgment in future.
The trauma Phillips has imposed on his children and the psychological damage that will stay with these children forever cannot be forgotten. What Phillips has done cannot be downplayed and I hasten to say the police did what was necessary in self defense.
Complete fabrication Charles you do not know that! What he has done wasn’t right, but clearly his kids were loved and knew they were. Of course the pigs have never shot anyone except in self defence, even all those they shot in the back well that was self defence. Makes me sick!
Research trauma informed care and in particular psychosocial trauma Michal. Nothing to do with being loved. Withdrawing his children from society for those informative years will leave scars.
The only fabrication is that you clearly have a closed mind.
Well said Charles.
It is the same love that men have for their wife’s that they beat up regularly.
Well done to the police and I hope those that helped Phillips are having a few restless nights
Assosting a kidnappingand a police wounding should seecthem in jail.
esp. the brown ones? did daddy leave you in the cupboard under the stairs for too long?
Trumpoop’s most likely referring to the brown ones he dodges surfing the S bend
How the F# were you ever socialized as a kid to form the ‘ narrow ‘ , vacant mind that you project; now that would be a statistic of abuse under several catergories. Ask one of NZs biggest victim agencies for real statistics.
My thoughts are that the police and counselors brain washing that the children are likely to endure will leave them in a worse place than a few years in the bush.
You probably think the covid vaccine had tracking chips that went in your arm Bonnie?
Brainwashing? FFS!
No tracking chips in the vaccines I had. You obviously have never experienced any police interviews. I’m sticking with brain washing as a good description of what the children are likely to experience as the police and social workers aim to convince them that their father was an evil monster and they need to be grateful for being rescued.
I didn’t support Phillips keeping his children in hiding but a better response would have been to build trust with his support network and give him a decent reason to surrender instead of threatening to lock him up and take his children away forever.
He had his chance but he chose ( his choice, no one elses) to do what he did. He could still have seen his kids yet he chose illegal means to do so. Stop with the nonsense he was an innocent victim Bonnie. In the end he and he alone went down all guns blazing, of which there were many and that alone should convince you of his intent.
did he really have a choice ?father on his own for two or more years then next minute the kids are being ripped away by the court because mum now decides she was wrong to abandon them for a two year fling in the south island
Yes he did have a choice. He would have had some type of access to his children despite the decision of the court. His choice to do what he did has resulted in him never seeing them again. Sadly that is the end result of his choice.
I don’t think that he was an innocent victim but what you call a choice was that he give up his children and goes to prison. While that obviously seems like a sensible solution to you other people can think differently. I would think that ambush was a better description of the police tactics although since they knew he had a gun and would be under stress after almost 4 years they obviously don’t have a realistic health and safety plan for risky situations. I see that the media are already running articles from experts saying what a great job the police did however I believe that Martyn’s description is the most accurate.
not any surprises here. the dude took his kids hostage into his delusion. sad fuck.
You along with the rest of us do not know why he did this. Were the kids happy do you know that NO like the rest of us you don’t.
For someone who doesn’t know their name to be talking about delusion I guess that it’s no surprise that you would rather believe a lie than attempt to understand what was actually happening in this unfortunate situation. The police were running around with guns from the start of this case and you can be sure that they had no intention of ever letting Tom describe how he made them look incompetent for almost 4 years.
sane people stand and fight for their rights. to go on the run with your kids is total delusion. I’m not going into the weeds on the Family Court or the Police response but I suggest there was only one outcome as far as he was concerned, and he got it. such a hero.
I know two young men that have done as you say they should at about 20k each on costs and they are now far from sane the poor buggers .
Yeah, since Phillips decided not to surrender his firearm and continue shooting the cops should have backed off, left their colleague to bleed out and waited for a trained negotiator.
Absolutely , but fortunately we have access to much smarter people …just in this blog !
And you are on the blog Law, smartest of the smart.
Since the police were chasing Phillips and not the other way around your comment is irrelevant to the situation. We have health and safety in employment to stop people doing stupid things yet you make excuses for police with body armor ambushing an armed man at night. All we have now is the police description of events which is tailored to explain their killing of a suspect, no trial, no jury, just a decision to take his life as the quickest way to end their embarrassment.
“you make excuses for police with body armor ambushing an armed man at night”
Phillips and his accomplice had previously presented a firearm during an armed robbery and demonstrated that they were willing to use it, by doing exactly that.
Only Bonnie or an idiot would approach them without wearing body armour.
How dare they approach at all!
So how do we know that an offer to talk with Phillips, no guns one to one via one of his supporters would not have lead to a better outcome? Seems like they don’t know much about anything but the pressure of public embarrassment as a guy and 3 children can evade them for years causes them to put themselves at risk and we have the unsatisfactory result of the suspect being dead and fools like you swallowing the police propaganda because you have no ability for independent thought.
Enough with cynicism, not one of the comments shows any understanding of the value of respect for each other and of psychological strains when one falls off the moving pathway everyone else is on. And sentimental cares about the children. Sheesh. Kids are going through their own problems in town living at home or in a garage or wherever all the time, except you don’t give a rat’s arse about them. So you sit all sorted giving your opinions of the situation, passing wise judgment about those others, not sorted, – well they’e not anything to do with you.
Can police only handle difficult emotional confrontations without force? It’s seems frontier mentality. Arthur whosisname from the 1800s etc. David Gray I haven’t forgotten, he was off in his violent, defensive world jut like Phillips seemed to be.
We need more citizen-concerned systems and less violence and brutality verbal or physical from people given power over others. And it needs to be enforced from the top, with the pollies in charge of happenings and not contracting out to charities and business, delegating all their authority. What do we pay government for? To see people shot at and killed.
There was another sad case of mishandling by police in Christchurch involving an ex Russian soldier who was almost induced to commit suicide I think. He had been in trouble with police, but I didn’t see why it ended in grim death, police refusing son to speak to him when they had communication open with him. I feel a great dissatisfaction with this country’s methods, a fail in everything from what could be expected in the 21st century .
This time you got this one so wrong MB
to the point that you’ll end up retracting your words!!!
Another male victim of the family court .Has anyone out there ever wondered why there are so many men around Toms age who have committed suicide for the same reason as he went bush .Very easy to label all men as arseholes and useless fathers then take their children away and use them as pawns in a game of I am going to fuck with your brain till you crack .While his may well not have been the best option I can fully understand his motive for doing so .
RIP TOM at least you no longer have to endure the Kangaroo court of media and the kick him while he is down mob .
Martyn – Deeply sad for everyone
– Tom’s Family
– Tom’s kids
– The Police Officer who got shot
– The Police Officer’s family and friends
– The Police Officer who pulled the trigger
– The local community
Sadly this was always going to end in a tragedy. I feel for Tom and his children. He was not a bad, stupid or selfish man – all he wanted was what was best for his children and it seems living with their Mother wasn’t acceptable to him! However this should never have got to the level it did. A long time ago, before things got out of hand, Tom should have been given an amnesty and ‘way back’ so he and his family could return to a normal life with dignity. So why didn’t this happen? Any decent loving father would have gone to the same lengths to feed and care for his children. These children were smart enough to “escape” had they wanted to. As time passed and Tom was backed into a smaller and smaller corner he has become stubborn and maybe less stable. However one person who knows exactly what was said by the Police and who fired the first shot etc. is the daughter who was with him, but I bet she has already been muzzled. And as for the dumb comment the other two children were found ‘safe’ – did they think they would find them tethered to a post? These children were raised to know how to survive. Time for a commission of inquiry into how our Police handlle delicate situations as it seems always to be the victims’ fault and NEVER our Police’s fault! RIP Tom. p.s. “Incredible” is our PM’s favourite word!
Great comments Patrize.
However one person who knows exactly what was said by the Police and who fired the first shot etc. is the daughter who was with him, but I bet she has already been muzzled. And as for the dumb comment the other two children were found ‘safe’ – did they think they would find them tethered to a post? These children were raised to know how to survive. Time for a commission of inquiry into how our Police handlle delicate situations as it seems always to be the victims’ fault and NEVER our Police’s fault! RIP Tom. p.s. “Incredible” is our PM’s favourite word!
The very fact that the cops and the MSM went on our about how cold it was going to get, for goodness sake they will have known survival skills more than most of us.
Patrize your thinking seems right.
The enquiry needs to be into the family court system in NZ .
I wonder if this was suicide by cop
Mark that crossed my mind too. He was close to reaching the end of his tether – they were in desperate need of supplies. While I admire his fortitude and resilience it was never going to end well. So very, very sad.
Hmmmm …. If so shooting the first one shows he was in no hurry …
Fortitude and resilience ….why not go the whole hog and admire his aim ,…F Nonce!
Why don’t New Zealand police wear body cameras?
My question was answered at 6.30pm :
Why NZ Police don’t wear body cameras – and if that will change
https://www.1news.co.nz/2025/09/09/why-nz-police-dont-wear-body-cameras-and-if-that-will-change/
Awful take
The dude endangered his own daughter by trying to kill a cop. He got what was coming to him
Tragic and baffling failure of cops to track him down sooner. If he d been a patched gang member, armed and running around with basically 3 helpless captives, there’d ve been an army dragnet across the whole region years ago.
Absolutely just see the man hunt in Australia