A Levin eyewitness says a boy racer event that descended into violence over the weekend was the largest he'd ever seen. It comes as video from the event shows onlookers being wiped out by cars in the chaos.
Around 30 officers were preemptively deployed to the event, which escalated throughout Saturday night and early Sunday morning, as it moved between locations.
Inspector Ross Grantham said 200 cars showed up to the moving event, "each containing multiple passengers". He said several people had shown up to "aggravate".
Police said officers were pelted with rocks and bottles, leaving officers injured and patrol vehicles damaged. Two people were arrested, and six cars were impounded following the "antisocial road user event". Several roads were blocked over the multi-hour ordeal.
A video sent to 1News showed a spectator being struck by the back of a car doing burnouts. The person was flung up into the air before landing heavily on the road. Another person was knocked over by a car that mounted a footpath.
St John said it wasn't aware of any injuries among those taking part in the event.
Officers deploy pepper spray amid violence - attendee
Inspector Grantham said: "A man arrested during this time for disorderly behaviour was allegedly wearing a stab-proof vest and carrying a large knife.
"This is incredibly concerning, as it indicates that the crowd was not just car enthusiasts, but included people out to deliberately provoke, aggravate, and endanger."
A man who watched the cars told 1News that many drivers came prepared for a night of burnouts and skids. He said drivers would arrive "with a whole bedload" of wheels amounting to 10 to 20 sets.
"There's heaps of cars skidding, people changing tyres on the side of the road".
He said he was "way at the back" when violence broke out from spectators. People were seen throwing beer bottles, cans, and rubbish at police, according to the witness.
"The cops were coming from there, and pepper spraying people.
"They had their riot shields and all that."
A video posted on social media appeared to show officers holding riot shields and retreating from a large crowd, as multiple objects could be seen thrown at them.
'Nothing to this extent' - local resident
Jack, an eyewitness to the gathering on State Highway 57, told 1News that he had racers around his house before, but nothing like what happened over the weekend.
His birthday party had been winding down when he heard the boy racers outside.
"I sometimes get boy racers coming out and doing skids up and down the street, but nothing to this extent. This is a first for me," the witness said.
"I came out around 2am and there were a ton of people outside my house. I don't know exactly how many there were, but it's the most I've ever seen outside my house."
Most people who arrived outside were watching, with several drivers doing burnouts.
"There were people ripping up their back tyres and skidding across the road, so it was pretty gnarly," the witness said. "They left a huge mess. My friends went onto the road and started picking up little bits of tyres."
He said the racers were around where he lived, for around an hour.
"There would be the quiet moments in between - there'd be people standing around for like 10 minutes, and then someone would go onto the road and just start hooning it, and just start chewing up the tyres, and chewing up the road."
'Atrocious, unlawful' - Govt considers new punishments
Tougher laws are already being considered for boy racers who take part in dangerous gatherings, Police Minister Mark Mitchell warned as he called out the "atrocious" event.
"It's atrocious, unlawful behaviour and we've seen far too much of this, where these boy racers think that they can come out - whether it's in a town or in rural communities - and take over damage property, and act as if they're above the law. And they're not," he said.
"We've obviously seen a clear example of that over the last couple of days where police officers that were trying to do their job and protect the communities, that they serve, were turned on and attacked by these boy racers."
He told 1News: "I'd like to be able to pass a law where instead of just impounding them for 90 days, they actually lose the vehicle.
"There's definitely a will from our Government to make the changes that we need to make to make sure that communities are safe and they're not being terrorised by these boy racers."
Residents 'outraged', feeling 'targeted', mayor says
Horowhenua mayor Bernie Wanden said local residents in Levin and Otaki told him they felt "outraged" about the event, adding that the violence towards police was "inappropriate" and "senseless".
"We've had events before, but they've never escalated into this sort of event," he said.
"Locals are feeling very outraged. The fact that our town has been almost targeted in this way has upset many, many people - let alone the inconvenience, the damage, and the sort of reputational harm that it does to the town."
"The spectrum of responses has been very wide, as you can imagine, and most of it has been we need to do something about this."
Deploying 30 officers was "significantly" more than what police would ordinarily have over a weekend, Wanden said, but were outnumbered by the numbers of people there.
"The size of the mob that turned up definitely took it out of it being easy to handle."
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