David Gray kills 13 at Aramoana

The small Otago seaside township of Aramoana, near Dunedin, was the scene of the deadliest mass murder in New Zealand history when David Gray went on a shooting spree that left 13 people dead. 

Gray, a 33-year-old unemployed Aramoana resident, went on his rampage following a verbal dispute with a neighbour. After shooting the man and his daughter he began indiscriminately shooting at anything that moved. Armed with a scoped semi-automatic rifle, Gray killed 13 people, including Sergeant Stewart Guthrie, the first policeman to respond to the emergency. (Guthrie was posthumously awarded the George Cross for gallantry.)

Gray was tracked down during a house-by-house search the next day. When he started firing he was shot and mortally wounded by Special Tactics Group police.

A Robert Sarkies movie about the massacre, Out of the blue, was released in 2006.  See it here courtesy of NZ On Screen:

Image credit: Utility vehicle at Aramoana with children’s bicycles on the back and police paintmarks on the ground (still from TVNZ film)