How the hunting at four years for the father of New Zealand took place

On September 11, 2021, Tom Phillips and his three children disappeared for the first time.

His Toyota Hilux was found parked under a tidal line on a beach near her parents’ house in Marokopa on northern island of New Zealand. Police launched a massive research operation on land, sea and air.

Less than three weeks later, the family returned home, the father saying that they had made a campsite trip.

Then, on December 12 of the same year, they disappeared again. Aside from a few lucky observations and granular frameworks of video surveillance sequences, the Bushman and his three children had not been seen since.

It was, until the first hours on Monday morning when the police responded to a burglary attempted report concluded a shooting that led to Mr. Phillips’ death, ending a four -year -old man’s hunt.

Many questions about his disappearance remain, in particular why he took his children and disappeared in the wild harsh of New Zealand, and if he was able to escape the capture for so long by having help.

When Mr. Phillips returned home for the first time in 2021, he was accused of having wasted police resources. The research effort on the severe and ruthless landscape of the Waitomo west region had cost the New Zealand authorities for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The police have not launched a new excavation the second time that he and his three children – Ember, Maverick and Jayda, aged five, seven and eight, respectively, have disappeared.

When he did not appear during an appearance of the court on January 12, 2022, the police issued an arrest warrant.

Mr. Phillips returned to his family home alone at night to collect supplies on February 9 of the same year.

It has not been seen for over a year.

The police said in the past that they thought that Mr. Phillips had taken his children – now nine, 10th and 12 years old – during a career dispute with their mother, although he never explained why he had done this.

Mr. Phillips was known to be a Bushman who had survival training. The inhabitants of Marokopa said that he was someone who wanted to be out of network and had not been on social media platforms.

Police thought he and his children had survived the dense desert surrounding Marokopa.

But it seems that Mr. Phillips and his children cannot survive in the bush on their spirit alone.

There was a series of observations around Kawhia between August and November 2023, including several alleged flights, as well as in a hardware store and in quadruple.

Video surveillance images captured at that time seemed to show Mr. Phillips and one of his children – camouflage and masks on their faces – trying to enter a Piopio store, southwest of Marokopa, the police said.

When Mr. Phillips was killed on Monday, police said they had found several firearms and other loot on his quad.

Police previously declared that he had thought that Mr. Phillips was helped in his escape by others.

When he was suspected of a bank theft in Te Kuiti, a small town in the Waitomo region, the police said there was an accomplice.

Less than 100 people live in the united community of Marokopa. Although there was no suggestion that his family had helped him, given the guard dispute, there were questions about the question of whether someone who knew him helped him to stay hidden or knew where he was.

In June 2024, the police issued a reward of $ 80,000 NZ (£ 37,200) for information that could lead to the site of Mr. Phillips and his three children. The deadline expired without any breakthrough.

They were then seen in October. A group of teenage pig hunters who had traveled the bush around Marokopa identified them and filmed the brief meeting on their phone.

In grainy images, Mr. Phillips could be seen to drive his children through the rugged terrain, all wearing camouflaged clothes, raincoats and large backpacks.

The New Zealand media reported that the teenagers had briefly spoken to one of their children to ask him if someone knew they were there. The child had replied “only you” and continued to walk, the father of one of the teenagers said 1news from New Zealand.

The observation caused an unsuccessful three -day research involving the police and the army helicopters. The police said last month that they thought that an aggressive search was the wrong approach because they said that Mr. Phillips was armed and considered dangerous.

He was revised before the end of August this year, when he and one of his children were captured on video surveillance that would have entered a Piopio store, making grocery articles.

It was a piopio to which he returned on Monday morning. It was around 02:30, local time (2:30 p.m. GMT on Sunday) that the police were called to an attempted burglary report in a rural farm supplies shop, which, according to the police, thought that Mr. Phillips had targeted without success.

A quad bike carrying two people was seen in the direction of Marokopa. Police set peaks along the road and, when they arrested the quad, the police said they had encountered shots.

Police said the first officer to reach the premises had been shot in the head and that he was in serious condition. A second officer turned fire and Mr. Phillips died on the scene, police said.

The child who was with him was unscathed and provided the police with the information that led them to the other two children, who were in a campsite remote in the bush between Marokopa and Te Kuiti in close conditions, the police said.

Children – whose well -being was the main concern in New Zealand throughout their disappearance – are now taken care of by the authorities.