• Police are actively investigating the violent death of Baby Ru, 18 months on. 
• Critical evidence was found last October, including items undergoing forensic analysis. 
• Police said they are still forensically analysing the evidence. 

Baby Ru’s violent death is being actively investigated 18 months on from the killing, police say. 

Today marks a year and a half since Ruthless-Empire Souljah Reign Rhind Shephard Wall – since officially named Nga Reo Te Huatahi Reremoana Ahipene-Wall - died after an incident at a house in Taitā, Lower Hutt. 

His mother, Storm Angel Wall, and her housemates, Rosie Morunga and her partner Dylan Ross, were the only people in the house at the time he was injured. 

Police have said the three people of interest have each spoken to police, but the truth about what happened to Ru has yet to surface. 

The officer in charge of the case, Detective Inspector Nick Pritchard, was unavailable to comment on the case today. 

He is currently leading the investigation into the recent alleged murder of Wellington man Simon Bird, who was found dead outside his home in the suburb of Northland on April 1. 

A 23-year-old man was charged yesterday with murdering Bird, 65. He has interim name suppression and was remanded in custody. 

“The investigation is continuing which includes ongoing forensic analysis of items located prior to Christmas,” a police spokeswoman said. 

Police announced in October they had uncovered “critical evidence” in the homicide investigation after searching a semi-rural area north of Wellington. 

In a statement last year, police said they conducted a targeted search in a concentrated area along Moonshine Rd, off State Highway 58. 

• Police recover "crucial evidence" in Baby Ru case
• Baby Ru case: New search evidence has ‘significantly advanced’ investigation

This is 20 minutes by car from where Ru lived and received the injuries that caused his death. 

“Items of property highly relevant to the homicide investigation were located during the search and are undergoing forensic examination,” police said in a release. 

“This was information that wasn’t available when Ru died. Part of that work included searching for items that have been deliberately concealed.” 

Police wouldn’t say what the new information was, but confirmed it did not come from the public. 

The items police have been seeking included a duvet cover, strap, hard drive used to record CCTV footage at the house, and power back-up unit. It was not known at the time whether these items had been destroyed or hidden. 

Baby Ru's family visit his grave daily after he died at Hutt Hospital’s emergency department on October 22, last year. Photo / Ngatanahira Reremoana 

Pritchard also earlier said police were not ruling out the child’s death being accidental. 

“We’re not defaulting it as a murder or manslaughter at this stage. We’ve got injuries that are consistent with blunt force trauma - fractured skull, which would take some force. I don’t have any definitive answer on the mechanism of what’s caused that other than the head would have to have come into contact with a hard surface, or hard object.” 

Police have said at least one person returned to the Taita house where Ru suffered his injuries to clean up the crime scene and remove crucial evidence, even as Ru lay dead in hospital. 

In February last year, Pritchard said police believed they knew who cleaned up the crime scene. 

However, they did not have enough evidence to charge anyone.