- Police say it’s lucky the 70-year-old wasn’t injured by gunshots that damaged the inside of her Collingwood St house 

- The elderly woman was left “shaken” by the 4am shooting 

- The latest attack follows a spate of recent shootings, with at least one home shot at per week in June 

A Whangārei grandma has been left traumatised after gunshots were fired into her home. 

The frightening incident took place on Collingwood St just after 4am today, police said. 

It is lucky the grandmother, aged in her 70s, was not hurt after the bullets caused damage inside the house, Detective Sergeant Paul Overton said. 

“This was a frightening incident for the victim and we will be making sure she receives support in the coming days,” he said. 

Overton said damage inside and outside the home was “consistent” with bullets from a firearm. 

Police are now appealing for help finding the person or people who fired the shots. 

”We would also like any drivers who were in the area to please check dashcam footage and let us know if you have captured anything significant.” 

Anyone with information should call 105 and quote file number 240713/7934, Overton said. 

The public can also share information anonymously through Crime Stoppers on 0800 555 111. 

‘Violence an indictment on society’ 

Whangārei District Councillor and former MP candidate Gavin Benney said his thoughts are with the elderly woman and her family. 

“Everybody deserves the right to feel safe in their own house and for that to happen ... it really is an indictment, firstly on Whangārei and how we’ve been a little bit deserted here, and secondly our society as a whole,” he said. 

Benney said community in the Collingwood St area are “tightknit” and that they will be “rallying around” the elderly woman. 

The crime showed the need for a gun registry that would help “stop a lot of this”, he said. 

Benney has previously been part of anti-crime groups, such as the Whangārei Stand Up Facebook group, but said the issue remained a problem. 

“I’m hopeful the new government will clamp down on that sort of stuff, but we’re not seeing it at the moment, to be honest,” he said. 

At least one home per week in June targeted by a shooting 

This most recent shooting follows a spate of similar crimes across Auckland this month and last, with at least one home a week targeted in June. 

Last Tuesday, July 2, a home on East Tāmaki Rd, Ōtara was fired at about 7.47pm. 

At least four holes from gunfire could be seen to have damaged the home’s outside walls, while one bullet pierced a window. 

The front door of the home also had a large bullet hole. 

A week before that on June 25,a Māngere home was also sprayed by gunfire that missed children sleeping in a room. 

Edward Ru, also known as musician Sweet & Irie, took to Facebook to share videos of the smashed front bedroom windows of his home on Plumley Cres. 

“All my kids were sleeping in that bedroom,” he said while showing a pane smashed with at least five holes. 

“Just thank the Lord that none of them got hit.” 

On June 18, the shooting of a Weymouth home left residents in shock, too traumatised to speak. 

The shooting in Roscommon Rd, close to Clendon McDonald’s, resulted in damage to multiple windows in the house as well as to a car in the driveway. 

It’s understood the shooters went to a family’s residence, fired multiple rounds of ammunition and then fled. 

A small East Auckland cul de sac became a target twice in just a week. On June 20, two men aged 23 and 25 were arrested for the shooting and faced firearms and drug charges. 

A drive-by in Māngere East on June 8 left a grandmother baffled and asking why a “punk-ass” targeted her home, after it was sprayed with bullets. 

Three adults and a baby were in the home at the time, with some of the ammunition travelling through multiple rooms, but no one was hurt. 

The 58-year-old woman, who did not want to be identified, was sitting in the lounge watching a State of Origin rugby league broadcast with her daughter, baby granddaughter and ex-partner, a 79-year-old man on dialysis.