Owen Heke whacks police dog with such force its metal tooth is knocked out

Heke went on trial facing eight charges, but at the conclusion, two charges were dismissed.

Of the six left, Judge Saunders found Heke guilty of aggravated burglary, presenting an item at a police officer, and injuring a police dog, after an incident in Kihikihi in 2024.

She dismissed charges of theft and assault with a weapon.

‘I was just waiting for a bang’

The judge explained how the victim was sitting at his rural Kihikihi home on the evening of January 22, last year, when Heke arrived and they began chatting.

However, Heke then said that he wanted the Harley-Davidson that was stored at his property.

The bike had belonged to a mutual friend who had died.

Heke got up to get the bike, and told the victim he knew it was stored in his shed somewhere.

The victim jumped in front of Heke and told him not to walk around the house.

Heke pushed him, and the victim pushed him back.

Heke then pulled a knife.

“He says that you said to him, ‘If he didn’t get out of the way, you were going to stab him’.

“[Victim] got out of the way and said, ‘F***, what are you doing?’ and put his hands up.”

Heke left, but returned shortly afterwards with an associate and stole the bike.

As they were leaving, police arrived, and a slow-speed – about 15km/h – pursuit began.

It continued for about 2km or 3km before Heke pulled over and ran into a paddock.

A constable believed he saw something in Heke’s hand as he ran away, and believed it to be some sort of weapon.

The police dog handler and Finn arrived at the scene at 10.30pm.

He’d been briefed that Heke had a weapon and had threatened to use it.

The dog handler found Heke lying down about 5m away, first noticing his silhouette.

The officer said Heke was “hunched down, facing towards me and holding both hands towards me, in one hand in front of the other motion”.

He could see an item in his hands that was “quite long and solid”.

Given the intel he’d been given so far, he thought it was a sawn-off shotgun.

He then heard Heke say, “Get f*****”, or “You are f*****”.

The officer said he was “just waiting for a bang”.

Heke then made a motion with his hands similar to that of a pump-action shotgun and a noise, consistent with “racking” a shotgun.

“Because of that, [the officer] immediately let Finn go in self-defence,” the judge said.

He then saw Heke motion at Finn with his hands, appearing to have been struck in the face with the weapon he was holding.

Finn then bit Heke on the leg, in what the judge described as a “quite severe bite”.

Heke was hospitalised.

The dog handler then looked around for a sawn-off shotgun, only to find a large mechanical torch.

There was no firearm involved.

When the officer went to put Finn into the van, he noticed he had a gash around his eye and that a tooth was missing.

Heke denied hurting the dog and suggested that he’d hurt himself.

However, Judge Saunders said she accepted the evidence of the vet that Finn had sustained a fracture to his lower left canine due to blunt force trauma.

Through his counsel, Kerry Tustin, Heke denied the burglary charge, because he believed the bike was his and said he wasn’t armed with a knife.

Heke also felt that the constable’s evidence fell short of the standard required to prove both charges.

The vet testified that it was rare for a police dog to lose a canine, and the injury must have resulted from “a significant level of force”.

Judge Saunders said she accepted the evidence of the victim and the dog handler, and did not give any weight to Heke’s “implausible” explanations.

She found Heke guilty on charges of aggravated burglary, presenting a weapon at police, and injuring a police dog and remanded him in custody for sentencing in December.

She dismissed charges of assault with a weapon and theft.

Belinda Feek is an Open Justice reporter based in Waikato. She has worked at NZME for 10 years and has been a journalist for 21.