A 13-year-old boy has been convicted of manslaughter after fatally shooting his 11-year-old relative last year.
The father of the convicted teenager has pleaded guilty to attempting to pervert the course of justice after it was found he had tried to cover up the truth behind the shooting, reports the New Zealand Herald.
The victim, 11-year-old Triston Papuni, had been staying with his relative at an East Cape farm in July last year when an argument broke out.
The convicted teenager, who was 12 at the time, was in a room with Triston, along with a 17-year-old friend, when the younger boys disagreed over who was taking a knife on a hunting trip.
Police say the accused, whose name has been suppressed, pulled out a semi-automatic rifle belonging to his father from under the table and threatened to shoot Triston.
After poking Triston with the gun, the accused then loaded two bullets into the rifle and asked his relative if he was going to continue to be "cheeky", reports the NZ Herald.
Triston started yelling and as he turned away, the gun was fired. Triston died almost instantly, the court heard, after the bullet travelled through his body.
Before the police arrived at the scene, the father of the accused had told his son and the 17-year-old witness to say that Triston had "got the gun from under the bed."
Both boys told police this and also said the gun had accidentally fired when the 12-year-old was trying to get the rifle from Triston.
Their accounts did not match post mortem findings and the 17-year-witness recanted the story.
A police firearms expect had said that he could not rule out that the gun went off accidentally so the 12-year-old was charged with manslaughter, not murder, which he pled guilty to.
The father and son will be sentenced next month.
Acknowledgements: NZ Herald
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Goodbye Triston
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