link to page 1
IR-01-25-39076
16 March 2026
David Farrar
[FYI request #32523 email]
Tēnā koe David
Request for information
Thank you for your Official Information Act 1982 (OIA) request which was transferred to
Police on 24 October 2025.
Please accept my apologies for the delay in responding to you. You wrote:
I would like information on murderers and murder victims, broken down by
ethnicity. Specially a cross-reference, so one can state that where the murderer
was a particular ethnicity, what was the ethnicity of the victims.
Ideal y this would be for the last ten years, but a shorter period is fine is that is
easier.
Table 1 shows a count of victims of homicide, by ethnicity and year, January 2015 to
June 2025. Table 2 shows a count of proceedings against offenders linked to homicide
victims in Table 1, by ethnicity and year.
A proceeding counts each separate occasion when Police deal with an alleged offender
for one or more offences. Proceedings for official statistics are usual y classified by the
most serious offence that the offender is dealt with on that occasion.
The counts of homicide victims for the years 2015 to 2022 were extracted from the
publicly available Homicide Victims Report (HVR) which is published on the Police
website
1 and is published two years in arrears.
Figures for the period from January 2023 are provisional and includes homicides where
investigations are stil ongoing. For this reason and to ensure the quality of the
information, the information is provided at the end of each quarter three months in
arrears. Caution is advised when interpreting this provisional information and note that
the figures provided herein wil differ to figures published in the HVR in the future.
1 https://www.police.govt.nz/about-us/publication/homicide-victims-report-2023-and-
historical-nz-murder-rate-report-1926-2023
Police National Headquarters 180 Molesworth Street. PO Box 3017, Wellington 6140, New Zealand.
Telephone: 04 474 9499. Fax: 04 498 7400. www.police.govt.nz
Providing a cross-reference of ethnicity details would risk identifying both victims and
offenders where information may be suppressed. Therefore, this information is withheld
under section 9(2)(a) of the OIA, to protect the privacy of those persons.
Table 1. Victims of homicide, by ethnicity and year, January 2015 to June 2025.
HVR
Provisional
Ethnicity / Year
2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 Jan- Jun 2025
African
-
-
-
-
2
-
1
-
1
-
-
Asian
2
3
2
3
7
3
3
3
1
1
1
European
22
22
21
26
20
17
15
28
26
22
8
Fijian
-
-
1
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Indian
2
2
3
-
8
1
3
2
2
3
-
Latin/Hispanic
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
1
-
-
Mäori
21
25
10
26
31
31
19
31
33
39
23
Middle Eastern
-
-
1
-
10
-
-
1
-
-
-
Pacific Island
3
3
3
7
9
2
8
8
1
9
3
Unknown/Not specified 9
3
6
17
45
12
21
19
21
14
15
Total
59
58
47
79
132
66
70
92
86
88
50
Table 2. Proceedings against offenders for homicide offences shown in table 1, by year and
ethnicity, January 2015 to June 2025.
Ethnicity / Year
2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 Jan- Jun 2025
African
-
1
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Asian
4
3
8
1
2
4
1
3
5
3
1
European
46
24
33
28
89
20
34
34
53
22
10
Indian
2
2
2
3
-
1
10
8
6
4
1
Latin/Hispanic
1
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Mäori
48
51
35
90
76
53
62
91
81
34
22
Middle Eastern
-
-
-
-
-
-
1
-
1
-
0
Pacific Island
5
15
11
15
24
29
27
24
36
7
6
Unknown/Not specified 1
-
-
5
2
-
2
2
1
3
2
Total
107
96
89
142
193
107
137
162
183
73
42
Ethnicity is an attribute of a person. The ethnicity recorded is the one which a person
identifies with most strongly. There are limitations to ethnicity recording. Only one
ethnicity can be recorded, and if an individual identifies with an ethnicity that is not
reported, their ethnicity is recorded as other or unknown.
Data in this response is drawn from dynamic operational databases and is subject to
change as new information is recorded or updated.
As part of its commitment to openness and transparency, Police proactively releases
some information and documents that may be of interest to the public. An anonymised
version of this response may be publicly released on the New Zealand Police website.
You have the right to seek an investigation and review by the Ombudsman of this
decision. Information about how to make a complaint is available at
www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or freephone 0800 802 602.
Ngā mihi
Kylie Seumanu
Director Data and Performance Insights
New Zealand Police
