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Queen assassination attempt: New Zealand police investigate claims of cover-up

The Queen and Prince Philip wave from their open car in October 1981 in Wellington, New Zealand.
The Queen and Prince Philip wave from their open car in October 1981 in Wellington, New Zealand. Photograph: Anwar Hussein/Getty Images

The New Zealand police will re-examine an attempted assassination of the Queen during her 1981 tour of the country, after allegations the matter was covered up by the government and police at the time.

On 14 October 1981, Christopher John Lewis, a disturbed New Zealand teenager, aimed his .22 rifle at the British monarch in the South Island city of Dunedin, lining up her jade outfit in his scope.

The bullet missed, but according to an investigation by reporter Hamish McNeilly for the website Stuff, the 17-year-old became obsessed with wiping out the royal family, as the government scrambled to conceal how close the self-styled terrorist had come to killing the head of state.

Two months after details of the historical case appeared in the local and international press, the New Zealand police commissioner, Mike Bush, has asked the deputy commissioner of national operations, Mike Clement “to oversee an examination by current investigation staff of the relevant case file”.

Police declined to answer further questions but said in a statement: “Given the passage of time, it is anticipated this examination of the old file and its associated material will take some time. New Zealand police will share the outcome of this examination once it has been completed.”

It is understood that immediately after the assassination attempt police told local and British media covering the royal tour that the sharp crack they had heard as the Queen stepped out of her Rolls Royce was not a gun shot but a council sign falling over.

According to classified Security Intelligence Service (SIS) documents obtained by Stuff, Lewis’s attempt on the Queen’s life was a genuine threat.

A memo in the SIS files, released to Stuff under the official information act, read: “Lewis did indeed originally intend to assassinate the Queen, however did not have a suitable vantage point from which to fire, nor a sufficiently high-powered rifle for the range from the target.”

Police officers at the scene and, later, SIS officials attempted to downplay the incident, variously telling the media the sound they had heard was a firecracker or a sign falling over, according to an SIS report.

“Current police investigations into the shots have been conducted discreetly and most media representatives probably have the impression that the noise was caused by a firework of some description,” the report stated. “There is a worry, however, that in court the press may make the connections between the date of the offence and the Queen’s visit.”

A former news editor of a local radio station, who was working in Dunedin at the time, told Stuff he believed multiple parties attempted to cover up the assassination attempt.

“I have no doubt the matter was covered up, the cops were embarrassed, they didn’t want the media to know and we got embarrassed that we allowed ourselves to be snowballed to such a degree,” said Allan Dick, who was summonsed to a meeting with a high-ranking detective and told reports of an assassination attempt were false.

Former Dunedin police detective Tom Lewis (of no relation to the shooter) said the then prime minister, Robert Muldoon, feared that if word got out, the royals would never again visit New Zealand. “Once you start to cover up, you then have to keep covering up the cover-up,” Lewis told Stuff.

Police told media that Christopher Lewis had shot at a nearby road, and the teenager – who went on to plot further assassination attempts on the royal family – was never charged with treason or attempted treason.

He died in a New Zealand prison in 1997.