Waikato Police investigating links between an incident at an East Hamilton home and the disappearance of a local man have discovered a body in a car believed linked to the case.
The car was located by Police last night after calls from the public that following media coverage on an alleged assault and the disappearance of Hamilton man Piki KINGI.
The officer leading the homicide inquiry, Detective Senior Sergeant Chris Page, said earlier today staff carrying out an examination of the car found the body of an as yet to identified male.
"The process of gaining entry into the locked car whilst maintaining the forensic integrity of the scene has been a time consuming and somewhat difficult task.
"As yet we've not been able to complete the formal identification process however we can confirm it was the body of a male and we believe it is likely to be linked to the activities that took place that we outlined earlier."
Mr Page said Police had spoken to the family of the missing man and they were aware of the current developments and the limitations involved in regards to the identification process.
"These developments heighten the need for us to be able to speak to anyone who saw the car, a 1992 burgundy Mazda MS6 liftback, registration ACC958 between when it was seen being driven by Mr KINGI about 11am on Wednesday and when it was found last night.
"In particular we would like to hear from anyone with information on when and who dropped the car off on Mansel Ave and who transported them once they had parked up the car."
In terms of the cause of death of the person found in the car Mr Page said it was far too early to speculate on this.
"Establishing the cause of death and extent of injury will be the subject of a post-mortem to be carried out tomorrow."
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