Police say they are treating the death of a man found dead in the Wellington suburb of Northland on Tuesday as a homicide.
65-year-old Simon Bird was found on his property, outside his Albemarle Road home on Tuesday.
Detective inspector Nick Pritchard told reporters the body was found after a friend requested a welfare check.
Bird was last seen on March 27 at 5pm, and police were now trying to piece together his movements between leaving his workplace in the central city, and when his body was found.
Police said he was a "fairly private person, and we don't know a lot about Mr Bird."
Detective Inspector Nick Pritchard. Photo: RNZ / Reece Baker
They wanted to hear from people who had interacted with him over the past few weeks, and to try and build a picture of his life.
Pritchard said police were "keeping an open mind" regarding people of interest.
Bird's vehicle had also been recovered, and would undergo a forensic investigation - but how the vehicle fitted into the investigation was yet to be determined.
Northland residents would see more police in the neighbourhood over the next couple of days.
Pritchard said the public could be reassured they were safe, and the incidents over the past few weeks weren't related.
Investigation teams were working long hours to find answers.
Police previously said they had brought in 15 extra investigators to help with the case load.
A Northland resident said the news the death was being treated as a homicide had created a "sense of dread" about the neighbourhood.
Shane Mannell's home over looked the property on Albemarle Rd where Bird's body was found on Tuesday.
He said a murder investigation within sight of his home felt more like something that happened on TV.
"It is shocking. You think you're removed from it. We tell ourselves 'oh that happens other places'.
"And then it's literally... I can see where it was and now all of a sudden it's real and you do get a sense of 'okay if that's happening here, what's going to happen next'," Mannell said.
Police said Bird was a quiet person and that was reinforced by almost everybody RNZ spoke to today.
Occupants of homes surrounding the address said they barely saw the man and another said they believed the property had only changed tenants in the last three or four months.
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