Fugitive father filmed with children in New Zealand wilderness three years after disappearing
Pig hunters captured video of Tom Phillips and his three children in camouflage walking in rugged terrain in the Waikato region
A fugitive father and his three children have been spotted together for the first time in nearly three years, along the west coast of New Zealand’s North Island.
Just before Christmas 2021, Tom Phillips fled into the Waikato wilderness with his children Ember, now 8, Maverick, now 9, and Jayda, now 11, following a dispute with their mother.
Phillips has not been seen since last November after he allegedly stole a quad bike from a rural property and broke into a shop in Piopio. CCTV footage showed two figures on a street, believed to be him and one of the children.
But a breakthrough in the search for the family came when the group was seen together last Thursday on Marokopa farmland, in New Zealand’s Waikato region, after a chance encounter with teenage pig hunters who pulled out their phones and began filming.
Det Insp Andrew Saunders described the sighting as “credible”, with police believing it to be Phillips and his three children, who he does not have legal custody of.
