Gang tributes for Napier stabbing victim Peter Lui

A gang leader fatally stabbed near his club pad in Napier’s Pandora industrial district on Monday is being remembered by the gang’s international community.

Longtime Outlaws Motorcycle Club member Peter Michael Lui, known as “China”, was attacked by two people about 1.20pm near the near-new club headquarters in Mersey St.

Paramedics worked at the scene stabilising him for more than an hour but he later died in Hawke’s Bay Hospital.

Online tributes for Lui from the gang’s international affiliates have appeared on social media, including Outlaws MC Essex, who posted: “Ride free in the forever chapter brother.”

Tributes from the gang’s Ireland and Stuttgart quarters have also been posted, including using the terms OFFO (Outlaws Forever Forever Outlaws) and GBNF (Gone But Never Forgotten).

According to notices being published in Hawke’s Bay Today, he has two sons, a daughter and four grandchildren, and a funeral service will be held in Napier’s War Memorial Centre next Tuesday.

Police were expected to give an investigation update later on Wednesday, but sources have told Hawke’s Bay Today the man was stabbed multiple times after he and his motorbike were pursued by two men in a car from Thames St into Mersey St.

There were reports that one of the many truck drivers using the route tried to intervene as the victim was being stabbed, and police were called as the assailants fled.

Police are understood to be investigating reports that the men had been seen circulating in the area in the days before the attack.

Detectives on Wednesday said they want to hear from anyone who saw a maroon coloured Holden Commodore in the days prior to Monday’s incident.

The vehicle was located by police in Seddon Cres in Napier early on Tuesday morning.

Police said the events of Monday have “rightfully caused concern and we want to reassure the community that there will be a strong and visible police presence across the city”.

Outlaws MC, established in Napier more than 50 years ago, built clubrooms in Mersey St after former longtime clubrooms between Kenny Ave and Battery Rd, Ahuriri, were sold more than two years ago.

Mersey St had been closed for about 24 hours on Monday and Tuesday while scene investigations were carried out.

Police said at an early stage that while there had been other gang-related incidents in Napier in recent weeks, the Pandora assault was being treated as unrelated and “isolated”.

Senior Sergeant Sally Patrick earlier said there will be an increased presence while a homicide investigation is undertaken.

Outlaws MC members have been involved in at least two other killings in Napier over the years, with a member sentenced to life imprisonment after an incident at Westshore in the late 1970s and another being jailed for life after an early-morning shooting of a rival gang leader in central Napier almost 30 years ago.