STREET MOURNS TEEN WHO DIED FROM 'HUFFING' AEROSOL CAN

A Christchurch street is mourning its fifth child death after a teenage
girl was overcome by aerosol can fumes.

Naomi Dobier, 16, has joined a tragic gallery of young victims to die while
living in Lambeth Crescent in Casebrook.

Naomi collapsed last Thursday night after drinking bourbon and "huffing"
the contents of a can of air freshener.

A post-mortem revealed the provisional cause of death to be asphyxiation
from inhaling aerosol propellants.

The death has stirred bad memories for long-time Lambeth Crescent resident
Margaret McKeown.

She said past neighbours had been rocked by four other child fatalities
since the late 1960s.

A baby was killed when a faulty pram collapsed and two children were caught
in a shed fire, Mrs McKeown said.

In May 1970, a six-year-old boy was killed just across the road from where
Naomi Dobier died, when his mentally ill mother suffocated him with a
plastic bag. The mother was found unfit to stand trial for murder and was
detained under hospital care.

"It strikes me as very strange, all the peculiar deaths ... I'd like to
know why it all happens to people in our small street," Mrs McKeown said.

"I'm actually beginning to wonder whether I'll stay in this street or get
out of it."

More details of Naomi Dobier's life and death emerged yesterday. Other
neighbours said she was a friendly, popular girl but that her home was a
hub for truants and late-night partying.

Gavin, her father, worked nights as a doorman.

"As soon as he drove down the road, the house would just fill up with
kids," one neighbour said.

Loud music, rumbling cars, and yelling drew complaints about the noise.

The Press understands Naomi became aggressive after sniffing from the
aerosol can last Thursday night. She apparently collapsed outside her home.
Stunned teen partygoers stood around Naomi's body as her younger brother
and a friend went for help.

"She's cold as! Ring the ambulance, we think she's dead," they implored Mrs
McKeown, a next-door neighbour.

"They were hysterical," she said, declining to give her last name. "It was
just chaos. The whole place was in an uproar."

Step-grandmother Audrey Dobier, from Timaru, said Naomi came from a broken
home and was crying out for help.

"She needed a lot of love, that girl. She was rebellious now and again.
That was because she needed more attention and love.

"She got into bad company apparently."

Mrs Dobier yesterday recalled her grand-daughter's lost innocence.

"She used to climb on my knee when she was little and say 'I love you
grandma.' She was a sweet little thing."

Naomi left Papanui High School last year. It is understood she had been
involved with a kapa haka cultural performing group.

Her funeral will be held in Timaru this afternoon.