A teenage date involving seven boys and a girl led to a police pursuit, theft and four wrecked cars.
The chase started when a stolen car was spotted about 4am on Saturday near Tokoroa, the police said.
The pursuit was abandoned, but police used road spikes when the car was spotted again near Taupo. This led to the car rolling before coming to a halt.
Three boys from Auckland, aged 15, 14 and 12, had also stolen two other cars earlier in the evening, the police said.
The boys explained they had stolen the vehicles to drive to Taupo to meet a girl they had been in contact with over social media.
Only a few hours later, a 16-year-old girl removed her electronic bracelet and was found with four other boys in a stolen car, which had also crashed.
The girl was arrested, but managed to get in the driver's seat of the police car and crashed again.
All seven boys and the girl know each other.
The "incident was created by a juvenile using social media to engineer a highly risky serious situation", a statement from the Taupo Area Police said.
