Pun intended with Spring’s nick name being Donkey.
Back in 2014 Marc Spring got a call from the NZ Police to say that he had been named by Matthew Blomfield as a suspect who might be connected to the alleged “hit” on him at his home in West Auckland. The call was friendly enough with Spring asking if he was a suspect. The answer was a relaxed one, with the Officer in charge, Uvaan Engelbrecht saying no, but lines of enquiry were required based on the allegations of the victim, Matthew Blomfield.
Spring says “I have seen the so called Police witness list, and out of the 22 names on the list, for some reason I am the only one who was deemed a suspect, which is rather strange, as emails I have from Blomfield to Cam Slater saying he knows Slater was behind the attack and that Slater should come clean – so why was he not on the suspect list? Just as investigative reporter Steve Cook is defamed in the book, and named as part of this so called ‘conspiracy’, yet Cook’s name is not on any list I have seen either”. It appears that Blomfield just changes his story to suit the angle he wants his complaints to go so he has a narrative for a later date.
Our investigations show Cam Slater has never even been interviewed, or even called by the Police over the matter (why would he be)… but if, as Blomfield claims in his rather verbose emails that “he knows Slater was behind it” then why does Slaters name not appear on any Police witness list? A recent Privacy Act request by Cook shows he was not on any suspect list either. So why the wild and defamatory suggestion of the names in the Whale Oil book?
Spring says “its like playing pin the tail on the donkey!”
Blomfield has also made the rather obscure allegation that the Police told him they knew of a gang hit going down in the Greenhithe area, and they were sorry it was on him! To date we have seen no evidence to support that claim.
Spring says “it’s just like on page 13 of the Whale Oil book where it states that 40 Armed Offender Squad Members arrived on the the scene at Blomfield’s home, yet the Official Information Act request of records from the NZ Police state that there were NOT 40 Armed Offender Officers, but there was some local officers totalling maybe 20 Officers”.
To quote Senior Sergeant Chris Goldsmith, “I can advise that approximately 20 armed staff attended this incident initially. These Police staff members were from various frontline response covering there North Shore area. The Armed Offenders Squad (AOS) was NOT deployed.
So why say it was?
The above OIA response from the NZ Police says it all… We say just more fabrication by the author Margie Thomson to bolster her narrative, as those simple facts were readily available from the NZ Police, yet she chose to embellish her story, or not to investigate the actual facts of what happened that night.
The interview conducted by the lead investigating officer, Uvaan Engelbrecht was at a friend of Spring’s home as it was neutral ground, as quite clearly the Police saw no need for a formal interview at any station under caution. Spring says “it was really just a chat, to discuss the background, and in my view the cops wanted to see if I could shed any light on what was really going on”.
During the interview which Spring covertly recorded, Engelbrecht stated to Spring that he was not a suspect, and that some aspects of the version of events that Blomfield had given Police did not add up, and that the Police felt Blomfield was not telling them the full story. Spring was also informed that a production order was in place on his mobile phone to check his whereabouts on the night of the attack, and to see if any messages or data could connect him to Ned Paraha or anyone connected to Paraha. Spring, whilst initially annoyed, then thought fair enough, as he had nothing to do with the event, so his phone would provide further evidence that he had nothing to do with what happened at Blomfield’s property. It would also prove that NO messages had been sent from Springs phone to Blomfield’s wife as he has previously claimed. (We are still waiting for the author Margie Thomson to provide us with the copies of these messages as the NZ Police say they don’t exist).
We are aware of a UK based Skype number to which Blomfield claims he was receiving messages from, and Spring suggests that the messages at that time were likely coming from Warren Powell as he was travelling through the UK during that period. Given we know the UK number from the evidence in Police files and disclosure, just as Blomfield does, then why was he claiming to be getting ‘anonymous messages’? We also know from information supplied to this blog that the NZ Police contacted Skype and they confirmed that the messages originated from a UK cell tower site, so therefore the messages came out of the UK. Spring was in NZ at the time.
Spring says of the covert recording “I was really quite concerned as to where this could all be headed given the previous behaviour of Blomfield, the false allegations, him contacting my family members, the death threats from his brother Dan Blomfield... so I wanted make sure that I had proof of the conversation with the Police… Ultimately if the interview was done at any cop shop the interview would have been recorded anyway”.
The baseless allegations of the Whale Oil book are far reaching, highly damaging, malicious and defamatory. Spring says “the author clearly thinks nothing of implying the NZ Police are incompetent, and that they did not do their job properly” From our investigations it’s quite the opposite, and when reflecting on the comment of Engelbrecht about him feeling like Blomfield was not supplying all the facts, its little wonder the Police were put between a rock and a hard place. The question really is why was Blomfield giving the impression he was hiding something from the Police when giving his statement? Spring says “I firmly believe Blomfield knows exactly why Paraha was there that night, and it became a crime of convienance during the early stages of his now long running, and yet to be completed defamation claim against Slater”.
We recently made some enquires about the investigating officer, Uvaan Engelbrecht, as we thought that could provide some answers about the investigation all those years ago. The reply Spring received was that Engelbrecht was very diligent and very thorough. Did Margie Thomson talk with Engelbrecht? Probably not.
Spring muses “you have an investigating officer who is diligent, very thorough, with the Police recently saying that the Paraha case was closed the day he was sentenced after he pleaded guilty, you have my interview where Engelbrecht said he did not believe Blomfield was giving the Police all the facts to work with, yet years later in 2019 a book appears purporting to be the truth, and a masterpiece of meticulous research, and goes as far as naming people as the likely perpetrators of the crime… when nothing could be further from the truth”.
Spring goes on to say “you really wonder why the author decided to not interview myself and others, as we hold so much information, particularly from the NZ Police that conclusively proves that the Whale Oil book is just so horribly wrong – but as I have said before this was never about the real story, it was the real hit job on me and a few others”
One thing is for sure – the Police can only work with real information, real evidence, and when you consider the comment by Engelbrecht, it makes you wonder what the real motive was behind Blomfield’s allegations contained in the Whale Oil book.
Next up, another reply from the Police saying that certain audio recordings simple don’t exist but for some reason the book does.