 |
| Carrick Graham |
If that wasn’t bad enough for the smiling assassin, John Key, the hacker known as Rawshark has also released through his @Whaledump twitter account a number of new emails between Cameron Slater, Cathy Odger’s and so-called PR Consultant Carrick Graham that clearly show them conspiring to undermine a Serious Fraud Office investigation into Hanover Finance.
In July 2008, Hanover Finance froze $550 million of assets effecting around 36,500 investors, so this is a pretty big deal. After years of waiting, investors are still yet to see any of their hard earned money returned.
Why has this happened and who is Carrick Graham you might ask? Well, he’s a PR consultant for former Hanover Finance boss Mark Hotchin, the money man who appears to have paid for the smear campaign Slater et al were running against former SFO Chief Executive Adam Feeley. Clearly their muckraking was designed to undermine the the SFO’s investigation into Hanover Finance, which in my opinion warrants criminal charges being laid.
In effect Mark Hotchin was using the money he misappropriated from Hanover investors to fight the regulatory body so that investors wouldn’t recover their money. This will undoubtedly piss off a lot of rich people off who would have normally voted for National. Not only detrimental to John Key's hopes for re-election, our markets will be adversely affected being that any form of corruption will cause investors to withdraw their funds from New Zealand.
If Judith Collins has in any way helped Hotchin, Graham and their employed attack bloggers to pervert the course of justice and undermine our financial markets, she will likely face criminal charges. There is no doubt however that she, and others, knew about what was going on and did absolutely nothing.
SFO Director Adam Feeley was later replaced before his contract expired and the investigation into Mark Hotchin and Hanover Finance was inexplicably shut down. Because of this, investors have had to mount a civil case to try and retrieve their money.
The implication here is that the smear campaign against the SFO was successful, which does not bode well for our investment markets. So why isn’t the investigation into what appears to be widespread criminal behaviour more robust? With so much at stake, the government cannot possibly be playing politics with the sanctity of our financial markets, can they?
Today, the NZ Herald reported:
Whale Oil blogger left out of probe
An inquiry into the events surrounding Judith Collins' downfall will not examine the relationship between her and Whale Oil blogger Cameron Slater or the Serious Fraud Office investigation into Hanover Finance, Prime Minister John Key says.
Opposition parties are calling for a broad inquiry, but Mr Key said it will instead be confined to the conduct of Ms Collins and her relationship with Adam Feeley, the former head of the SFO.
Ms Collins is accused of trying to undermine Mr Feeley when she was Minister of Police. An email from Slater in 2011 said the minister was "gunning for" Feeley. She has denied any wrongdoing.
Other private emails released over the weekend appear to show right-wing bloggers were being paid to run a smear campaign against the Financial Markets Authority and SFO, overseen by Carrick Graham, the then-PR handler for former Hanover boss Mark Hotchin.
It appears that Carrick Graham is just another go-between big business interests and right wing propagandists who, because of the smear campaign they mounted against the SFO, have actively undermined investor confidence in New Zealand’s financial markets. Just how much these despicable people have cost New Zealand would be hard to quantify, but it's likely to be in the billions of dollar range.
Clearly the terms of reference for an investigation into Judith Collins’ involvement should include Slater, Odgers, Graham and Hotchin’s apparent conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. Because without that we can just expect another whitewash from a government that is determined to continue with their dirty and undemocratic politics. After all, that's the only "game" they know how to play.
