Careful what you read!

ACT MP David Garrett was recently forced to make a personal statement to Parliament about how he used the plot of the novel The Day of the Jackal to fake a passport.

Garrett told MPs that he took the identity of a child – who was born about the same time as him, but who had died young – to obtain the passport in 1984 and described his actions as “harmless prank”.

Following these revelations, it got me to thinking what his statement might have looked like had Garrett been reading the book: “The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer”.

Here is my attempt:

"Twenty-six years ago while living a very different life, I foolishly undertook what I naively saw as a harmless prank, one that was to later have repercussions both for me personally and others who did not deserve to be hurt by my thoughtless actions.

"Using a method made known by the publication of the biography of Richard "The Iceman" Kuklinski The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer, I copied the actions of Kuklinski - an American contract killer, who during his 30 year murder-spree, killed numerous people, either by gun, strangulation, knife, or poison.

"His favored method of "icing" victims was the use of cyanide since it killed quickly and was hard to detect in toxicology tests. This would be variously administered by injection, putting it on a person's food, by aerosol spray, or by simply spilling it on the victim's skin.

"One favorite method of disposing of a body was to place it in a 55-gallon oil drum. Other disposal methods included dismemberment, burial, or placing the body in the trunk of a car and having it crushed in a junkyard. Bodies were also left sitting on park benches, thrown down "bottomless pits" and fed still-alive to giant rats.

"To this day I cannot explain the rationale behind my actions except to say; I was simply curious to see whether such a thing could be done.
I never used the murdered victims for any purpose. They duly expired and I later destroyed any evidence.

"Twenty-one years after I finished my murder spree and many years after I had began, I was arrested along with a number of others following a police inquiry into unsolved murders. This inquiry followed investigations, believed to be connected to that country's intelligence service, of a number of murders using the same method I had used.

"I was duly put before the court and admitted many counts of murder. After submissions by my lawyer, I was discharged without conviction. The court accepted that the consequences of a conviction for this offence would have consequences out of all proportion to the offending. I was also granted permanent name suppression.
At the time I committed these offences, I gave no thought whatsoever to the effect it would have on others.

"Following my arrest, I wrote letters of apology to the victims' relatives expressing my sincere remorse for the pain I had caused them. The regret I feel at the hurt I unwittingly caused these families is something I carry with me today and will continue to carry for the rest of my life. I cannot wind back the clock, but I sincerely wish that I could."

Garrett has now resigned as an MP. Good job and good riddance. Now if just the horrible, little bald man with a perma fake tan would do the same!