Speaker 1: Before we start the show. We've all heard that the
Speaker 1: ABC has canned it's Q and A show, which is
Speaker 1: called Q and A, but we haven't canned ours. We
Speaker 1: are very keen for you out there in listenerland to
Speaker 1: send us in some questions. We will go through them
Speaker 1: and we will pick some that we think we can answer,
Speaker 1: and we will do exactly that on a podcast of
Speaker 1: our choosing in the near future. So if you'd like
Speaker 1: to write in, there will be an email address in
Speaker 1: the description of this episode. It turns out that Troy
Speaker 1: Penell lasts another season or two after that, and at
Speaker 1: some point either he decided to retire from the top
Speaker 1: level of the game or he was moved on one
Speaker 1: or the other. The other interest that he had, apart
Speaker 1: from women other than his wife, was racing and race horses.
Speaker 1: They basically said that he had favored the Bulldogs and
Speaker 1: that had the free Kicks account been reversed, that they
Speaker 1: might well have won the game. I'm Andrew Rule. This
Speaker 1: is Life and Crimes. As we go to air with
Speaker 1: this story, it's already been out there for quite a
Speaker 1: while that a former AFL umpire, quite a distinguished and
Speaker 1: experienced umpire, called Troy Panell had gone missing. Troy Penell
Speaker 1: was a Western suburban umpire as a youngster, and in
Speaker 1: two thousand and five, against the advice of those people
Speaker 1: who knew him best out in the Western suburbs at
Speaker 1: the old Footscray District League, as it was against their advice,
Speaker 1: the AFL recruited him as an AFL umpire and he
Speaker 1: went on to umpire for thirteen years until twenty eighteen,
Speaker 1: and in that time he was regarded, I think in
Speaker 1: many ways a pretty good umpire, pretty quick and experience seasoned,
Speaker 1: all that good stuff. But he did have a few falls.
Speaker 1: From Grayson is one spectacular one which is perhaps interesting
Speaker 1: in the context of what happened later. In twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: Troy Penell umpired a game at Docklands between the team
Speaker 1: that he actually supports, that would be the Western Bulldogs
Speaker 1: and the Adelaide Crows, who come from another state and
Speaker 1: have very little to do with Melbourne and don't have
Speaker 1: a lot of followers in Melbourne, but they do have
Speaker 1: a lot of followers in Adelaide where they're from. And
Speaker 1: in this game, of course we have you know, two
Speaker 1: umpires in this game. Troy Penell awarded seventeen free kicks
Speaker 1: to the Western Bulldogs and one to the Adelaide Crows. Now,
Speaker 1: this was a very tight game and in fact, at
Speaker 1: one point towards the full time siren just minutes out,
Speaker 1: the Bulldogs I think were only two points ahead. Adelaide
Speaker 1: were within one kick of winning the game. And then
Speaker 1: along came a magic free for the Bulldogs and bang
Speaker 1: bang couple of quick goals and ultimately the Bulldogs won
Speaker 1: by fifteen points. Now, that win which was back in
Speaker 1: May of twenty sixteen, but that win was a crucial
Speaker 1: one for the Bulldogs because it pushed them up the
Speaker 1: table towards the top, which meant that they would get
Speaker 1: a run at the finals and then get into the finals.
Speaker 1: And indeed, as any football follower knows, they came home
Speaker 1: with a wet sale and they won an historic premiership flag,
Speaker 1: the first one I think since nineteen fifty four, so
Speaker 1: it was basically the first flag in a lifetime and
Speaker 1: only the second footscray flag as we used to say
Speaker 1: foots Gray or Bulldogs flag in history in our AFL
Speaker 1: or formerly VFL. Now this greatly incensed the Crows supporters.
Speaker 1: As the season war on and the Crows were obviously
Speaker 1: not going to get to the Grand Final. Crow's supporters
Speaker 1: formed a deep and abiding hatred of Troy Panell and
Speaker 1: blamed him for their problems. They basically said that he
Speaker 1: had favored the Bulldogs and that had the free kicks
Speaker 1: account been reversed, that they might well have won the
Speaker 1: game and gone on to greater things. And meanwhile, the
Speaker 1: Bulldogs would not have. Now, that is a supposition that's
Speaker 1: there to be made, and they may well be right,
Speaker 1: but to some extent, most people would think of that
Speaker 1: as just the partisan barracking by highly partisan supporters in
Speaker 1: Adelaide against highly partisan supporters of the Bulldogs here in
Speaker 1: western Melbourne. Let's jump forward a couple of years. It
Speaker 1: turns out that Troy Panell lasts another season or two
Speaker 1: after that exhibition of umpiring. I think there was widespread
Speaker 1: criticis and perhaps some of that criticism permeated the AFL,
Speaker 1: and at some point either he decided to retire from
Speaker 1: the top level of the game or he was moved
Speaker 1: on one or the other, and he I think umpired
Speaker 1: at a lesser level and he became I think a
Speaker 1: coach of other umpires, a junior league umpires.
Speaker 2: Or whatever that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1: He lived in the Outer West. I think he had
Speaker 1: grown up around Werribee. He bought a nice new house
Speaker 1: on a big block, a big new house on a
Speaker 1: big new block with a swimming pool at Gisban sixty
Speaker 1: days after that big game, the Docklands game. Interestingly, that
Speaker 1: was on the seventh of May and sixty days later
Speaker 1: on the seventh of July, which might be a total coincidence,
Speaker 1: and probably is. He bought a big new house at
Speaker 1: Gisman for just north of eight hundred thousand dollars, which
Speaker 1: was a fair amount at the time in twenty sixteen.
Speaker 1: It's now eight years ago.
Speaker 2: That house these days.
Speaker 1: Is probably in the low one point something's one point
Speaker 1: two one point three.
Speaker 2: Quite a bit. That house is not out of the way.
Speaker 1: I guess a guy who was just turning forty mid career.
Speaker 1: He's got a pretty reasonable job at a place called
Speaker 1: Sea Roads Shipping, I think it's called. They're based in
Speaker 1: Port Melbourne and they run container traffic, a lot of
Speaker 1: container traffic across Bass Strait and I think across the
Speaker 1: Tasment of New Zealand. Thousands of containers a year in
Speaker 1: goods being shipped back and forth. Troy Pannell's day job
Speaker 1: was as a sort of a managerial role inside that
Speaker 1: sea road shipping business. That job, it wasn't terribly highly paid,
Speaker 1: but it was quite responsible. He'd been there some years
Speaker 1: and he was trusted with organizing payments around the office,
Speaker 1: and he was authorized to pay bills of up to
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars, et cetera, et cetera. And it turns
Speaker 1: out that he might have seen this as an opportunity
Speaker 1: because at some point Troy Perenell became the sole director
Speaker 1: proprietor of a small and obscure company which had a
Speaker 1: name something like Containers Surveying and Maintenance Proprietary EMITTED or
Speaker 1: similar a name like that, and it was a name
Speaker 1: that suggested that what that company did was to maintain
Speaker 1: shipping containers. That if you had containers that had a
Speaker 1: problem or loose rivets or hinges that were broken or whatever,
Speaker 1: it might be that this company could take your container
Speaker 1: on the back of a truck and you weld it
Speaker 1: up or fix things and make sure it was fit
Speaker 1: for purpose.
Speaker 2: Good idea.
Speaker 1: The only problem with it was that this company was
Speaker 1: apparently false front was a bogus company. It was a company,
Speaker 1: but it didn't actually have a workshop, and it didn't
Speaker 1: actually allegedly do any work. It didn't take containers anywhere,
Speaker 1: and it didn't work on them wherever they were. No
Speaker 1: work was being done. The only transaction to do with
Speaker 1: that little company between Sea Roads Shipping Troy Penel's employer
Speaker 1: and this little company set up, the only transaction was
Speaker 1: that every month or so he would invoice Sea Road
Speaker 1: Shipping for the maintenance of X number of containers. And
Speaker 1: the reality of this is that over a ten year period,
Speaker 1: can you believe this a ten year period, he had
Speaker 1: charged the company he worked for around eight hundred dollars
Speaker 1: a throw, eight hundred dollars a time for each container
Speaker 1: that they were using. Over ten years, that added up
Speaker 1: to something like a hundred thousand containers. In a year
Speaker 1: they'd use, you know, ten thousand containers or whatever, and
Speaker 1: over ten years it's ten hundred thousand. And the result
Speaker 1: of that, if you're multiplied by eight hundred, is eight
Speaker 1: point seven million dollars. That this company that he had
Speaker 1: set up allegedly stripped eight point seven million dollars out
Speaker 1: of his employer's cash accounts.
Speaker 2: Clearly, it was quite a.
Speaker 1: Successful business sea roads shipping, because no one actually noticed
Speaker 1: that this might be a problem. No one was actually
Speaker 1: having a close look at the containers to see what
Speaker 1: was being done or not being done to them. And
Speaker 1: it came to light only because of an alert accountant
Speaker 1: who said, oh, there's a problem here with GST and
Speaker 1: bas this company, you know, container surveying whatever it's called.
Speaker 1: They're not paying. Yes, now we better ask Troy here,
Speaker 1: who handles all that transactions with the containers maintenance, what's
Speaker 1: going on there? And they asked him, and he duck,
Speaker 1: shoved and duck the question, and it wasn't long before
Speaker 1: they worked out that the money had been paid out
Speaker 1: into basically a void. And indeed, when you looked up
Speaker 1: this company, its sole director was one Troy Panell, their
Speaker 1: own shipping manager or whatever his title was now. His
Speaker 1: title sounded good, but he was on a salary of
Speaker 1: only about one hundred and ten thousand for most of
Speaker 1: that time. Not a big salary, but probably okay. Given
Speaker 1: that probably wasn't a lot of hard work, and clearly
Speaker 1: he wasn't being supervised very strictly. He could pretty well
Speaker 1: do what he liked, and indeed he did do what
Speaker 1: he liked. So the balloon went up last year in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four, and ultimately he was summoned to court
Speaker 1: it They started a civil action against him and against
Speaker 1: his his company, I suppose, and it was all heading
Speaker 1: in that direction. He obviously could no longer work for them,
Speaker 1: and he was going to turn up to court and
Speaker 1: eventually the system would have extracted large amounts of money
Speaker 1: from him and his assets in order to pay back
Speaker 1: his employer part of least of what he'd allegedly stripped
Speaker 1: from them. Now what were his assets? Now this is interesting.
Speaker 1: Troy Panell had bought at the House of Gissement, Yes,
Speaker 1: that was twenty sixteen. Troy Panell and his then wife,
Speaker 1: who claims no knowledge of any of these things, and
Speaker 1: I have no reason to disbelieve her. I'm told by
Speaker 1: a lawyer that I trust that she has been sort
Speaker 1: of broadsided by this, that she's been lied to consistently,
Speaker 1: and we'll come to that. And he has apparently betrayed
Speaker 1: those closest to him quite a bit. He and his
Speaker 1: then wife they had premises in Kinton called Duck Duck
Speaker 1: Goose the Larder I think it was called. It was
Speaker 1: a sort of a food shop I think did pizzas
Speaker 1: and it did food and it might have done gift
Speaker 1: wear and stuff as well.
Speaker 2: Sort of quite a big, stylish.
Speaker 1: Premises in the main street of Canton. It was the
Speaker 1: sort of place that people driving through tourist traffic, that
Speaker 1: sort of thing they'd pull up, maybe buy something from
Speaker 1: Memento and buy some food or whatever.
Speaker 2: Coffee.
Speaker 1: And another one down in Sedn Now that of course
Speaker 1: is the upmarket piece of Footscray sed and he had
Speaker 1: one there with a quite a fashionable name. I think
Speaker 1: it was called something Galaxia. It was a small and
Speaker 1: fashionable cafe of the sort that people refer to as instagrammable.
Speaker 1: It would produce beautifully served dishes of meals that people
Speaker 1: would take photographs of before they consumed them, as some
Speaker 1: people do so. Troy perenew until the manure hit the
Speaker 1: fan seemed to be going okay. He was involved in
Speaker 1: the businesses. He had the house at Gisbon where he
Speaker 1: and his then wife lived with their children, I think
Speaker 1: two children. But Troy had a few worries. He had
Speaker 1: a few other responsibilities. One of them was forgot where
Speaker 1: he actually lived, and he formed an attachment for a
Speaker 1: woman other than his wife, and she was ensconced in
Speaker 1: a property in ascert Vale and he had a long
Speaker 1: term relationship with her while still living at home with
Speaker 1: his wife, and he managed to father a baby girl
Speaker 1: with that woman, and that led to some disharmony in
Speaker 1: his domestic arrangements, as it might. In fact, their wife
Speaker 1: is married to called him a liar and a cheat,
Speaker 1: which a lot of people would probably agree with. And
Speaker 1: the other interest that he had, apart from women other
Speaker 1: than his wife, was racing and race horses, and Troy
Speaker 1: Panell he used to go to New Zealand, I think.
Speaker 2: Regularly because of his work.
Speaker 1: I think perhaps Sea road shipping had a bit to
Speaker 1: do with shipping across the Tasmans to New Zealand, and
Speaker 1: he used to.
Speaker 2: Go there fairly regularly.
Speaker 1: And at some point he decided that he would get
Speaker 1: more involved in racing. He's clearly always been a bit
Speaker 1: keen on it, and he started to buy the odd horse.
Speaker 2: In New Zealand.
Speaker 1: But this is where the story gets interesting. You'd expect
Speaker 1: Troy Panell he suspect number one for draining eight point
Speaker 1: seven million out of a company. You'd expect, probably if
Speaker 1: you were guessing you'd think that he was somebody who
Speaker 1: would buy expensive race horses and bet like the Watsons,
Speaker 1: just bet in five thousand dollar lots, ten thousand dollar
Speaker 1: lots and bet like hell. But he didn't. He bought
Speaker 1: cheap horses in New Zealand. The best one he bought,
Speaker 1: the best race horse that he bought, actually cost ten
Speaker 1: thousand dollars as a yealing, which is less than.
Speaker 2: The cost of production. It's a bargain. That's a sort
Speaker 2: of hack price.
Speaker 1: That's what people pay for a good kid's pony, really,
Speaker 1: And he bought this Philly for ten thousand dollars. In
Speaker 1: twenty and eighteen, he did a deal with a husband
Speaker 1: and wife training team over there, that is Vaughn and
Speaker 1: Trudy Keegan, who are sort of boutique trainers, people who
Speaker 1: trained twenty or thirty horses, sort of small stable, and
Speaker 1: he said, can you get this one broken in and
Speaker 1: train it for me?
Speaker 2: Whatever?
Speaker 1: And they did, and then he bought another horse and
Speaker 1: another horse, and I think eventually around that time eighteen nineteen,
Speaker 1: the beginning of COVID, he had up to nine horses
Speaker 1: over there. Now, even in New Zealand where prices are
Speaker 1: lower and I think racecources can be trained a bit cheaper.
Speaker 1: In New Zealand, he was running up bills of around
Speaker 1: ten thousand dollars a month. Now, that is quite a
Speaker 1: bit for the average person, but if you are as
Speaker 1: it is alleged stripping out somewhere between half a million
Speaker 1: and one million dollars a year from an embezzment scheme.
Speaker 1: And this is the allegation about Troy Penell. He would
Speaker 1: have plenty of money to pay ten thousand dollars a
Speaker 1: month in training fees, because that would work out about
Speaker 1: one hundred and twenty grand a year, and yet it
Speaker 1: is alleged that he was getting anything up to eight
Speaker 1: hundred thousand.
Speaker 2: Dollars a year out of his alleged scheme.
Speaker 1: And so really, even though it's a big expense ten
Speaker 1: thousand dollars a month for the average working wage person,
Speaker 1: in the context of this, it's not. The other thing
Speaker 1: is this, you would expect him to be a big punter,
Speaker 1: you'd expect him to be a degenerate punter. But again
Speaker 1: this is a bit surprising.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: I set out on this story to find out who
Speaker 1: Troy Perenell really was, and I thought no worries he
Speaker 1: will be another one of these embezzlers, like the classic
Speaker 1: bank manager of the classic bank teller. These people that
Speaker 1: can get their hands on money, they start gambling, they
Speaker 1: have a loss, they think they can borrow something out
Speaker 1: of the till. Go to the races, put it on
Speaker 1: the favorite, win it all back, go back, restore it
Speaker 1: to the till, go to the casino, put it on
Speaker 1: black or red, etc. It's the slippery slope, and it
Speaker 1: happens a lot, and it is always happened, and there
Speaker 1: are always gambling addicts who will end up embezzling cash
Speaker 1: to cover their losses, and they become more and more
Speaker 1: desperate because you know, they're two million in the hole.
Speaker 1: They've got to try and bet their way out. There's
Speaker 1: no other way, and they become increasingly desperate. I thought
Speaker 1: this would be that case. But I put out some
Speaker 1: feelers with a couple of sources in the corporate gaming
Speaker 1: and betting industry as they call it. And one of
Speaker 1: those sources knows a lot of people across certain corporate bookmakers,
Speaker 1: and the other one knows other people in other corporate
Speaker 1: book makers. So we're looking here. You know, Ladbrooks Sports Bet,
Speaker 1: the tab tap Corp bet three six five better, all
Speaker 1: the usual suspects. And the message I got back from
Speaker 1: both those contacts was we've never heard of this guy,
Speaker 1: and if he's betting, we doubt his better big and clearly,
Speaker 1: if he's betting, he's betting using somebody else's accounts, not
Speaker 1: his own, not certainly not his own name. He doesn't
Speaker 1: seem to exist, And I thought, well, that's not that surprising.
Speaker 1: As a former afl umpire, he will have been flagged
Speaker 1: as a person who shouldn't bet on sporting contests or whatever. Okay,
Speaker 1: So I then talk to two live bookies, bookies the
Speaker 1: old fashioned bookies who go to the races and put
Speaker 1: up the odds on a board and say give it
Speaker 1: a name, punters and all that stuff. And the two
Speaker 1: I spoke to are two of the most well known,
Speaker 1: experienced and biggest bookies left in this state. There aren't
Speaker 1: that many of them left, but these two guys are
Speaker 1: right up there, and they are very wise people. They
Speaker 1: have seen a lot of punters come and go, and
Speaker 1: it's fair to say that if there was someone betting
Speaker 1: in telephone numbers, these guys would know about it. If
Speaker 1: the guy was not betting, through them, they would have
Speaker 1: heard who he was betting through same result. Neither of
Speaker 1: them had heard anything about this Troy Panell, or indeed
Speaker 1: about anybody that sort of fits the profile. Bookies call
Speaker 1: Lisa to Guy's a gold brick. A gold brick is
Speaker 1: someone with access to a lot of money who feels
Speaker 1: an urge to bet with it. Bookies love them because
Speaker 1: ultimately they will lose, and bookies will benefit from those losses.
Speaker 1: They had never heard of anyone matching that description. No
Speaker 1: gold brick, regardless of the name. They just hadn't heard
Speaker 1: of one. My four contacts across the entire betting gaming
Speaker 1: industry in Victoria are telling me that this bloke isn't
Speaker 1: an active large punter. Now, the two lots of trainers
Speaker 1: that have trained for him, that is the husband and
Speaker 1: wife team in New Zealand, the Kegans, and quite a
Speaker 1: respected small trainer here at Kinon called Charles Cassa. Nice guy,
Speaker 1: looks like Frank Zappa, the musician, and in fact Charles
Speaker 1: Cassa before he was a horse trainer. At one point
Speaker 1: he used to sing and play guitar in rock and
Speaker 1: roll bands. So there you go a bit of Frank
Speaker 1: Zappa about him. Charles is a horseman first, racial trainer. Second,
Speaker 1: he trains a few horses and goes okay that Kenton
Speaker 1: lives a nice life with the family on the farm
Speaker 1: and trains away. He told me he had a conversation
Speaker 1: with me. He said he met Troy Panell at the
Speaker 1: races at Geelong Day. Used to both be around Gelong
Speaker 1: at one time, and he said it was one of
Speaker 1: those casual relationships you fall into it the races. You
Speaker 1: see somebody see me regularly and you get to nod
Speaker 1: to them and say hello mate, Hello mate. And he
Speaker 1: said I only knew him as mate for quite a
Speaker 1: while before I knew what his name was. I had
Speaker 1: no idea what he did. I didn't know he's an umpire.
Speaker 1: I just seen him at the races occasionally, and at
Speaker 1: some point point he's approached me and said, I've got
Speaker 1: a horse. It's a barrier rogue or a float. Rogue
Speaker 1: won't load and a float and I need somebody as
Speaker 1: a good horseman to try and train it, handle it,
Speaker 1: educate it. And I think the story was that he
Speaker 1: cass undertook to try and re educate the horse or whatever.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter, but that's how he started off training
Speaker 1: the odd horse for Troy Penell. What's his summary of
Speaker 1: Troy Perenew, Well, his summary of him is nice enough.
Speaker 1: Bloke didn't see that much of him. He said, he
Speaker 1: didn't visit the stables, you know, all the time. He
Speaker 1: didn't hang around all the time. Now again, he visited
Speaker 1: the stables, but he said he didn't give the vibe
Speaker 1: of the wealthy owner, the owner with cash to burn.
Speaker 1: He didn't give the vibe of the guy that's pulling
Speaker 1: eight hundred thousand a year out of a business and
Speaker 1: spending it on racing or on anything else. He said,
Speaker 1: he's cars. His cars were sort of working class cars.
Speaker 2: He said.
Speaker 1: At one point he had a fairly secondhand subar route
Speaker 1: and another time he had a fairly secondhand rav four.
Speaker 1: That's the small Toyota issue, a reasonably humble vehicle. He said,
Speaker 1: that was the sort of vehicle he was driving. I
Speaker 1: was aware that he had the businesses in Canton, but
Speaker 1: nothing about him shouted spare money or money to burn.
Speaker 1: And he said, I doubt he ever had a really
Speaker 1: big bet. He said, a lot of owners talk as
Speaker 1: if they bet bigger than they do. He said, quite
Speaker 1: a lot talking thousands or talk about having five hundred
Speaker 1: each way on a horse or whatever, and he said,
Speaker 1: the reality usually is it's half that. If they say
Speaker 1: they're having five hundred each way, it's probably two hundred
Speaker 1: each way. And he said, I can only remember one
Speaker 1: time where I think he act one heavily enough to
Speaker 1: push it down from nine dollars a nine dollar quit
Speaker 1: that he's eight to one in the old into three
Speaker 1: point fifty. And that was an Arra rat. Now Arrarat races,
Speaker 1: God bless it is a reasonably small meeting, reasonably small
Speaker 1: event where the betting pools are small, and if someone
Speaker 1: had a solid bet, you know, a thousand dollar bet,
Speaker 1: it may well push a horse into much shorter odds,
Speaker 1: at least temperarily. And he said that would be the
Speaker 1: only time I can think of when Troy Penell had
Speaker 1: a decent bet, And he said he never seemed to
Speaker 1: put enough on to want to sling a jockey for winning.
Speaker 1: He said, if we want a race, he said, I'd
Speaker 1: drink bourbon. He never bought me a bottle of bourbon,
Speaker 1: which you'd expect an owner to do occasionally if you
Speaker 1: win a race for them by a present.
Speaker 2: Just sort of.
Speaker 1: The Manners never did any of that. He said he
Speaker 1: wasn't a big notor he didn't spend up. I didn't
Speaker 1: see any sign of spare cash. Now back in New Zealand,
Speaker 1: you know, we've got horses being trained in two countries.
Speaker 1: Back in New Zealand, we have the Philly that he
Speaker 1: paid ten thousand dollars for In New Zealand. She proved
Speaker 1: to be a very handy animal. And the trainers over there,
Speaker 1: the Kegans, told Troy Pernell, this is around twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: I think in there they said this Philly's got ability,
Speaker 1: and they waited for her to grow out. She's a
Speaker 1: great big thing, big and tall and long. They had
Speaker 1: to wait for it to sort of keep growing, and eventually,
Speaker 1: as a three year old, they gave her her first start. Now,
Speaker 1: she started in what we would call sort of a
Speaker 1: semi city start. It was at Awapuni, which is the
Speaker 1: Palmerston North Racetrack. It's a pretty serious racetrack on the
Speaker 1: North Island and maybe like Geelong here or something like that,
Speaker 1: or maybe you know, pretty serious track. And she won easily,
Speaker 1: she won by five lengths. Interestingly, she paid eight dollars
Speaker 1: fifty starting price was eight dollars fifty, which would suggest
Speaker 1: that no one had a fortune on it. Clearly no
Speaker 1: one had, you know, twenty grand on it. But they think,
Speaker 1: they think if Troy Panell is telling the truth, which
Speaker 1: we're not sure, they think Troy Perell hooked that filly
Speaker 1: up in multis multi bets, so with her to win,
Speaker 1: with another one to run a placing, with another one
Speaker 1: to do something else. They put together these multi bets.
Speaker 1: And they said that he told them that he'd invested
Speaker 1: six and a half thousand dollars and he ended up
Speaker 1: winning more than eighty that day, and maybe he had
Speaker 1: some other bets as well, and claimed that ultimately that
Speaker 1: day he won more than one hundred. But anyway, they
Speaker 1: saw no actual proof of it. But he did on
Speaker 1: that give them a gift. He gave them a sling,
Speaker 1: as it's known in the trade, and I suspect that
Speaker 1: that sling was much smaller than the bills that he
Speaker 1: didn't pay. Subsequently, because that Philly, he brought her across
Speaker 1: to Australia. He took her up to his other trainer,
Speaker 1: Charles Casser at Canton, and as soon as she started
Speaker 1: working at Canton, the first thing that the local trainers
Speaker 1: and jockeys and workwriders notice was.
Speaker 2: That the Philly was a roarer.
Speaker 1: She had a throat obstruction is the way to put it,
Speaker 1: which meant that as she galloped with any sort of
Speaker 1: speed and breathed heavily, she had a very raspy, loud,
Speaker 1: raspby breath, which is an indicator of a throat problem.
Speaker 1: And it's something that when it's that serious, it has
Speaker 1: to be remedied. If it can be remedied at all,
Speaker 1: it has to be remedied with quite serious surgery, throat surgery.
Speaker 1: And indeed what happened was they operated on that Philly
Speaker 1: and she had a long spell I think nine months,
Speaker 1: and they brought her back in the best she could
Speaker 1: do here in Australia in Melbourne was to run third.
Speaker 1: She want third, rest of the time, she mean basically
Speaker 1: mostly last. So she went completely wrong. So Troy Pernell's
Speaker 1: big throw at the stumps, the ten thousand dollars Philly
Speaker 1: that won three good races in New Zealand and won
Speaker 1: him some money. When he gets here, she goes wrong,
Speaker 1: as happens with horses, and eventually, when his problems started,
Speaker 1: he sold her for fifty thousand dollars as a broodman.
Speaker 1: The people that bought her sold her for one hundred
Speaker 1: and seventy thousand dollars as a brood may which was
Speaker 1: interesting turnaround. And in the meantime someone sold a fole
Speaker 1: out of her for one hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: Now that fole was not sold by Troy Pernell, not
Speaker 1: officially anyway. It was sold in the name of a
Speaker 1: particular stud, and studs sometimes do that on behalf of clients.
Speaker 1: They prepare yealings for sales. And you know, Joe Smith
Speaker 1: might have a yeling to sell, so he takes it
Speaker 1: to Shady Trees Stud, and Shady Tree Stud say, we'll
Speaker 1: look after your yeling for fifty five dollars a day,
Speaker 1: and we'll lead it around and groom it and rug
Speaker 1: it and feed it and make it beautiful and shiny,
Speaker 1: and providing you pay the bills, we'll organize all that
Speaker 1: and sell it for you at the sales and after
Speaker 1: we take out our cut, you'll get the balance. Now,
Speaker 1: it might be that that yealing that was sold for
Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty thousand to the top trainer Kiaran Mar.
Speaker 1: It's quite possible that you know, a large percentage of
Speaker 1: that money went to Troy Panell. I don't know, and
Speaker 1: in a sense that probably doesn't matter. What matters is
Speaker 1: that when the horsemen.
Speaker 2: You were hit the fan.
Speaker 1: Late last year Troy Perennell was on notice that he
Speaker 1: was in diabolical trouble. First of all, he was going
Speaker 1: to be sued to return the money that was missing,
Speaker 1: and clearly that would mean that any assets that he
Speaker 1: owned would be liable, you know.
Speaker 2: Shops, houses, whatever, horses or whatever it might be.
Speaker 1: He was due to front at the Supreme Court in
Speaker 1: Melbourne on the ninth of May this year. That's only
Speaker 1: a few weeks ago. He didn't front, and about thirty
Speaker 1: five minutes after he was due in court, so this is,
Speaker 1: you know, ten thirty five or whatever, the lawyers for
Speaker 1: the other side get an email from him saying, Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I can't make it to court today. I've
Speaker 1: hit a kangaroo in my car and I have no
Speaker 1: functioning indicator and my windscreen is cracked and I'm sitting
Speaker 1: by the side of the road. He didn't say where.
Speaker 1: I don't think. I'm sitting by the side of the
Speaker 1: road waiting for roadside assist or a tow truck or whatever,
Speaker 1: and that more or less was the last that anybody
Speaker 1: had heard or seen of Troypenel. Subsequently, a warrant was
Speaker 1: issued for his arrest, and by mid May he had
Speaker 1: vanished into smoke. He hit the toe as they say,
Speaker 1: and had gone everyone thinks into state or somewhere, and
Speaker 1: he wasn't really heard of apart from one email suggesting
Speaker 1: that he was in Queensland, which is possibly untrue that
Speaker 1: he was there. He may well have been closer to home.
Speaker 1: None of us knew where he was. I suspect no
Speaker 1: one knew where he was. But it would appear that
Speaker 1: the authorities, despite the arrest warrant, were happy to leave
Speaker 1: him out there somewhere, providing he got a chance to
Speaker 1: turn up to court for his latest hearing on the
Speaker 1: sixth of June. He didn't front and in fact, on
Speaker 1: that day he was spotted by a police car in
Speaker 1: central Victoria, not that far from Dalsford, and apparently at
Speaker 1: some point he's crashed his car, a lone vehicle crash,
Speaker 1: as if he's run off the road and hit a
Speaker 1: tree or whatever it was. Now he was apparently injured
Speaker 1: badly enough, or it appeared that he was injured badly
Speaker 1: enough that he was flown to the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne.
Speaker 2: To be treated.
Speaker 1: It appeared that he was seriously injured, and there was
Speaker 1: a lot of sympathy for his situation, but it would
Speaker 1: appear that he wasn't terribly seriously injured, and that at
Speaker 1: some point in the near future he will front court
Speaker 1: to face the original proceedings and also at some point
Speaker 1: to face charges, and that.
Speaker 2: Is where that story sits.
Speaker 1: So we looked at a man that is an umpire
Speaker 1: who fancied a life of wine, women and race horses,
Speaker 1: not necessarily in that or Thanks for listening. Life and
Speaker 1: Crimes is a Sunday Herald Sun production for true crime Australia.
Speaker 1: Our producer is Johnty Burton. For my columns, features and more,
Speaker 1: go to Heroldsun dot com dot au, forward slash Andrew
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