You may have seen the “Shanklin Man Impersonates Police Officer To See Kasabian At Festival” story that we ran early yesterday.
One of those that did, was Daniel Tredinnick. He was that ‘Shanklin Man’ in the story. He called VentnorBlog, keen to layout his side of the story, as he felt it hadn’t been in the other media.
Daniel says that all of the reports that are circulating in the National media – The Telegraph, The Sun, etc – must have come from The Isle of Wight County Press, as they were all using photos taken by the CP at his house on Monday.
Want the facts straight
Talking to VentnorBlog, he said the CP asked him to not to speak to other media and keep it exclusive to them. He felt he was being exploited by them, telling us, “I’m wondering if the County Press has used my exclusive story – not giving me any money for it.”
Having stuck to the arrangement, he was surprised to see it in the Sun and Telegraph, going on to say, “For me to have not mentioned it to anyone – and them gone to sell it, is a bit of a p**s-take really.”
“I just wanted to make sure the facts were straight – I’ve got children to think about,” he told us later in the conversation.
VB contacted the County Press editor Alan Marriott for a comment as we published the article. You can find it below.
Change of plan
Daniel decided against the arrangement with the CP and came to VentnorBlog.
He was particularly concerned that the medication that he was under at the time of both of the offences – a central part of his case in court – wasn’t mentioned in either of the National papers’ articles.
Getting the facts straight
Daniel explained that he has been an alcoholic for the last 17 years and sitting two years on the waiting list for detox at Seven Acres.
He told VB that the medication he was prescribed before the incidents was for recovering alcoholics, not active drinkers like he was, so the effects of the drink were doubled in his view – changing his behaviour.
Listen to the interview for all of the detail
There’s a great deal more that Daniel shares with us.
How he came to take the police uniform; the fact he wasn’t impersonating a woman; getting in and out of the Festival site; tales of people that he helped on site; the senior police officer he had a lengthy conversation with; how he isn’t a massive Kasabian fan; the details of how he was rumbled and what happened next.
It really is worth a listen … [audio:http://otw-audio.s3.amazonaws.com/daniel-tredinnick-exclusive-talk-to-ventnorblog.mp3]
County Press response
UPDATE 10:28
As mentioned above, we contacted the County Press for a comment as we were publishing. Here’s the response in full that we received a short time after from Alan Marriott …
“Mr Tredinnick is correct in stating we contacted him for comment and a picture and we did ask him not to contact other media. We did file the story to the national press as we knew they already had an interest in it.
“The Sun chose not to use elements of the story which gave Mr Tredinnick’s side of the story and his mitigation in court. Those included his deep regret, problems with alcohol and the facts regarding theft of uniform.
“Both the Telegraph’s and Sun stories were much shorter than the filed copy.
“The CP will be running a full interview with Mr Tredinnick on Friday and covered the court case at the end of last week.”
Image: Fake Elvis under CC BY 2.0
