Mark Blanco, 30, died during a drug-fuelled party in 2006 and the case has never been resolved.
A retired judge could be brought in to help police investigate claims an actor was allegedly thrown to his death following a row with Pete Doherty.
Mark Blanco, 30, died nearly 20 years ago but the case his never been solved. His mum, Sheila, has been on a relentless quest for justice and outside police force is now set to examine the case to decide whether to launch a full review.
It comes two years after a Channel 4 documentary, Pete Doherty, Who Killed My Son?, suggested Mark had been murdered after an FBI expert found he was thrown to his death. An investigation by the Metropolitan Police has resulted in no charges and suggested Mark’s death was suicide – a finding rejected by a coroner.
An inquest previously heard he had been kicked out of the “crack den” during a row with Doherty‘s literary agent Paul Roundhill and minder Johnny “Headlock” Jeannevol. Mark returned two minutes later before somehow falling to his death from a balcony.
Sheila met with Commander Umer Khan of the City of London Police on Friday as the force considers the Metropolitan Police’s decision to shelve the case.
Speaking to our sister title, the Mirror, Sheila said: “I found the City of London Police to be open, less defensive and very different to the meetings I’ve had with the Met. They will look at material provided by the Met, but we don’t know what that contains. Commander Khan may get a retired judge and others to assist them in their review.”
Sheila said police failed to investigate her son’s death properly from the very start. “The Met totally ignored the detailed evidence presented in the C4 documentary – ‘Pete Doherty, Who Killed My Son?’ Grant Fredericks, FBI Instructor and pioneering forensic scientist states that Mark was murdered – as the Mirror reported at the time,” she said.
“I knew from day one that Mark was most probably unconscious as he dropped to his death. Experts Professor Richard Wassersug 2009, and John Kennedy 2012 and 2017 have corroborated this – only for their work to be dismissed as irrelevant by the Met on numerous occasions.
“I welcome Commander Khan’s and his team’s experienced eyes on the 19 years of the Met’s apathy to crime in Mark’s case. We know what happened, now I want to know who was responsible for Mark’s death – in fact, what the coroner asked the Met to investigate at the Inquest, in 2007.”
A study by neurobiology expert Professor Wassersug in 2011 suggested Mark’s head injuries were not consistent with him having deliberately jumped. Mr Kennedy, who has given video forensics testimony in scores of cases in the UK and overseas, has said previously there was no sign of defensive movement in CCTV of his fall indicating he had been pushed.
FBI instructor Grant Frederick told the film makers that fresh analysis of CCTV shows Mark was “thrown over the balcony”. He used 3D and reverse projection, overlaying new film on the original images, to “step back in time”.
Mr Frederick said: “The reverse projection clearly shows there couldn’t be just one person on the balcony. What I would see is that Mark has come out and somebody has taken Mark and is putting him over the balcony. If the measurements and the distance are correct, then Mark was thrown over the balcony, Mark was murdered.”
Mr Frederick claimed he asked the Met to carry out the reverse projection work 10 years ago but they failed to do so. Mark fell from a block of flats after a run-in with the Libertines star Doherty. CCTV shows the singer stepping over Mark and fleeing with his then minder Jonathan “Headlock” Jeannevol.
Speaking outside his home in East London, Jeannevol, 46, said earlier this year when asked what happened to Mark: “Go and ask Pete.” He later told the Mirror: “If I had done it I would be in prison, someone would be in prison if they had done it. We just saw that he [Mark] had fallen and Pete ran and I followed him because that was my job, to look after Pete.”
The 2007 inquest heard the ex-minder had confessed to police that he pushed Mark off but retracted it, saying he was high on cocaine when he made it, and was released without charge. Doherty has previously denied any knowledge of how Mark died but admitted running away from the scene to avoid a run-in with the police over drug possession.
Commander Umer Khan, City of London Police said: “We were asked by the Metropolitan Police to look into carrying out an independent victims’ rights review regarding the death of Mark Blanco in 2006. An initial scoping meeting was held today, and we await more information before a final decision is taken to carry out the review.”
In a statement, Scotland Yard said: “A Victims’ Right to Review in relation to the investigation into the death of Mark Blanco has been initiated and is ongoing. Whilst the Victims’ Right to Review is taking place, we will not be making any further comment about this matter. The person who requested the review will be updated, as appropriate, during the process and informed of the outcome.”
