Dear Mr Blunden

1. Although I chose some inappropriate words in response to your 24 December 2014 email, I don’t resile from the basic position I took. After nearly two years, it is incredibly frustrating to not only see someone in your position allow rubbish to be published in your paper but you also tried to defend the indefensible. 
   
   
2. In a role reversal, you shot the messenger, something the media claims whenever it is attacked. I have done everything I want to do in life. I am just hanging in hoping I live long enough to read just one journalist admitting that he/she made a mistake. Sadly, I am sure M/s Gillard will play full-forward for the Bulldogs before a journalist admits a mistake.
   
   
3. M/s Panahi’s last two articles were so bad and so damaging to Essendon personnel, they were indefensible. And how ironic that you attacked me with similar intemperate language that I used.  
   
   
4. I became interested in this saga in July 2013. As I had no desire to be a player, I corresponded with individual members of your staff on 38 occasions. I gave them inside information that they were unaware. Unfortunately, none was used because of the alleged “parameters that the AFL and your paper had agreed to”. I then passed on information to an Age journalist on 18 occasions. Neither your newspaper nor the Age used any of my information. 
   
   
5. The following are just a few innocuous extracts from emails with your staff. They give you the tone of the communication for the first 12 months. All were sent in the 12 months before I copied you on anything. I shall table the hard-hitting information I forwarded, and which was ignored, at a later date:
   
   
6. “Re my earlier off-the-record email. All I meant was I don’t wish to be quoted. If there is any merit in what I said, run with it as your own.”
   
   
7. “I never wanted to be a player in this game and desperately needed a journalist I could feed information to. I phoned you many months ago and left a message but you did not return my call. To my knowledge, you haven’t even checked with Dr Reid about what Evans told him what advice Demetriou and McLachlan gave him (Evans) on 1 February 2013.” 
   
   
8. “I have two emails which I will sit on which would be page-one stories in every newspaper in Australia. If I wanted notoriety, I’d release them.”
   
   
9. “I’m sorry if I have caused you any discomfort. Obviously, that wasn’t the intention because I could have gone after you if I had wanted to.”
   
   
10. “The Yanks risk the lives of their men to recover the bodies of dead soldiers. In Australia we allow our sporting associations to bury sportsmen and freedom of speech just to cover up the lies and deceitful behaviour of our sporting administrators.”
    
    
11. 3 April 2014: There is no evidence whatsoever that Essendon players were given Thymosin Beta-4. It will be impossible to prove AOD-9604 was a prohibited substance when taken by the Essendon players. Dank even communicated with WADA in early February 2012 about its classification.”
    
    
12. “Getting my report in readable form is the big challenge. I have written just on 400 pages. I have done what I assume Garry Downes has done. I suspect he won’t be as thorough and he has a different conclusion. He will say there is enough evidence to proceed. That will leave it to someone else. If he reaches that conclusion, he is wrong.”
    
    
13. I am quietly confident I can destroy the whole investigation. The investigation was corrupted. The following is an extract from the first draft of my report “The Search for Justice”. It will need some pruning but I have already written 290 pages. I discuss Thymosin Beta-4 in two places in my report. In section 5.2.6.2, I go into great detail. Section 9.6.15 is a summary, but it will give you an idea. 
    
    
14. Thymosin Beta-4: The most important task in the whole investigation was to ascertain whether there was any evidence that Essendon players were supplied and administered an alleged WADA prohibited substance, Thymosin Beta-4. Essendon FC was certain that the players hadn’t transgressed. 
    
    
15. There are many substances with Thymosin in the name. Thymosin Alpha, which is also known as Thymomodulin. This substance is not banned. The second substance is called Thymosin Beta-4, which was only listed by name as a WADA prohibited substance after 10:45:17 am on 4 February 2013. 
    
    
16. ASADA had no evidence that when the players and Dank mentioned Thymosin they were referring to Thymosin Beta-4. Consequently, ASADA was guilty of gross misconduct in stating that Dank was referring to Thymosin Beta-4. The AFL was out–of-order in using the interim report as evidence to charge Essendon players for having used a banned substance. ASADA has stated unambiguously that Thymosin Beta-4 was administered to the players despite there being no evidence to support the statement: 
    
    
17. “ASADA has also unbelievably fabricated the figures and changed Robson’s evidence, which should result in the jam being called off.”
    
    
18. “I blame the AFL for most of the Essendon saga. If the AFL had been less arrogant and less apathetic, and more vigilant, the saga would not have occurred.” 
    
    
19. “Read Clause 7.4 of the AFL’s anti-doping code and then tell me how many clubs you think comply; whether you think the AFL has ever checked compliance; ring all the other clubs and the AFL and see what they say. I suspect you could nail most of the doctors for not fulfilling their responsibilities. If this rule were enforced everyone would be more vigilant and everyone would know what substances were taken.”
    
    
20. Two Herald Sun journos said: “Suspended coach James Hird, current coach Mark Thompson, club doctor Bruce Reid and former football boss Danny Corcoran were all charged by the AFL with bringing the game into disrepute over their role in the supplements scandal last August. Your colleagues had an obligation to say all charges were withdrawn against Hird, Corcoran and Reid’.”
    
    
21. “Dr Bruce Reid phoned Dr Harcourt on 19 October 2011 (the first day of 2012 pre-season training) and expressed concern that he had been marginalised. He told Dr Harcourt that Dean Robinson had given the players peptide Tribulus and other substances without his knowledge. 
    
    
22. Dr Reid was concerned that Tribulus was a WADA prohibited substance and he asked Harcourt to check it out. Clause 4.6 of the AFL’s anti-doping code says: “Where reasonable and as soon as the AFL becomes aware that a possible Anti-Doping Rule Violation may have occurred, the AFL will immediately advise ASADA of the possible violation. The AFL will provide ASADA with all information pertaining to the possible Anti-Doping Rule Violation.” 
    
    
23. In my view, Dr Harcourt should have informed Demetriou, Matthew Finnis and ASADA that Robinson had marginalised Dr Reid and that therefore a violation may have occurred. Demetriou, Adrian Anderson and Gillon McLachlan also breached Clause 4.6. I suspect every club is still breaching Clause 7.4. If each club complied with Clause 7.4 there would be no doping issues. 
    
    
24. Anderson warned the clubs about possible radiation poisoning and unbelievably no one at the AFL followed it up.
    
    
25. 24 July 2014: “The following is the 23-page executive summary from my 300+ page book.” NB That document contained pages and pages of unknown information.

Dissection of your 24 December 2014 email

Item (Blunden) 1: You are an obnoxious bully who clearly has way too much on his hands.

My Comment: 

1. On reflection, I retract my admission on Wednesday that I was obnoxious. I don’t believe I am evil nor odious nor offensive. And I definitely haven’t bullied anyone, a claim which your paper can’t make. Your journos bullied EFC into capitulating in August 2013 and have tried to bully the players into pleading guilty despite their belief they haven’t been administered Thymosin Beta-4.
   
   
2. I fed your staff important information for 15 months, which they ignored, presumably, because they were acting on instructions from higher up. Inter alia, I even provided proof that Ian Robson’s evidence was changed by ASADA; that Jobe Watson’s evidence was omitted, and that ASADA had fabricated the evidence on 28 occasions when creating a table of admitted substance use. 
   
   
3. I dissected two articles by one of your journalists Rita Panahi. They were disgraceful articles by someone who has no idea about the subject and no idea of the various journalists’ codes. Both articles were very harmful to Essendon players and their families. 
   
   
4. I acknowledge that M/s Panahi’s article was so poor I should have said she was on training wheels rather than on a training bra.
   
   
5. I have identified a corrupt AFL–ASADA investigation
   
   
6. I have dissected about 20 appalling articles by Age staff.
   
   
7. I have proved the media has trashed its reputation during this saga.
   
   
8. I realise I have spent an abnormal amount of time on the saga but as I am trying by myself to negate nearly two years of trash by the Age and the Herald Sun, my effort has only been a drop in the ocean. I have written about 200,000 words. The media has written tens of millions of words. And in all modesty, I suspect, with the exception of Chip Le Grand, I have been closer to the truth than any of your staff or the Age’s staff. 

Item (Blunden) 2: For months now, we have been bombarded by your intellectual supremacy, and filled our spam files with your rantings.

My Comment:

For the first 12 months I tried to inform your people, as well as exposing the Age’s vitriolic campaign against Hird, Thompson and Essendon. When it was obvious your paper had no interest in fulfilling its journalistic responsibilities, I decided to do your job for you by exposing the AFL and ASADA. It was only at that point that I copied you on my work. Every time I dissected an article or made a claim I put my head on the chopping block. I made no claim to intellectual supremacy, and it was kind, and perceptive of you, to acknowledge it. But I do claim moral supremacy over you, your journalists and those at the Age.

Item (Blunden): 3 We have endured this without complaint. You may even have some points worth noting.

My Comment:

1. “Endure without complaint”. That sounds as though you are about to lodge a workers compensation claim. Two journalists from your paper asked me to stop forwarding them material. I stopped immediately. Instead of suffering great pain through my actions you should have made the same request as your journos or tried hitting the delete button in the top right-hand corner of your keyboard. If you want to ascertain what endure means, ask Hird or the Essendon players. 
   
   
2. If you believed I had some points worth noting, why didn’t you use one of them, even just once? Silly question, I was told they weren’t within the parameters of your apparent agreement with the AFL.
   
   
3. My records, all 9000+ pages, suggest I am one of a few nobodies who have attacked the media because of its biased, gutless, coverage. I am flattered if you think I have caused your empire more anguish than you and your ilk have caused James Hird, Mark Thompson, Dr Reid, Paul Little, the players and their families. 

Item (Blunden) 4: But personal attacks on one of my staff members, especially at Christmas, won’t be tolerated.

My Comment:

1. Your journalists and M/s Panahi have made unsubstantiated personal attacks on Hird, Thompson, Dr Reid and the Essendon players for nearly two years and you have the audacity to cry foul when I give one of your journalists a little tickle for her second appalling destructive article. Although all the evidence supported my conclusion, I probably shouldn’t have said M/s Panahi didn’t have enough intelligence, and that she was still on her training bra. But in the scheme of things, my comments were nothing in contrast to the destructive elements in her comments. 
   
   
2. It has always amused me why journalists are the most sensitive people in the community. You destroy reputations daily and then squeal like little girls in the playground when someone questions you.
   
   
3. I questioned 12 statements in M/s Panahi’s article. In all modesty, I think very few people would find fault with my comments on those 12 points. I should be interested to know whether you questioned M/s Panahi’s apparent disgust that the Essendon lawyers were trying to win the case.
   
   
4. While on the subject of personal attacks, I should think the worst thing that could be said about a player is that he didn’t put his head over the ball. Yet, your journalists, week-after-week, year-after-year, denigrate players on that score and for many other unfathomable reasons.
   
   
5. As I said last week, you must have started on the Christmas booze early for condoning M/s Panahi’s attack on the players on Monday 22 December and condemning my attack on Wednesday 24 December as being against the Christmas spirit.   

Item (Blunden) 5: If you can’t make your case without such rudeness, don’t bother us again.

My Comment:

1. It’s been a while since I have been in a newspaper room but my recollection is journalists are the rudest, foul-mouthed people in the workforce.
   
   
2. I made my case for 12 months without being rude and your journalists refused to use my information. Your journos were polite except for the time one told me to fuck myself because I said he didn’t put his head over the ball in an article. Basically, he laid on the ground and let the AFL tickle his tummy like in the Disney film Old Yellar.
   
   
3. In the scheme of things, being rude is nothing in contrast to you and your newspaper destroying the reputations of a number of Essendon people.

Item (Blunden) 6: There’s a line to be drawn on this, and you crossed it.

My Comment:

1. Talk about hypocrites. You have crossed the line almost daily in your treatment of Hird, Thompson and the players. Despite my constant pleadings, which you claim turned into rantings, how can you claim the high moral ground in denigrating Hird without discussing the Essendon organisation structure and his job description? 
   
   
2. Your paper has crossed the line by not ensuring its journalists comply with the various codes of conduct.
   
   
3. At least I have identified the mistakes I believe M/s Panahi made. You, on the other hand, have just made general accusations without identifying specific comments to support your allegations.
   
   
4. People who have worked with you tell me that I shouldn’t judge you on your email or how the paper has (mis)handled the Essendon saga. They say very few in Australian journalism could match you when you were more hands on than your current position allows. They assure me that old newspaper man will recognise the real stories in this. While I understand the commercial issues, I reckon it is time for that great newspaper man to re-emerge and remind everyone of how he won that reputation you still have among former colleagues who are keen and objective assessors of your talents.
   
   
5. Ironically, you were only copied very late in the game at my friends’ insistence because they believed you would do something about it.

Bruce Francis