New Zealand Racing Integrity boss under fire after secret affair
IN a story that would be more fitting on Jeremy Kyle, New Zealand Racing Integrity boss Ross Neal has landed himself in hot water after news of the scandal broke late last week.
Neal is a top corruption investigator for New Zealand Racing and has played an important role in many anti-corruption cases in the past few years, but Neal has hasn’t been living up to his squeaky clean image.
There are calls for Neal to resign after it was found that Neal was having an affair with a Motukarara trainers’ wife, which ultimately resulted in Lyn O’Connell, wife of trainer Blair O’Connell, having a heart attack in a motel room which was occupied by both Neal and Lyn O’Connell.
The grieving husband is now calling for Neal’s resignation and stated that his wife wanted to become a stipendiary steward and Neal was helping her with that process.
“He would come down every six weeks or so for work and she’d meet up and have dinner with him, the first few times that was fine, I understood,” O’Connell said. “They discussed about her becoming a stipendiary steward, how you go about it, how you read a race, and she came home and told me all about it.”
O’Connell states Neal was having an affair with his wife for over a year and in February, 2016, Lyn O’Connell suffered a fatal heart attack.
Mike Godber, general manager of the Integrity Unit, said Neal traveled in the ambulance to the hospital with O’Connell, but left before her family arrived.
Neal called his co-chief stipendiary steward, Nigel McIntyre, for help and the two went back to the motel room and collected O’Connell’s clothes and wedding rings. Blair O’Connell only learned about his wife’s condition by phone call from the hospital and he thought she had been in town with friends that night.
Lyn O’Connell died in hospital a few days later and Blair O’Connell now questions the integrity shown by Ross Neal and his associates. He said that Neal could not champion “integrity” after having an affair with an employee, and she was also battling cancer at the time.
O’Connell confronted Neal by phone with Neal, who is also married, initially stating that whilst they were both in the same motel room, nothing untoward was happening.
“We were having dinner at a restaurant, she dropped me back, we had a cup of tea and that was it, and then she collapsed,” Neal stated.
“I’m just telling you what we did that night and that’s all I’m going to comment on.”
O’Connell said he suspected his wife and Neal had been having an affair weeks earlier, but she denied it. Neal later admitted he was having an affair with O’Connell after her husband threatened to go to the Racing Minister about the scandal.
“He rang me back and admitted he’d been having an affair with her for about a year and a half, which just broke my heart,” O’Connell said. “He only admitted it after I threatened to go to the Racing Minister and the Racing Board and go public.”
O’Connell also stated that Neal’s actions were “absolutely disgraceful” and he should not be in his job “because he has no integrity, he’s a mongrel.”
O’Connell had to break the news to his teenage children and it has taken its toll on his health.
“It’s been killing me inside. I don’t sleep, I’ve lost 22kg since my wife died. I still love her and always will,” he said.