This was my gateway case. First read about it definitely last decade.. possibly as far back as '05 or '06. Nice to see more people care now.
First thing, the chance of him actually having gone in the water and died accidentally are minute I believe.. so minute that if that is what happened it might be somewhat of a miracle. Not only do numerous people with knowledge on the matter say his body would've washed up, the vast majority of people who fall in from Isle of Wight do have something turn up (even if a severed foot as in one case). Furthermore I read on a reddit thread from a person from Cowes, that if he had fallen in there would not have been any deep water for him to fall into because of the way that path goes, where he would've fallen in and that it is not a deep water area. People do not fall in off that path and drown. If Damien did go in.. something would almost certainly have had to turn up. Even if just his camera or a part of it, or his fleece.
Personally I have bounced between it being Nicky Mac's crew, and it being corrupt police.. with the possibility that this is all serving as a distraction, the reported witness sighting of Damien getting into a car on Baring road being him getting a lift from a stranger who was a predator or trafficker (this was a different witness to Shirley Barrett who said that was Nicky Mac's car).
By the way Danny Spencer worked in construction at the time, and I have read in a comment somewhere before now that he was working on a construction site at that time, so there was a suggestion that Damien was buried in the foundations of that building (Danny being part of Nicky Mac's crew, reportedly the one seen with Mac in the Bars Hill sighting).
A while back I paid a small fee to have access to IoW news archives for a week, read everything on Mac and his crew in the archives and there was a lot, you can literally chart Mac's descent into depravity and crime. Stealing from shops, stopped by cops and running off wearing a stupid wig, found hiding in an allotment with a shotgun discovered in the boot of his car, numerous court appointments, at least one of which where his lawyer said he was trying to turn his life around and be better. Oh and a long-term feud between Bunny Iles and the owners of an Indian restaurant, seemed to be a racist thing, the restaurant hired a guy who knew fighting styles who beat down on Iles. Interestingly Danny Spencer, much younger than Bobby Mac and the others (although drugs have aged him as we saw when Bronagh Munro confronted him), only early 20s in '96 I think, in the '80s Spencer and his brother were considered budding young talents in long distance running and football. That were in the news a bit. Sad how drugs destroyed him by the next decade. Also there was a Katy McNamara who appeared to have been a sister or cousin of Nicky's, and she was doing well in dancing, in the archives in the '80s a couple times, by the 21st century there was something about the "Katy McNamara Cup" dancing competition in IoW. So it appeared as though his relative was quite opposite to him in that she was very successful. Oh yeah and Nicky Mac's son served in Iraq or Afghanistan, 2003 I believe.. since then has worked as a chef, and more recently has sadly followed in his father's footsteps being named in the news in relation to cocaine and robbery charges. So yeah, quite a lot of interesting information in the archives, which sort of helps to build a picture of what these suspects were like and the kinds of lives they lead. I also managed to find his son or daughter's Facebook a while back and found a picture of Nicky Mac with the baby when he was a new dad, and he looked different. Healthier, he had hair and a moustache. So that again showed how drugs destroyed him.
Anyway I digress. The actual last ever sighting of Damien, the infamous missing CCTV, well that went missing because someone taped over it. It's gone and never coming back sadly. The thing about the police in this case.. they were either corrupt, or horrifyingly dysfunctional. They look corrupt, with the disappearing footage, sighting of a police car stopped outside Yorkies, talking to the carer after Damien left his car having just leaned all over it drunkenly, there have been reports that the car that stopped outside Yorkies dropped off a couple ladies, the disappearance of the camera, not even tracking down and interviewing the others on the Yorkies CCTV for years, ACTUAL YEARS. Danny Spencer getting confidential witness statements, reports that there may be people in the police force associated with Mac's crew (I read someone somewhere say Spencer has family in the police there, or did. Possibly his brother he was in the paper with as a youth for achievement in athletics? Is there any way to find out the names of people who've been in the police in Cowes?). So yeah, they look corrupt but I believe it's possible they were actually so dysfunctional, just operating so poorly, that they look corrupt. And some of the other things could be innocent events such as the ladies reportedly dropped off by the police.. some suggested they may have been sex workers, informants, mistresses.. maybe they were just two ladies getting a lift from the police. Maybe the car outside Yorkies all in all was just a coincidence.
Another thing is, going back to the notion of Damien having gone in the water.. well if the police were corrupt you'd think they's enthusiastically roll with that. "Great! We'll take that, yeah he drowned". In actuality they did have kind of this attitude ininitally, however by now they have admitted they are looking at it as a suspicious disappearance and a possible murder enquiry, bringing in suspects n' all. So the police are on-board with the foul play theory, and not trying to suppress it.. unless.. they had little choice because of how hard the Nettles family pursued from the off.. after a few years they had to concede and play like they were doing the right thing. That said even if it was police corruption I think that was then and while some from then are probably still in the police.. much of the individuals are different and if anything the police now might be more inclined to investigate their own predecessors.
I think it's a possible angle.. but I do primarily believe it was Nicky Mac's crew. His death is suspicious as well. As you can see in comments on his eulogy
Nicolas John McNamara people said he was starting to recover, get back to his old self.. the needle was in his back, possible but difficult.. maybe someone was worried he was going to talk. One of the guys in the house when Mac died has since committed suicide. I'm not sure but suspect aside from Mac and that guy it was just Shirley in the house; the last survivor. I don't suspect she was involved in Damien's death firsthand though, so don't see why she'd kill Mac if he were gonna' talk.
Again Mac's crew could all be a red herring though. Easy to blame local drug gang, maybe they use Damien as a threat to others, implying they did it for street cred but actually not involved.. Spencer getting the witness statements could be because witnesses were telling lies, not because they were telling the truth. Nicky Mac agitated by mentions of Damien because people thought it was him, not because it was him.
And I do think that the guys in the Yorkies CCTV are a little suspicious. They were military guys on training. I doubt they'd do that on purpose, however if it happened, I think they'd be the guys who could cover it up efficiently, especially if they had access to boats which I believe they did (could've weighted and dumped that night). They would be gone soon, and if they were questioned they'd be tough to crack... which they weren't even questioned until the next decade, so by that time they can all just play "it's been too long I don't remember that". They could've buried him not weighted and dumped, and again being military guys could do a good job of it.
Here is the full available video of the Yorkies CCTV
In the next post I will share my thoughts on this video. By the way it's been a while since I've gotten into this case so I realise I'm saying a lot of things without backing them up at this time, if I come across where I've read these things again I will post them here. If anyone wants to know where I found anything specifically I will see if I can find it again.
