It was very sad to find out this week that an old school friend of mine, Mark Blanco, died after falling 30ft from a balcony of a flat in London. Mark was a good guy, very intelligent and driven and obviously going places with his life.

He had gone round to visit the flat of Peter Roundhill. The Sun Newspaper reports that Roundhill is "Doherty's best friend and soulmate, a modern-day Fagin who is known to locals as a small-time drug dealer and user". Again, according to the Sun report, the flat has a reputation as a crack-den.

[Paul Roundhill's] flat, on the second floor of a mansion block, is an absolute tip. The internal walls have been torn down, the toilet is a disgusting shade of brown and the bath has not been used for washing for years. If the cooker has ever been used it has only been to boil up drugs.

Mark had gone there that night to try and persuade Pete Doherty to attend his upcoming play, "Accidental Death of an Anarchist", presumably to get more publicity for the production.

There were six other people in the flat - Roundhill, Doherty, Pete's minder Johnny Headlock, Roundhill's posh friend of similar age Annabel Heald, a girl called Kate - not Moss - plus another woman.

It doesn't seem to have gone very well. This is London newspaper report suggests the party-goers took an instant dislike to Mark:

According to friends, Doherty, his minder, known as Johnny Headlock, and Mr Roundhill started bullying Mr Blanco.

One friend said: "They wouldn't let him sit down and gave the only spare seat to the dog. Then they burnt his cap. Someone at the party, who was supposed to be a mate, punched him three times in the face before he was thrown out of the party".

I can believe this part of the story. Both Pete Doherty and Paul Roundhill come from middle class backgrounds, as did Mark. Mark had been to Cambridge university, was intellectual and talked 'posh'. When you are trying to fit into the drug culture, you try to hide these traits. Meeting someone like this becomes acutely embarrassing as they show you up for the fraud you are.

Peter Roundhill says that he kicked Mark out of the party and never left the flat but other reports say that Mark left the party with Roundhill, Pete Doherty, and Jonny Headlock. The Sun reports that a neighbour,

heard a massive struggle. Paul Roundhill was shouting and there was lots of swearing. There was a scream and the guy landed on the floor. Two girls went down to the street to try to revive him.

Mark was on life support for two days and then died, his £800 Tag Heuer watch and gold cufflinks are still reported missing.

There are a lot of parts in this story that don't add up from my point of view. Mark not a violent person in any sense, and would use his intellect to try and win. He would never start a fight and reports of him 'physically intimidating' Peter Doherty make no sense to me. Pete Doherty has been in and out of jail several times for drug and burglary convictions, it's hard to imagine a slim-build Cambridge intellectual worried him to that degree.

Mark was also not a person to be 'star-struck' - which made the following comment by Paul Roundhill seem so odd.

Roundhill said: "He was over-excited. He would not calm down. He had spoken to Pete and invited him to the play and he was excited that he had talked to someone so famous as Pete about that."

Maybe he was projecting his own feelings about Pete Doherty onto Mark there? Graduating from Cambridge or Oxford University, often means you mix with many famous and influential people along the way. You soon learn to take all this in your stride. Mark was clever enough to understand celebrity, and knew that by bringing Doherty to his new play he could increase the media interest. He wasn't turning up at that flat as a star-struck fan.

Paul Roundhill then goes on to suggest that Mark committed suicide, "I think he did not fall accidentally. In some ways it seems he was doing a creative act or making a creative statement in his mind, having been ejected, by jumping."

I have trouble believing that, as do many of his friends. People with severe vertigo don't tend to climb over balconies or commit suicide by jumping. Besides, Pete Doherty refusing to attend your play is hardly a reason to end it all.

A lot of this story doesn't add up. I sincerely hope that the police get to the bottom of this. They don't seem to be treating this very seriously at the moment, with one 'phone call interview' to Pete Doherty so far.

To cap everything off Pete Doherty seems to have stepped over Mark as he was dying and moved on to another party with Paul Roundhill, Jonny Headlock and other party-goers. He wrecked a hotel room that night and ran off (again) when the police were called.

Doherty also disrupted a wedding party, set off the fire alarm and started a fist fight in the bar before fleeing when police were called.

A hotel spokesman said: "He’s ripped out every wall light fitting, torn down the curtains, smashed every mirror, broken all the lamps, upturned all the furniture and wrecked the telephone and Internet connection sockets."

I'd like to join Mark's family in calling for a full police investigation to uncover the truth behind the death.

R.I.P. Mark

News Articles

Sick and inhumane Pete Doherty left my son to die
Flat owner is Pete's svengali
The damaged world of Doherty's circle
Party victim ‘did not jump’
Did he fall - or was he pushed? Questions surround Doherty and the party death
Party fall actor had clash with Doherty
Doherty Branded ‘Sick’ by Blanco’s Family
Doherty hides away in amid rumours of split Highlands with Kate
Doherty bouncer tells of last moments before actor’s death
Pete Doherty, The Big K, and what really happened at the Hotel in the Sky

Other Blogs

Accidental death of Mark Blanco - Andy Mayer

When a mutual friend got knocked down by a car, he was the guy who went to see her every night until she got better. He was a heck of showman and he deserves better than being a remembered as a walk-on part somebody else's pop career.

Mark's MySpace Page - Set up by Mark's family and friends