In another New Zealand ‘justice is stranger than fiction’ story, the Ministry of Justice has hired as its “Advisor, Official Correspondence” an admitted alcohol abuser and aspiring creative writer bent on winning by illegal means if necessary.
Or “Advisor, ‘Offical’ Correspondence” according to the Crown Ministry office holder, Alex Pickard (pictured).
Among Mr Pickard’s self-achievements – according to his LinkedIN page – he slept through 7 years of university before finally obtaining a bachelor’s degree in fine arts/film studies where he “did very much enjoy working as various crew jobs (sic) on fellow students (sic) sets.”
LinkedIn is a business and employment web-based networking service, which makes Mr Pickard’s doltish boasts all the more surprising. Pickard evidently considers promoting the criminal ends he will go to advance his career, how he spent his prolonged university years sleeping and recovering from hangovers, how his highlight was “working as various crew jobs on fellow students sets” and his consequent massacre of the written English language are his best employment selling points.
Judging by his New Zealand Ministry of Justice hiring, Pickard appears to be correct.
In a personal profile page replete with grammatical and spelling errors, Mr Pickard intones “I also did a lot of English papers which I loved.” But it is creative writing where Mr Pickard sees his future and expresses, “With a lust for creative writing and a knack for creating challenging works of art, I intend to get as much of said work out into the world as possible. And by hook or by crook I’ll do it.”
The Ministry of Justice refuses to release information on Mr Pickard’s taxpayer-funded salary on privacy grounds. Six months into the job Mr Pickard’s creative dismissals of official complaints made to the Ministry of Justice are the subject of at least one judicial review.
Pure New Zealand Ministry of Justice.
