Three days earlier, sitting on the front porch of a modest Rothesay Bay house, the purple toes on his swollen right leg poking through a crumpled track suit and sucking the occasional drag of a cigarette through teeth that testify to years of meth abuse, Glozier looks anything but a kingpin.
"I am getting it bad from all angles," he says, his tone more wryly reflective than self-pitying. "Going to jail, no money, cops after me, media after me, criminals after me. What else bad can come out of it? It is just like everything that can possibly go bad has gone bad."
BOXING SAVED ME
It would be stretching it in the extreme to say that Glozier - who was sentenced under the name David John Blaikie - is someone who had it all. But he was once the World Boxing Organisation's representative in New Zealand. His social media accounts picture him with Mike Tyson on a promotional tour to China, with his match-making duties also taking him to Moscow, Macau and throughout the South Pacific. One of the first people media called when news of his shooting leaked out was Peters, who was quizzed about his relationship with a man once often seen at his side.
Rubbing shoulders: Mike Tyson and Glozier in 2012. Photo / Facebook
"I've never had a minder or bodyguard, everybody knows that," Peters said. "I'm not denying I know John. I'm saddened the turn his life has taken. He was a pretty good boxer in his day and we shared an interest in boxing. I knew John quite well and we saw each other a lot - but as for being my bodyguard, that is nonsense."
A friend and former fight promoter who asked not to be identified as he did not want to be linked to Glozier's criminal activities described him as "a normal guy who sets fights up".
"He just had another life."
With its ability to drag no hopers and hard cases off the streets and out of jails and transform them into fit, healthy and often wealthy heroes, there is substance to the cliché that boxing saves lives. But not everyone gets saved. Some get dragged down. Glozier's drugs-related convictions, along with those of reigning national super middleweight champion Adrian Taihia (last week jailed for manufacturing P) and heavyweight slugger Richard Tutaki (stripped of a title fight with Sonny Bill Williams when the Herald revealed he was facing meth possession and driving charges in 2012), show that the sport has a problem.
From left, Khoder Nasser, Sonny Bill Williams, Sky CEO John Fellet, Richard Tutaki and Glozier in December 2011 at the announcement of the bout between Williams and Tutaki. Photo / Christine Cornege
"There is more criminality in boxing - drugs, violence, whatever - in boxing than croquet and tennis," says Glozier dryly. "I know how bad the whole scene is. I've seen lots other people fall by the wayside, fighters, people I know. It probably looks bad but, you know, meth is a problem across the board, not only in boxing."
The highly addictive, destructive drug is also, says his friend, at the root of Glozier's problems.
"I blame it entirely. He was a totally different guy when I met him. It is a f***ing terrible drug and once people get into it they are f***ed. It has totally raped him. Unfortunately when people get bad you only have to look at their smile and it is there for all to see. When I met John he was a good style of a guy; he was big, quite an imposing physique, a former boxer, he was charismatic. When I saw him the other day it was really sad.
"He has got plans of going into rehab and plans of getting clean. I hope he makes it."
Glozier refuses to blame meth for his life's downward spiral.
"Because bad things have happened it is easy to say if I hadn't [got involved with methamphetamine] it wouldn't have happened. It is not a good thing at all, I am not promoting it, it is, how do you put it... it hasn't been good."
Throwing people like him in jail isn't the answer to the country's meth problem, he says.
"To try to stamp out the meth they have raised the penalties but all they are really doing is putting lots of people in jail, and a lot of people who aren't really criminals are going to jail. I'm not saying I'm not a criminal, but there are a lot of people who just use and their mates ring up and say 'can you get us something'? Next thing someone is up for supply with a maximum sentence of life imprisonment when they have never been in trouble, they are just partying."
But Glozier has been in trouble. In 2001 he was sentenced to five years imprisonment for conspiring to import cocaine. At the time he was already serving a 34-month sentence for supplying methamphetamine. His priors also include receiving stolen property in 1996 and dishonesty offences in 1991. However, for the best part of decade after serving his time on the cocaine charge, Glozier steered clear of trouble - or at the least the police.
That period of relative calm ended in brutal fashion at around 10pm on November 13, 2012 when gunmen burst into his house.
Glozier is initially reluctant to talk about that night. "I got home invaded. I got shot. They didn't catch the guys," is all he will say the first time we meet. Eventually, months later, he elaborates.
"Someone sent them to see me. They came thinking that I had money or drugs. I didn't have anything. I didn't have any drugs and I didn't have any money. Then I started arguing with the guy. I wasn't very happy. I probably should have...I don't know what I should have done. I shouldn't have got angry. That might have been better."
Rumour at the time suggested Glozier's assailants were members of the King Cobras, a gang that boasts a reputation for drug dealing and extreme violence when defending its territory. Glozier says he doesn't know the identity of his attackers - "they were wearing balaclavas" - and doesn't believe the attacks were gang related.
"The guy that did it was probably in a gang. A lot of those guys in gangs are just bad low life criminals. They are opportunists and committing crimes all the time. They go and do all sorts of crime and if they get caught then it is 'it's gang-related'. But it's only gang related if the gang says, 'OK let's go and do this'."
THE CORPSE HANDLER
Whether or not they were sanctioned, the attacks on Glozier underscore the point that criminals are often also victims of crime.
The notion that the likes of Glozier can be viewed as a victim won't sit easily with many. Former kick boxing champion and fight sports commentator Mike Angove believes Glozier is simply an "idiot".
"By no means is John Glozier typical of a professional fighter or professional fight trainer," Angove says. "Those who fall down the way side like he has fallen and Adrian Taihia has fallen are the bottom two per cent. Taihia is actually a pretty damn nice guy who obviously made a poor choice under family duress - but it doesn't disguise the fact they were bloody idiots."
Others spoken to by the Herald have used a more colourful phrase to describe Glozier: corpse handler. It's an expression used to describe boxing matchmakers who specialise in finding opponents with no chance of beating a promising up and coming fighter.
Glozier laughs when asked if he's heard of the term - "yeah, like getting guys out of the cemetery" - but he denies out-rightly fixing fights.
"It is not like you say to the guy 'you are going to lose'. It is just that you know that he is going to lose because he is not good enough. I know the game and I know the right opponents. [Promoters] don't want guys who are going to fall over in the first round. They want guys who are going to go a few rounds and maybe look competitive. And they know I won't sneak someone in who is really good."
It's impossible to separate Glozier's transition from reputable match maker to 'corpse handler' from his drug problems, his former promoter friend says.
"Unfortunately from all the crime and the drugs he lost his boxing career. He was a substantial matchmaker, that's how he made his money. Then he started selling bums for fights, selling guys who would go and take losses, take falls. That, in conjunction with the drug charges, meant that he couldn't work any more."
SOMETIMES, IT'S JUST EASIER
The bag of white powder police discovered in Glozier's kitchen wasn't methamphetamine. He spent weeks in prison on remand before testing confirmed what he had claimed all along. The police, though, clearly had good reasons for their suspicions, as their wire tap would reveal. "There was a guy down the South Island that I knew and a girl that I knew," says Glozier. "She was good looking and in that scene. She had managed to get a guy who manufactured [methamphetamine] to give it to her on credit. She said, 'How can I make money it?'
"I rang my mate up - he was under surveillance - and basically told her to go down and see him. I got brought into it as the person who was setting it up. The reality was that she was in the scene, she was the one who got it and she went down there with it. Because I'd rung him up and he was under surveillance it was like I'd sent her down there.
"I never got caught with any drugs. When they raided my house I didn't have any drugs on me. They didn't find any drugs.
"Sometimes pleading guilty is not because you are guilty it is because the overall picture is a lot easier. If you fight it and lose you can get a longer sentence."
THE REAL MASTERMIND
Put up for adoption at birth, Glozier was taken in by a fisherman and his wife and raised in Bluff and Tauranga as David John Blaikie. A stable upbringing ended when his adopted father drowned taking a boat north following the end of the southern tuna season. A few years after the boat hit a sandbar at night off 90 mile beach and sank, a teenaged Glozier headed to Auckland where he reconnected with his birth father, respected boxing official Laurie Glozier.
Boxing would become his life. He would be introduced as Laurie's son and took his name.
In 1986 Glozier was convicted for possessing a cannabis plant. In 1989, according to his court file, he used meth for the first time. A decade later police using a wire tap listened in as Glozier and Lithuanian national Rokas Karpavicius arranged a meeting outside a Point Chevalier cafe. They busted Glozier with two bags of meth weighing 56.2 grams, valued at between $4000 - $8000.
Glozier outside Auckland District Court in 2000. Photo / New Zealand Herald
That deal was small beer compared to a bungled plan to import $800,000 worth of cocaine from Canada that Glozier, Karpavicius and two accomplices would attempt. Glozier was the middle man, taking $US100,000 from Karpavicius and giving it to a courier who, with the help of Canadian national Michael Pearson, was to buy the drugs from Canadian suppliers.
The plan fell apart spectacularly when the courier got drunk at a casino and gambled away the money. It had been doomed to fail anyway, as the ultimate purchaser was an undercover cop.
All four were men were charged but when the dust settled only Glozier, who had travelled to Canada to try to retrieve the remaining money, was convicted. The courier and Pearson were cleared by a jury (although Pearson was sentenced to six years for importing ecstasy) while Karpavicius fled oversees while on bail. Linked to LSD and ecstasy importations into New Zealand and Australia, Karpavicius was eventually apprehended in Latvia and returned to New Zealand in 2012.
A judge who sentenced him to six years jail on drug importation and money laundering charges described Karpavicius as "the guiding force and mastermind" of a money laundering operation that operated on "a very large scale,".
Pictures attending news reports of Karpavicius' activities show him lounging on yachts with attractive women. Glozier laughs when asked if he ever made large amounts of money from his crimes.
"No I didn't get rich. I wasn't selling. There are people out there that that is their whole thing. They are drug dealers. I know people like that. I might have used it and [moved] bits here and there but it wasn't like my life was like I am a drug dealer and I am just dealing drugs to make money. It's probably bad associations. I knew lots of people."
Almost 15 years after they met in carpark over two small bags of meth, Glozier and Karpavicius are both back in jail. Despite having upset someone badly enough to get shot, Glozier doesn't believe he has too much to fear inside.
"No because I haven't done anything too bad to anybody. It is not like it was retaliation or revenge or anything like that. There are always worries. It is an intimidating place. It is a bit of law of the jungle.
"I have to just deal with it and try to... get some good out of it. It is going to be hard but life goes on. I just have to get through it and start again."
With time already served taken into account, Glozier will likely serve at least a year of his 40 month sentence behind bars. He will have time to reflect on how he found history repeating over a decade after his first lag.
"It is hard to look back. I have met a lot of bad people, I have met a lot of good people. I just think maybe, you know, time has gone quickly. Maybe I was slow to grow up. I realise now I am an old man, but I don't feel it. The years have just gone past and I have lived life like I am 28, 30, then suddenly I am 50. I don't know, I never sort of had responsibilities to settle down and change my lifestyle. It is never too late but time goes so quick."
TIME FOR CHANGE
About four years ago Glozier reconnected with his daughter who, like him, was adopted out. He has a grand daughter and he hopes one day to introduce to his 81-year-old mother. He wants, he says, to turn things around when he comes out, to teach others not to follow in his footsteps.
"I really think he is the sort of guy people could learn from," says his ex-promoter friend. "He is an articulate, intelligent guy. Believe it or not he is a good guy and he actually stops people getting in trouble. He is a lovely guy, but he is a contradiction. He thinks people like him are pieces are shit. He doesn't celebrate it. He's not a guy that has tattoos and tries to glorify it. He is a good person. But these stories, they are all too omnipresent in Auckland unfortunately.
"As a mate I really want to help him when he gets out. I really want him to go into rehab. I want him to change. I want him to be honest and if he can do that I am going to help him. There are people out there who will support him. But is a bad drug. You don't see many people walk away from it."
John Glozier didn't want this story written. He wanted to go quietly to prison and serve his time. "It's not much of a story," he said when first approached by the Herald. After hours spent on his porch talking boxing and shooting the breeze he consented to be interviewed, figuring he might as well have some input into a story that was going to be written regardless.
"I know you have to inflict some pain on me now," are his parting words after we shake hands.
He also knows, deep down, that most of the pain he has suffered has been self-inflicted.
