Stabbed Hutt man a 'gentle guy'

Reuters

DARK SIDE: A Thai tourist police officer watches late night revellers in Pattaya. New Zealander Robert Hollick was stabbed to death in the resort town, according to a local media report.

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An Upper Hutt man stabbed to death in a bar in Thailand was a "teddy bear" with a "massive heart", one of his friends says.

English-language Thailand news website The Nation said yesterday police had charged Swedish man Andreas Ringvall, 40, with murdering Robert E Hollick, 43, from New Zealand.

Hollick was stabbed three times in his neck.
Mick Geurts, a friend of Hollick's who was with him in Thailand a week ago, said the news was devastating.

"I was only in Pattaya a week earlier sitting with my good friend Rob having a beer. A guy with a massive heart that would do anything for a friend."

Geurts said he thought it was an "unprovoked attack".

"Rob is a gentle guy and has never been violent to anybody. He is known by his friends as a big teddy bear.

"Nobody deserves to go like that."

Geurts said Hollick was a harmless guy in the "wrong place at the wrong time", and he was sorry he left Thailand early.

Following the early morning attack, Ringvall and his Thai girlfriend, Dao Pholutsa, 26, were captured by local people and were handed over to police, the report in The Nation said.

Mual Samat, 34, a taxi motorcyclist, told police Ringvall had a quarrel with Hollick after Dao played with Hollick's pet dog inside a bar, the Nation reported.

Samat said after Ringvall sent his girlfriend back to his room, he returned to the bar and attacked Hollick with a knife.

Hollick was the owner of recruitment company Top Dog Personnel in Perth.

Staff member Vanessa Nunn said Hollick set up the company about seven years ago. It specialised in finding earthmoving workers for West Australia's mining and civil construction industries.

Hollick had been semi-retired and living in Pattaya for some time, she said.

She heard about Hollick's death from one of his friends in Thailand who phoned to say he had died.

- © Fairfax NZ News