A Price to Pay

by Paul Gitsham

  ‘The camera was broken that morning, and the video footage deleted. Before we got there.’

  Warren was irritated by the delay to what could be crucial evidence, and he ordered Richardson to light a fire under IT and get the deleted footage recovered as a priority – he figured they owed them a favour now.

  In the meantime, it was clear that the two sergeants had more to show him.

  ‘I finally got the call logs and cell-tower positioning data back from Silvija Wilson’s work phone. I really wish criminals would stick with the big four mobile phone providers; it’s taken ages to get an answer from that dinky little network,’ said Pymm.

  ‘Well you’ve got it now,’ soothed Warren. ‘What’ve you found?’

  ‘It’s early days, but I’ve managed to unpack some of the data.’

  Warren moved around to see Pymm’s screen.

  ‘What am I looking at?’

  ‘This spreadsheet shows the calls to and from that phone for the last twelve months.’

  ‘OK.’

  Pymm pointed to a series of entries highlighted in yellow. ‘I haven’t identified every number yet, but these are the calls that she received from Malina that afternoon.’

  Both the twelve-minute call immediately after the killing, and the two-minute call whilst Malina fiddled with the security system, were listed.

  ‘OK, that confirms that we have the correct phone data.’

  ‘Well there’s a bit more. These next entries take place over the next two hours, before Malina called her aunt on her personal mobile phone to let her know what happened.

  There must have been over a dozen calls, to multiple numbers. Some lasted seconds, others several minutes.

  ‘Is this a normal level of traffic for this phone?’ asked Warren. There was no point getting excited over her day-to-day business calls.

  ‘No. This number usually only makes or receives a handful of calls a week, mostly from the same half-dozen numbers. I took a quick look at her personal mobile phone, and she receives and makes many calls each day, from lots of different numbers. That’s the phone that Malina and Biljana also usually call. I haven’t even started properly identifying the callers yet, but it looks to me as though the unlisted number is a private line that only a few people know about, and she actually conducts most of her business on her personal phone.’

  Warren contemplated what he saw on the screen. Two phones, one of them public, one of them clearly private, and she had obviously taken some measures to keep the private phone unlinked to her. Why? Her nieces had stored the numbers on their phones under ‘Aunty – job’, implying that it was to do with her work, and that had been the number that Malina had immediately rung when the murder took place.

  Warren’s gut was telling him that this phone was the key to unravelling what had happened that afternoon.

  ‘We’ve also tracked Silvija Wilson’s movements on the day of the murder,’ said Richardson.

  ‘First of all, the cell-tower location data shows that Silvija Wilson’s unlisted work phone and her personal phone always move in tandem,’ said Pymm.

  ‘Which proves that the unlisted phone is definitely hers,’ said Richardson.

  ‘Good, that should stop her playing silly buggers and denying the work phone belongs to her,’ said Warren.

  ‘It looks as though her day started exactly as she said it did,’ continued Pymm, pointing to one of her screens. A large map of Middlesbury and the surrounding villages was covered in red dots, joined by dotted lines. Floating textboxes showed the timestamps.

  ‘She was at home until just after 7.50 that morning. She sent a text message to Malina, then travelled – presumably by vehicle judging by the speed – to the girls’ flat. It took her about eight minutes. She spent just under five minutes there, before leaving. Both of the girls’ mobiles moved with her.’

  ‘Picking them up for work,’ interpreted Warren.

  ‘Exactly. All three mobiles arrived at the massage parlour at 8.25. The traffic would have been building up with the school run at that time.’

  That fitted with the sisters’ account that they arrived at work at about 8.30.

  ‘The girls’ mobiles stayed at the massage parlour until they left after being interviewed following the murder. They then returned home at 17.30 with their aunt. They stayed there until they were picked up later for their formal interview.’

  ‘OK.’ He looked at the two women. ‘Don’t keep me hanging – what are you not telling me?’

  ‘Look at Silvija Wilson’s two phones.’

  Warren squinted at the timeline.

  ‘The car’s movements are confirmed by ANPR cameras along the route,’ said Richardson.

  ‘Bloody hell.’

  ‘And look at the call logs for her two phones,’ said Pymm, pointing to a second screen.

  Warren switched his gaze. ‘Bloody hell,’ he repeated. ‘I’ll get DSI Grayson to authorize search teams along that route. Mags, get a team down there to seize any CCTV.’

  He turned, about to head towards Grayson’s office.

  ‘Oh, just one more thing that I thought you might be interested in.’

  Warren stopped. He knew that tone of voice. ‘You’re worse than bloody Columbo,’ he muttered.

  ‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’ Pymm pointed to another highlighted entry. ‘This number called her “job” phone about once a week. She occasionally called it. Does the number look familiar?’

  Warren squinted at the number, before standing up sharply.

  ‘Find Silvija Wilson and arrest her.’

  Chapter 28

  Unsurprisingly, Silvija Wilson’s first action the moment that she was arrested at the small house she had shared with her late husband, was to insist upon a lawyer. She angrily rebuffed the offer of a translator.

  Search teams moved into her property the moment she was taken into custody.

  In the hours between Richardson and Pymm’s piecing together of her movements on the day of the murder, the pace of the team had increased even more, with dozens more officers racing up the A1 from Welwyn to assist in the searches along her route. Mags Richardson was coordinating the retrieval of yet more CCTV evidence and David Hutchinson was organizing more house-to-house inquiries.

  The time pressure was all the more acute with the initial extension of the two masseuses’ detention fast approaching its end. He would have to prepare a request for the local magistrate to detain them longer. It was almost certain that the two sisters would be charged, rather than released, but Warren knew from experience that when that happened the dynamics of the situation would change dramatically. He really couldn’t predict the effect that charging Malina and Biljana would have on the three women; would the sudden dawning reality of their true situation cause the two sisters to become more cooperative, or would they shut down and refuse to answer any more questions? What effect would it have on their aunt?

  Warren started Silvija’s interview by going over the sequence of events that the two masseuses had given when first questioned, and then stuck to, despite the evidence to the contrary. Silvija Wilson repeated precisely what she had said before – there was no way that she could know how her nieces’ stories had started to unravel.

  Again, she denied any relationship with Stevie Cullen, and claimed that the first she had known of the attack was Malina’s call to her personal mobile phone at 15.35.

  Warren was pleased. It was always nice to start an interview with a few easily provable deceptions that he could use later. His casual inquiry at the start of the interview whether the number of Wilson’s personal phone was correct and if she owned any other mobile phones that they could contact her on if necessary was met with a denial. The perfect place to start, he decided.

  ‘Do you recognize this mobile phone number, Mrs Wilson?’

  He recited the number of her unlisted work phone.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  An interesting response. He could see the calculation i
n her eyes, and knew exactly what her defence would be.

  ‘It’s just that it’s unlisted and we can’t identify it.’

  She shrugged.

  ‘You see, I think that this is your phone.’

  Wilson said nothing. He could see in her eyes that she was frantically trying to work out whether he was guessing that it was hers, or if he knew for sure.

  ‘I’ll ask again, do you have access to another phone, Mrs Wilson?’

  She swallowed. ‘I have another phone that I occasionally use for business.’ She brightened slightly. ‘I use it so rarely that I forgot about it and didn’t recognize its number.’

  Her relief as she was able to use her defence was short-lived.

  ‘Did you have it with you on the day of the murder, Mrs Wilson? Did your nieces try to contact you on it that day?’

  She licked her lips. ‘I don’t think so.’

  Her response was textbook. Caught in a potential lie that could have serious repercussions, she was now trying to row back slightly from her original position and hoping not to commit herself further.

  ‘According to the phone’s call log, there were two incoming calls from Malina’s phone.’

  ‘She must have called that number by mistake. I didn’t have the phone with me, so I didn’t pick up.’

  ‘You left the phone at home?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It seems a bit strange for you not to carry your business phone on a workday.’

  ‘I don’t get many calls on it, and I only carry a small handbag. I just check it for messages when I get home in the evening.’

  A jury would probably raise an eyebrow at her definition of a ‘small handbag’; Warren could probably pack enough for a long weekend away in the bag that she had been carrying when she’d arrived at the crime scene.

  ‘The calls were rather lengthy. The first lasted twelve minutes, the second over two minutes.’

  She paused. ‘They must have left a voicemail. I haven’t checked that phone since the day of the attack.’

  Warren nodded understandingly. ‘But you did have your personal mobile phone with you?’

  ‘Yes, I always carry that with me.’

  Warren placed a stapled pile of paper in front of Wilson.

  ‘The column of numbers on the left are the coordinates of your personal mobile phone from the twenty-four hours beginning at one minute past midnight on the day of the murder to midnight that night.’ He paused. ‘The column on the right shows the coordinates of your business phone at the same time. As you can see, the coordinates at each time point are identical.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’ It was the weak denial of a person backed into a corner. Warren could see that she clearly did understand. Her solicitor undoubtedly understood.

  ‘It shows that wherever your personal phone was, your business phone was within a few metres, even when you left the house. You were carrying them both that day.’

  She swallowed. When that didn’t work, she took a gulp of water. Her tongue still sounded thick when she spoke again.

  ‘I must have been mistaken. Maybe I picked it up by accident and put it in the bottom of my bag without thinking that morning? It’s always so busy first thing, and the girls are never ready on time, and I had a million things to do. I had to go to the bank …’ Warren let her ramble on.

  ‘It’s an easy mistake to make,’ he said, ‘but the phone would normally be at home?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘That’s strange. I don’t know if you are aware, but mobile phone companies are obliged by law to keep data such as this for twelve months, just in case we request it. My officer in the case loves stats, and she reckons that over the past year, your two phones have been close enough to one another to return the same coordinates to the cell tower for 98.4 per cent of that time. I’d say that you routinely carry your two phones.’

  Even under her thick make-up, Wilson was now visibly grey.

  ‘Yet you say that you never spoke to either of your nieces on that phone, that day. You must have known that they were calling you.’

  ‘It was in my bag on silent. They must have left voicemails.’

  ‘We have been unable to find any voicemail recordings from that day.’

  ‘Maybe they weren’t saved?’ Wilson’s tone was desperate. It was getting painful; beside him, Moray Ruskin was watching with fascination as Wilson’s story collapsed around her. And they hadn’t even got to the good stuff yet.

  ‘The reason there are no voicemails, is because the phone was answered. The call log tells us that the phone was picked up both times. What were you and Malina talking about when she called you? Twice?’

  It had been a long time coming, but Wilson’s next response was no surprise. She looked over at her solicitor, who said nothing.

  ‘No comment.’

  ‘Come on, Silvija, what was so important that your niece phoned you twice that day?’

  ‘No comment.’

  Warren was keen to stop her falling into a no-commenting cycle. He decided to see if he could lay the groundwork for catching her in another lie later.

  ‘According to your niece’s account of events, Mr Cullen was killed a little after one-thirty. Is that correct?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The first call made to your phone by Malina was at twelve minutes past one, for twelve minutes. Presumably, Mr Cullen was having his massage at that point?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So, what were you speaking to Malina about when her sister was with Mr Cullen?’

  Warren had given her a possible way out. Would she take it, or would she go back to no commenting again?

  Wilson sighed. ‘It’s all a little awkward. Malina is unhappy in England, but she doesn’t want to leave her sister.’ Wilson paused. ‘She’ll deny it of course if you ask her and I’d rather you didn’t mention it to them – especially Billy, she’d be very upset.’

  Warren had to give her marks for effort. Wilson had even tried to stop him from asking the two sisters questions that they might contradict her on.

  ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘and what about the second call?’

  ‘More of the same.’

  He nodded. ‘That conversation must have taken place just as Mr Cullen was being murdered.’

  ‘Um, I guess so.’

  ‘Did you hear anything in the background that could help us?’

  She thought for a moment. ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘According to the call log, the call was ended by Malina. Do you know why?’

  ‘No.’ Wilson paused. ‘She just said she had to go.’

  Warren said nothing, waiting to see if Wilson would fill the silence.

  ‘Maybe she heard Billy finishing the massage and going upstairs?’ she said eventually. ‘She wouldn’t want her sister to overhear the call.’

  ‘Yes, that makes sense,’ said Warren. ‘Well you’ve been really helpful, Mrs Wilson. You’ve cleared up a lot of discrepancies.’

  Wilson relaxed.

  Her solicitor didn’t.

  ‘Are we done now? Are the girls free to go?’

  ‘Not just yet, there are just a few more things I’d like your help with.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Do you know who this mobile phone belongs to?’

  Wilson squinted at the number. She swallowed. ‘No, I don’t recognize it.’

  ‘It’s an unlisted number from your business phone’s call log. You ring it regularly, and it also calls you on a regular basis.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know who it belongs to.’ She shrugged and managed a half-smile. ‘Who knows people’s phone numbers these days? Can you not trace it?’

  ‘It’s an unregistered pay-as-you-go phone.’

  ‘Maybe if you tell me when it called, I could go home and look at my diary and perhaps work it out who it belongs to?’ she said hopefully.

  ‘That won’t be necessary; we’ve already done that. Mrs Wilson, at the beginning of the inter
view you said that you had no relationship with Mr Cullen. Are you still saying that’s the case?’

  Wilson’s shoulders slumped.

  ‘We’ve traced this number to Mr Cullen’s own unlisted business phone. Tell me, Mrs Wilson, how did you know the man who would later be murdered in your massage parlour, and why did you lie about knowing him?’

  Silvija Wilson’s solicitor requested a break. Warren agreed – it had been an intense experience on his side of the table also. It was getting late in the evening, and he decided to finish for the night. Wilson was on the back foot. A sleepless night staring at the ceiling of a prison cell often changed a person’s perspective. Besides which, he wanted to see what else his team could find to bring to her next interview.

  True to form, Shaun Grimshaw was the first to comment on how well the interview had gone, miming someone tying a noose around their neck.

  ‘Cracking work, Boss. You’ve given her so much rope, she could hang herself twice. I hope you were taking notes, Moray. She must have ticked every box on the “signs someone is lying” form.’

  Warren thanked him politely. Despite the success of the interview so far, it was far from in the bag. He also felt slightly sad. They still didn’t know why Stevie Cullen had been killed, or by who. His feeling was that Silvija Wilson was desperately trying to protect her two young nieces, who she clearly loved dearly.

  He took a long slurp of the coffee that Grimshaw had made him. He grimaced at the bitter taste; Grimshaw obviously thought he needed the caffeine boost and been extra generous with the coffee powder.

  ‘I plan on resuming tomorrow morning. Is there anything else that I can hit her with?’

  ‘I’ve got some financials back from Silvija Wilson’s personal account,’ said Pymm. ‘I’ve only skimmed them so far, but it makes interesting reading. I have a team ploughing through her mobile phone records, putting names to numbers. I expect to have a list first thing tomorrow.’

  ‘CCTV is coming in from the route that she took that day. It’s being processed as a priority,’ said Richardson. ‘I think we’ll be able to join the dots by tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Search teams are out and about along the route,’ said Hutchinson. ‘It’s dark now, so they’re a bit restricted. I’ll keep you posted.’