“Good work Steven. We know those Captains well and your assessment of them is spot on. Don’t worry about it. You did the right thing. When we are finished here we will go back to the station and we will make an official OB (Occurrence Book) entry about the incident. Always remember that Steven – always cover your own ass with an OB entry. It’s a very powerful tool” said Night.
Thirty minutes later and the mortuary van finally arrived. The driver and his crew were in white overalls and blue gumboots. They were both short and skinny and looked malnourished. Neither were in the disposition for conversation and rebuffed any attempt by Dlamini to make any formal greetings or light conversation to try and lighten the mood while loading the bodies. Unusually the morgue workers refused any help in loading the two cadavers into their van, which was actually just a modified pick-up truck with a cell attached to the back.
The assistant’s breath reeked of alcohol and his eyes were slightly hazed over. They set to work straightening the bodies from the rigor mortis in a very uncouth and matter of fact way – the assistant pulled out a rubber mallet and hammered it against bent arms and legs in order to straighten them. Night was happy to see this finally have an effect on the young Dlamini who ran out of the room in sickness at the sight. Night was beginning to worry that Dlamini was too cold, too unaffected by the dead human beings, until now.
Night had dispatched Shaka and Stanislov to the station to arrange for the trauma counsellors to inform the next of kin and to let them know that the bodies of their loved ones would be taken to the state morgue where they could be collected for burial. Night and Dlamini saw off the mortuary van. Night gave his Controller a full report back over the radio on the situation and returned Control of room 201 to the owner of the hotel.
“So now what Sergeant?” asked Ri Ren.
“Business as usual Andy.”
“Is that it? Don’t you need the room for further investigation, don’t we need to seal it for you or is that it, you are just going to leave, like that?”
“Yes, we are going to leave, like that. Fingerprints in the room have been taken. Photographs of the scene have been taken. Forensic evidence has been gathered. A formal inquiry has been opened. A case has been registered at the Norwood Police Station and investigations are on-going. You will find that the detective will be back to take statements from you and all the workers on duty last night. The case will be investigated. For now though you can have the room back and unless the detective told you otherwise you can rent it out.”
“Fuck me that’s insane. You can’t rent the room out now after that, he can’t boss, hey?” asked Dlamini
“No I won’t. Well I can’t. The lock is broken. Remember Sergeant you broke it?”
“Yeah it was a fine breach even if I do say so myself. You can claim back the money needed to fix the door from the State you know. Just get it fixed, get a receipt and submit a claim along with a statement and case number. It will only take a year or so to be processed but you can do it if you want.”
“Yeah okay, thank you Sergeant. Is that it then, are you finished here?” asked Ri Ren AKA Andy.
“Yes as a matter of fact we are. Good bye Andy, we’ll see you soon, I’m sure.”
Constables Stanislov and Shaka arrived a few minutes later and collected Night and Dlamini who were waiting outside the hotel. November Whisky 50 still had a good few hours of duty left to complete their 12 hour shift.
“C’mon guys let’s get some action! It’s time to ride the lightning!” said an excited Student Constable.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The young Dlamini didn’t have to wait long for his action. The police radio came noisily alive and the policemen’s bingo words were uttered by the Controller. “Any November Whisky vehicle for a 44 Alpha in Sydenham come in for Control?”
To Dlamini’s great dissatisfaction Night picked up the radio mike but did not respond to the Alpha call. Dlamini demanded to know why they were not responding but was quickly told to be still by the Former Russian Special Forces soldier sitting next to him in the back seat. After a few seconds, that seemed an eternity to Steven Dlamini, another November Whisky vehicle did respond.
“Send for November Whisky 11 Control we are close by, in Linksfield.”
The radio Controller explained that there was a 10111 caller reporting that a man was being stabbed to death in Third Avenue at a house party. November Whisky 11 was en route. Sergeant Night then informed the radio Controller and his Norwood colleagues that they would provide back-up but were relatively far away and would be on scene in ten minutes.
Night then educated Dlamini as to the reason he didn’t immediately respond to the call.
“Control asks for a vehicle to respond to the call instead of nominating a unit because he doesn’t know where we all are or what we are doing at the time of the incident. Now because we are at the other end of our jurisdiction, Melrose North, it will take us a relatively long time to reach the call. So I gave other vehicles who may have been better situated to respond, a chance to answer the call. Get it?”
“No boss I don’t, why don’t we just reply anyway and then all of us can respond.”
“Because not all of us then need to drive at breakneck speeds to get to the call and stop whatever it is we may have been doing and you never know what November Whisky 11 was doing. Judging by the amount of time they took to answer the call they may have been searching a suspicious person or vehicle and they only responded because none of the other November Whisky vehicles, including us, did. Now they are first responders and we can travel at a safer speed to get there.”
It seemed though that nobody told Shaka about travelling at a safer speed. He covered half the distance to the 44 alpha call in the powerful Beast in just under three minutes, travelling through busy intersections bringing traffic to a standstill with blue lights on and sirens blazing. Twice he cut through busy service stations to avoid the traffic lights altogether, barely missing a couple of petrol attendants.
They were driving down a stretch of Louis Botha Avenue and were gaining speed. Dlamini glanced over the giant’s shoulder and saw the speedometer needle hovering at 170 kilometres per hour, in a 60 kilometre zone, while weaving in an out of heavy traffic missing the other vehicles by mere inches. Dlamini was shitting himself. Night was enjoying his friend’s driving skills and Stanislov looked and sounded annoyed.
“Do you really have to drive that fast Zulu my friend? As our esteemed Sergeant has told the young Dlamini here we are not the first responders after all” said Stanislov.
“Ja Stani my brother but it’s only November Whisky 11 responding to the murder in progress and the crew is female, and the driver is a very fragile little guy. They may need our help. And besides they haven’t even broken on scene yet so we may just get there first” said Constable Shaka with a massive smile and a wink of his eye directed into the rear view mirror at the Russian behind him.
Five minutes later and the Beast pulled up outside the Third Avenue house in Sydenham. There was no sign of November Whisky 11.
“Control November Whisky 50, break 44 Alpha, Sydenham” said Sergeant Night.
The Black Bastards were immediately greeted outside the house by a hysterical young man. He explained that his boyfriend had been stabbed by the owner of the house. Sergeant Night calmed him and instructed Dlamini to stay with the sobbing young lover in the police vehicle. The Black Bastards tactically entered the house with Night taking the lead with the shotgun and Stanislov taking up the rear with the assault rifle. They cleared the house and made their way through a back door and onto a garden patio with a braai area and pool.
The policemen found a couple sitting on some deck chairs calmly eating some boerewors rolls. Three young ladies were huddled around what looked like a music DJ and his musical mixing deck. Yet there was no music playing. And there was a trail of blood leading to an outside garden flat at the back of the property some distance away. The five guests and a DJ of what looked as t
hough was earlier a much bigger party, just stared at the police officers and said nothing.
“Stani, Zulu, check the garden flat and I will ask these good people what is going on here.”
The two Constables went towards the cottage and Night asked the man and woman who sat eating what had happened. He immediately pinged the man. He was in his late forties. He wore blue sandals, white shorts and a blue vest. He had scars on his face and had a half beard. He looked unconcerned and partly drunk. He ignored the Sergeant’s question and continued eating. Michael Night’s intuition told him that this man was no good. Night’s heart slowed and his vision focused in on the eating man. He felt the cold steel of his shotgun between both hands and he felt his trigger finger itch. He instinctively wanted to put this man down.
Night’s radio came to life. It was Stanislov from the garden house. “Control, November Whisky 50.”
“Send November Whisky 50.”
“Ja Control. The 44 Alpha is a positive. I have one Charlie Mike down. Please send an ambulance and please get our friends in the mortuary van ready -The ambo probably won’t help much. And I’ll need everybody else, another full house please Control.”
“Roger that November Whisky 50.”
Constable Shaka had returned to Night’s side and explained that they found a young male dead in the bathroom of the flat. November Whisky 11 had arrived and were outside with Student Constable Dlamini securing the perimeter of the property.
“There is blood everywhere Mike, the walls, the roof, the floor, it’s a bad one hey. I don’t know why Stani called for an ambo.”
Shaka read his friend’s sentiment and also looked at the eating gent. He too did not enjoy the man’s energy and unconsciously put his hand on his 9MM, which he had holstered after finding the victim. The woman sitting next to the man broke her silence and started to speak.
“That boy is dead in there because he wanted to fuck me!” she said. She was stout and wearing tight brown shorts and had a loose fitting white t-shirt on and wore no bra. Her breasts sagged over her fat stomach and she had a pasty film of white cream across her unpleasant face.
“You see, my hubby here, Ronald he killed him because he wanted to steal me away and fuck me all for himself.”
“Is this true Ronald, did you kill the man in there?” asked Night calmly.
Ronald took his time to answer the question. His eyes were moving up and down the length of the police officer’s figures, seemingly gauging their strength and experience.
“Ja! I did. He was a little faggot and he was… hitting on my wife.”
“So he was a faggot and flirting with a woman, your woman, so you killed him.”
“Ja but I was only going to give him a beating, you know to discipline the shit but then he hit me see, with this…” Ronald put his hand under his chair to grab something hidden behind a cooler box.
“Hands! Hands! Let me see your hands Motherfucker!” shouted Night. Shaka had drawn his nine and it was pointed at Ronald’s head along with Night’s shotgun. Night racked a round into the chamber of his 12 gauge, even though it was already loaded – an old policeman’s trick, done for effect. And the effect was very persuasive. Ronald very quickly removed his hand from under his chair and placed both of them high in the air above his head. “Don’t worry officers I won’t fuck with you. I know you will kill me, if you get the chance.”
Night lowered his weapon and moved in. He expertly handcuffed Ronald and placed him under arrest while Shaka and Stanislov provided cover. Through further investigation and interviewing everyone at the party Night found out the full story of what had happened that day. Ronald was the owner of the property and held the party in celebration of his wife Keisha’s, 40th birthday. The three young ladies were his daughters. And the young man was indeed the DJ for the festivity and the boyfriend of the eldest daughter. Everybody gave corroborating stories about what had happened, unconcerned that father of three and husband would go to jail for murder. Night suspected they were glad to be rid of him. And Ronald was no stranger to prison.
The gay couple had been invited to the party by the DJ. Their names were Gary and Tom. The merrymaking started well and everyone was enjoying themselves. Until too much alcohol had flowed. The young gay couple started to tease Ronald’s wife. They remarked on how large and flaccid her breasts were. Keisha took offence at this and stormed off to tell her husband who she found in their bedroom with a young girl, a friend of the youngest daughter, aged 14.
This enraged her and they had a loud domestic in their room, while the young girl scurried out and ran home. Tom and Gary found this hilarious but Tom stopped laughing when Ronald charged out of the house and floored him with a right hook to the face and a few kicks to the head for good measure. Gary the quieter and more timid of the two ran and hid in the bathroom. A couple of hours passed and the guests forgot about what had happened. Except Gary who continued to drink at a ferocious rate and his rage, fuelled by the spirits, built up inside of him until he could contain his emotions no more. When most of the party goers had left the house Gary confronted Ronald about beating up his lover, who had been doing a line of coke in the bathroom at the time of confrontation. Ronald actually apologised and admitted that he thought their jokes were funny as his wife was actually a fat bitch. Perhaps Gary saw this as a weakness and so struck Ronald across the face with the ceramic cup that held his brandy and coke. Ronald did not like that one iota. He stood up and ran after Gary who vaulted across the garden, screaming at the top of his lungs, into the garden flat and into its bathroom where he barricaded himself in. This move proved fatal for Gary as it gave Ronald the time he needed to go into the main house and fetch his favoured butcher’s knife from the kitchen. He then returned to the bathroom door and methodically started to kick it down. This was when Tom called 10111 and reported the murder in progress.
Eventually Ronald broke the door down and Gary attempted to jump past his attacker and escape. He failed. Ronald raised the butcher’s knife high into the air and brought it down with great force into the top of Gary’s left shoulder, slicing his clavicle.
Ronald removed the knife and calmly walked away and took a plate of food for himself from the bar. Ronald was a stone cold killer and knew what he was doing. He effectively executed Gary by stabbing him in this way. Once the clavicle is cut in this technique and the knife removed the victim will usually bleed to death very quickly, within minutes. Even the responding paramedics remarked that had they got there after only a couple of minutes there was not much they could have done. Gary was a dead man the moment Ronald chose his weapon. Gary’s last few moments on earth were spent stumbling around the garden flat aimlessly seeking sanctuary, painting the walls and roof red with his blood which was evacuating from his body at an incredible rate, spraying a couple of metres into the air.
The crew of November Whisky 50 spent another four hours at the house in Third Avenue in Sydenham going through the same protocol as earlier in the day which effectively ended Dlamini’s first diurnal of training. Night and Shaka went to the station to charge Ronald with murder, they also added a secondary charge of statutory rape for further investigation and booked him into the Norwood holding cells while Stanislov and Dlamini guarded the scene of crime while the crime scene experts and investigators carried out their respective responsibilities.
Dlamini would never forget that day as it was the first time he had to actually handle a dead body as he had to help put, what once was called Gary, into the mortuary van. He had seen plenty of death in Alexandra Township where he grew up, which was why he was seemingly unfazed by the suicide and overdose deaths earlier that day but he, like most people, had never had to handle the rigor mortis dead before.
The only other state morgue van had responded to the call and the driver was alone and made the usual request for help in moving the corpse. Constable Stanislov obliged by offering the services of young Steven Dlamini. To carry the dead body was always the responsibility of the rookie.
The driver asked the student which end of the form he wanted to carry. Dlamini thought about it for a while and then decided on the top end. Dlamini picked up the physique that used to house the soul named Gary and was immediately shocked by the cold timber-like feeling of the corpse. Gary’s old garb felt like wood. The body was naked as the clothes had been cut away and taken for forensic evidence. Dlamini got a scare when blood spurted out of the open and large knife wound in the shoulder as the mortuary worker picked up the legs first, tilting the body. Dlamini held his nerve and helped place the form into a packed van. He literally had to help squeeze Gary’s body into the van which was overflowing with human meat. Dlamini’s first day on duty was full of death and it earned him the nickname “body-count” by the Black Bastards as even by South African standards dealing with three dead bodies, in two separate incidents, in one shift, in one area of jurisdiction was infrequent.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“Never violate a woman, nor harm a child. Do not lie, cheat or steal. These things are for lesser men. Protect the weak against the evil strong. And never allow thoughts of gain to lead you into the pursuit of evil.” David Gemmell.
Field Training - Day Two
“Any November Whisky vehicle for an Five Alpha in Orange Grove come in for Control?” asked Lisa.
Unsurprisingly none of the six November Whisky units booked on duty responded to the call to attend a scene of Domestic Violence in Progress.
“Any November Whisky vehicle for an Five Alpha in Orange Grove please come in for Control.”
“She knows that we are on duty Mike, she knows that you are on duty Mike, even if we haven’t booked on air yet” said Stanislov.
Night in London Page 19
