Death Comes Knocking: Policing Roy Grace’s Brighton

by Graham Bartlett

  The planning of the police response is faultlessly described and takes place in the office of the Gold commander, Chief Superintendent Graham Barrington. Observant readers will have worked out the similarity of the name to mine. The office described is exactly as my office looked, down to the reference to the sweet messages penned by Barrington’s triplets on the huge whiteboard. My alter-ego’s physical description, however, is all too flattering. I am not athletic and fair-haired and I have only ever run one marathon.

  I was not directly running the search for Fitzpatrick. As the Divisional Commander, however, I knew that the outcome of this operation would be mine to manage. I was the public face of policing and would come under huge pressure if we had another robbery or worse. That said, I knew all of those who were involved and my trust in them was absolute. Despite them being the best around, though, however good the plan, however good the team, as Grace says, ‘with guns around sometimes people get hurt and that’s when all hell breaks loose.’ This gave rise to a number of sleepless nights over the years.

  As with the fictional Chief Superintendent, during the hunt for Fitzpatrick the Gold commander was weighing up all the intelligence, possible sightings and suggestions for places to raid, and making the final call. It was the paucity of information that I found most exhilarating when in command. It is easy to decide to act when there is certainty. However, when the best you have is probability, alongside crazy time and staff constraints, all your synapses go into overdrive drawing on all your professional experience and judgement before giving the green light. In the ‘squeaky bum moments’ that follow, you hope beyond hope you have it right. It’s one of the greatest buzzes of senior command; Grace experiences it in every book and, like me, he thrives on it.

  That February morning, as on every day since Fitzpatrick had been identified, there had been a dedicated intelligence cell working to locate him. The team that would carry out the arrest was the crack Tactical Firearms Unit.

  Officers were aware our man knew that police were looking for him, and that he was probably still in the area. His desperation was likely to be extreme as this could not end well for him.

  Out of the blue, intelligence came in that at lunchtime he would be going to the Sidewinder pub in the Kemp Town area of Brighton. One of the worst places possible to try to arrest an armed suspect is in a pub. The presence of the suspect and other members of the public, whose sobriety and compliance could not be relied upon, together with the availability of ad hoc weapons such as glasses and furniture, render armed raids on pubs suitable only for the direst emergencies.

  Therefore the default tactic is to sit and wait. Try to take the suspect outside by surprise with such an overwhelming show of force that resistance becomes futile. Such arrests are, in the vast majority of cases, resolved swiftly, if not quietly. Such was the intention that day.

  Just after 1 p.m., an unmarked car containing covert armed officers was crawling around the area hoping to spot Fitzpatrick, hopefully somewhere they could safely overwhelm him, arrest him and neutralize any threat he might pose.

  Rock Place runs between the vibrant centre of Kemp Town, the famous gay village, and the seafront. This area is always throbbing with people and traffic. Rock Place, however, seems out of place. It feels like a homely backstreet with a few shops, a pub, a garage and a music school. It’s impossible for two cars to pass along its short length.

  The police car inched its way towards the bottom of the street when suddenly Fitzpatrick appeared on foot in front of them. Their heart rates accelerating into overdrive, they eased their BMW to a gentle halt and did what they were trained to do.

  The doors flew open and, using the car as cover, they burst out and shouted their challenge at Fitzpatrick.

  ‘Stop, armed police!’ Their guns aimed directly at him.

  Unlike thousands of suspects before, this one hadn’t read the script. Crazily he pulled his own pistol out of nowhere and pointed it straight at the officers.

  In a split second they had to weigh up the threat. Real gun or not? Threat or no threat? Shoot or don’t shoot? As mentioned previously, only a snap decision is possible.

  Believing their lives were in imminent danger they fired three shots at Fitzpatrick. Two slammed into him, devastatingly rupturing his internal organs. He crashed to the ground. The gun flew out of his hand. The officers then did something many would consider bizarre but goes to the core of being a cop. They rushed in and, as Grace did with Carl Venner, tried to save the life of their would-be killer.

  Having battled to stem his bleeding, they soon handed over to the paramedics who spent a further thirty agonizing minutes trying to get him breathing before rushing him to the nearby Royal Sussex County Hospital. Once there, a team of twenty-five doctors and nurses combined their skills in attempting to save him before he was finally pronounced dead. In all, police and medics struggled for an hour and forty-five minutes from the moment he pulled a gun on armed officers before they accepted defeat. Their determination to preserve human life was in stark contrast to his contempt for theirs.

  I will never forget the mid-afternoon text from my deputy and good friend Superintendent Steve Whitton. ‘We found Fitzpatrick. We’ve shot him and it’s not looking good.’ Brief and to the point.

  It took my breath away. The Divisional Commander for West Sussex, Steve Voice, had recently overseen the aftermath of a fatal police shooting in the village of Fernhurst on the Sussex–Hampshire border. From his experience, he penned a guide to our role following such an event. It became my bible.

  Managing the impact on officers and the community was a commitment that continued from the moment of the shooting right through and beyond the inquest. Initially, issuing any public statement was the domain of the Independent Police Complaints Commission who rightly investigate when people are killed at the hands of the police.

  It was imperative that we were able to include something in those initial press releases to indicate that the man who had been shot was armed and dangerous and that the police had been threatened. The diplomacy of Steve Whitton in getting two small but significant references into the media statement – that the dead man was wanted for armed robberies and that a non-police-issue gun was found near his body – had the effect of practically eliminating any ideas that trigger-happy cops were cruising the streets of Brighton shooting at will, which may otherwise have prevailed.

  At the subsequent inquest, it was established that the gun was an airgun. This only become apparent after the gun was closely examined. The armed officers had no chance of knowing this when it was aimed at them. It was also revealed that Fitzpatrick had told a friend he’d rather be dead than go back to prison. The jury returned a lawful killing verdict, and noted that Fitzpatrick had probably died within two minutes of being shot. They found, too, that the officers had been forced to make that split-second decision to protect the lives of the public and themselves. Their conduct was described as exemplary.

  Lots of public meetings, briefings to elected and executive officials and MPs, painstaking preparations for the inquest and IPCC report and convening Independent Advisory Groups became a huge part of my job. Apart from a couple of examples of injudicious statements in the media, the impact of this tragedy on the life of Brighton and Hove was minimal.

  It’s not always that way. The press can take delight in writing thousands of words and many column inches dissecting a decision that an individual cop has had milliseconds to make. Anyone can be wise in hindsight; my former colleagues rarely have that luxury.

  16: HELL HATH NO FURY

  Thirty-five-year-old Canadian ‘action man’ seeks professional white single female between thirty and forty for companionship, days out, holidays and possibly more! Must be willing to tolerate ‘Walter Mitty’ personality, hidden violent background, refusals to accept rejection, obsessive stalking, psychological torture, arson and plots to harm you and your family.

  If only people could be this honest. If only Dr Alison Hewitt
had had this insight into the new man in her life from the outset. Much the same goes for Red Westwood, besotted with her lover turned would-be killer, Bryce Laurent, in Want You Dead. Had she been given a glimpse beneath his phony immaculate veneer then surely she would have chosen a different path. One that did not involve the complete destruction of her and her family’s life.

  DCI Nev Kemp worked for me as the Head of Crime for Brighton and Hove. He had been a friend for years and I had mentored and supported him into CID and up the promotion ladder. I had recognized his talent and potential and, when I retired, he succeeded me as Divisional Commander at Brighton and Hove.

  Nev was a grafter who had a knack of separating the wheat from the chaff. He had a fabulous eye for detail and could scan the dozens of crimes reported each day and pick out those that might come back to bite us.

  As the only other senior officer in the city with a CID background, he felt safe using me as a confidant in those decisions that were not always clear-cut. Professionally and personally I was glad to help; command can be a lonely place. I saw myself as Chief Superintendent Jack Skerritt to his Roy Grace.

  The arrest of Al Amin Dhalla leapt off the page at him. It seemed a relatively low-level incident, in the scheme of things, but something about it made him worry.

  ‘Graham, I’m not happy about a job that’s come in. Can I just run it past you to check my thinking?’ he said as he entered my office one morning in March 2011, gently closing the door behind him. ‘It’s a stalking job but I think it’s going to blow up into more than that.’

  ‘Tell me more.’ The very term stalking grabbed my full attention. These cases were never easy and too often dismissed as minor irritations.

  Early in my career, I had great hopes to be part of a change that would finally protect people from the horrors of obsessive behaviour. As Staff Officer to ACC Maria Wallis, I had been at the centre of devising anti-stalking laws under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997. Unfortunately, as is sometimes the case, the police, through clumsy implementation, watered down the effect this Act was intended to have and countless victims were left unprotected.

  You have probably never heard of Aston Abbotts. That would not be surprising; it’s not fame that its 500 residents crave. A scan of its website depicts a charming Buckinghamshire village which appears to be struggling with its transition from a nineteenth-century self-supporting agricultural community to an idyllic rural retreat for professional townspeople. Nothing illustrates this better than its boast of being home to ‘one pub, one church and one helipad’.

  What a joy it must have been for Alison Hewitt to be brought up in such a lovely little village, even with its issues with incomers. Despite the sad death of Alison’s father, her mother, a former probation officer, saw that she and her three younger brothers, Mark, Paul and Dave, wanted for nothing. Alison’s ambition to read medicine and qualify as a doctor was nurtured by her perfect Middle England upbringing in this quaint spot. Life was safe, life was good.

  The horrors that would befall Alison, however, could have come straight from the pages of a Roy Grace novel. The twists, the turns, the chase, the bluffs, the sheer adrenaline that this real-life nightmare entailed prompted many to question: which is stranger, fact or fiction? The eventual publicity that followed this case, including a gripping Channel 4 documentary ‘Living with My Stalker’, was among the inspirations for Peter to write Want You Dead, to highlight the horrors of stalking and to promote the domestic violence charity the White Ribbon Campaign.

  It’s no secret that the lot of a junior doctor can be tough. Long, unsociable shifts interspersed with hours of being on call, coupled with endless studying, means there is precious little time for romance. Only those who inhabit that frenetic world understand the demands it makes on tomorrow’s consultants. Alison was so immersed in her work and her passion for the outdoor life that she simply did not have time for dating.

  At thirty-five, however, she wanted to find the man she would spend the rest of her life with. She’d had some false starts and, frankly, craved a short-cut to happiness. Unlike Red’s preferred route to find love, she did not fancy the idea of online dating. She wanted more control; less chance of landing a weirdo. A friend recommended the London-based Executive Club dating agency. Since it catered for the more discerning professional, she felt safe. Even if she didn’t find Mr Right, at least she would not end up with some nutter who would not take no for an answer.

  Al Amin Dhalla had been a member of the agency for a while. As a thirty-five-year-old Canadian accountant who had been in the UK for a number of years, he seemed quite a catch. Other than being perhaps a little too generous with his first date gifts, nothing about him had rung any alarm bells with the agency. He appeared to be a most eligible bachelor. His introduction to Alison could easily have been yet another success story for the Executive Club.

  Alison lived in a small, anonymous rented flat just a short walk from the Royal Sussex County Hospital where she worked. Her and Al’s companionship, to start with, was unremarkable. Given her punishing schedule, they would spend what spare time she had enjoying trips out in London, romantic walks along the Brighton seafront or just nestling up together in her flat. He seemed genuinely charming and his knowledge of history, castles and films fascinated Alison. They established a routine of him travelling down to the city from his Croydon home to spend their weekends together.

  Soon afterwards, as part of her training, Alison started a placement at the Accident and Emergency Department, which meant less predictable shifts often leaving her completely exhausted. This irritated Al, especially as his weekend visits would often be to an empty flat.

  His solution was to propose that he move in with her and effectively be her house husband. It was all a bit quick for Alison, so she gently rejected his kind offer. However, she started to notice more and more of his possessions were stacking up in her cramped apartment. Her objections and his reassurances changed nothing; his clutter kept coming and coming.

  Eventually he finally admitted that he had let his London flat go and had effectively moved in. Angry but boxed into a corner, Alison felt all she could do was negotiate that he support her with the rent. She implored him not to make big decisions like that again, at least not without a discussion. With an apology, he meekly agreed.

  Fourteen years after losing her first husband and the father of her children, Pam – Alison’s mother – was soon to marry the man who had brought meaning back into her life: defence contractor David Gray. The whole family were looking forward to him becoming stepfather to Alison and her brothers. The wedding was to be a celebration of a new chapter in her mother’s life.

  Al insisted that this would be the ideal occasion to introduce him to the family, especially as two of her brothers lived abroad. This was a rare opportunity, as all the Hewitts would be in one place.

  As Alison was to be her mother’s bridesmaid, Al was paired up with her grandmother, Peggy, so he was not left alone. During the day he was most affable, chatting easily to Peggy and other guests, moving effortlessly among them. He enchanted them with his derring-do past and his multifarious achievements.

  To Peggy, he confided in fine detail the tragic death of his parents in a horrific car crash of which he was the only survivor. The verdict from the gathered well-wishers was that Al was charming – if a little intense – and that he had coped well, considering that meeting all the family in one go must have been quite overwhelming.

  Peggy thought otherwise, however. His resistance to her gentle yet rapier interrogation caused her to conclude that he was hiding something; he had a big secret. More than once, after the event, she warned Pam, ‘This is not the man for Alison.’

  Not long after the wedding, Pam treated her four-year-old grandson to a visit to the seaside to see his Auntie Alison. During a meal at a seafront restaurant, Pam gently questioned Al about the tragedy that had so scarred his childhood. Instead of an emotional skate through the events that orphaned him
at such a tender age, he painted a gruesomely detailed picture of a raging fire, the stench of petrol and the screams of his dying parents. His clinically detailed, emotionless testimony convinced Pam that Al was lying.

  The Accident and Emergency shifts were starting to take their toll and Alison felt she needed some proper time with Al. They decided on a romantic getaway to the Greek island of Skiathos. Having selected the date and hotel, Alison got online and made the booking. It was while she was entering the passport details that she noticed something odd. Al was, in fact, five years older than he had maintained and had only been in the UK for two years not the five he had previously said. She immediately asked him for an explanation and he apologized, explaining that he felt that to tell her his true age might have put her off him at the get-go. She accepted this white lie, smelling no rats, and they flew off to Greece.

  Sun, sand and sea provided the perfect relief from those punishing shifts. However, on her return from snorkelling one day, another of Dhalla’s unwelcome surprises awaited her.

  As she dried off she noticed him grinning like a Cheshire cat next to a freshly built sandcastle. For some reason, she mischievously kicked the castle over only to reveal a black box buried in the powdered rubble. Her heart sank as she flipped the lid. The contents glistened.

  They had talked about this. He had quizzed her about ring sizes. He had hinted about marriage. She thought she had been firm in her rebuffs and had made it clear. Apparently not.

  ‘Alison, will you marry me?’

  Her stomach was in turmoil. What had he not understood? Why was he putting them both through this? Once again she gently but firmly refused his misplaced offer.

  His reaction to yet another rejection was pitiful. He behaved like a scolded child so, to appease him, Alison reluctantly agreed to briefly slip the ring on her fourth finger. Of course it fitted, of course it was stunning but there was no way she could keep it.

  Sheepishly, he gathered up the box and slipped it away, out of sight but not out of mind. The rest of the day was a series of awkward silences, both of them walking on eggshells. She assumed that Al was wallowing in humiliation. She felt for him. He, on the other hand, like Want You Dead’s Bryce when confronted by Red’s first rejection, was burning with rage. You don’t treat men such as Al and Bryce like that. If you try, you will learn the hard way.