Latent Hazard rkadika-1

by Piers Venmore-Rowland

  ‘Not five-star accommodation, but at least it’s quiet. I’ll come back and get you in a couple of hours. I’m sorry but I need to lock you in, otherwise the duty policeman might investigate.’ The door swung shut behind her.

  Rafi climbed onto the hard bed and pulled the blankets over him – a few seconds later he was sound asleep.

  The next thing Rafi knew, Kate was standing over him.

  ‘Come on sleepyhead, time to get up.’

  He followed her back to the office. On his desk was a cup of steaming hot black coffee; next to it was a large pile of papers.

  ‘I thought you might like to get your teeth into the accounts of the companies financed by the venture capital business. Let me know if you spot anything out of the ordinary,’ said Kate.

  ‘Will do,’ replied Rafi, picking up the first set of accounts.

  A couple of hours later Rafi was hunched over his desk hard at work – the clock on the wall showed WED 21:15.

  ‘Anyone else found an Estonian connection?’ called out Rafi. ‘The security business has an activity there. It’s in the fine print in their accounts, under currency exchange rates.’

  Emma rifled through a stack of papers. ‘Hold on a minute… Yup… The fish processing business has the same!’

  ‘Good work, you two.’ Kate picked up her phone. ‘Let’s see if David has any Estonian contacts… Good evening David… How do I find a police or security services contact who we can trust in Estonia? There’s some digging that we need done and quickly.’

  ‘That’s a good one,’ came the reply. The speakerphone went quiet for a moment. ‘If you go to my office… You know where the keys to my filing cabinet are, don’t you…? Go to the second drawer down; near the back is a folder marked EU Money Laundering and Illegal Trade Conference. At the front you’ll find a business card stapled to a sheet of paper – Colonel Hendrik Matlik. He is one of their top dogs in their Security Police. Give him a ring and say that you’re working with me and that you could do with some help. On first impressions he comes across as very severe, but underneath he’s a huge teddy bear. He’s a real five-star compatriot, very proud of his country joining the EU and is determined to keep organised crime out. Oh yes, and remember to send my love to his daughter, Kristina. She must be at university now… Also ask him to ring you back on a secure line – he’ll appreciate that! Good luck.’

  A couple of minutes later, Kate returned with the business card – “Colonel Hendrik Matlik, Kaitsepolitseiamet”. On the reverse was the English translation – “Estonian Security Police”. ‘There’s a direct line number. Excellent!’

  It was 9.40 p.m. in the UK and 10.40 p.m. in Tallinn. As Kate dialled the number, she wondered whether there would be anyone in the office.

  ‘Halloo, tere ohtust.’

  Kate raised her eyebrows. ‘Do you speak English?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Kate breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Could I please speak to Colonel Hendrik Matlik?’

  ‘Do you know what time it is?’ came the reply.

  ‘Yes, I must apologise, but it’s important that I speak to him.’

  ‘Can I say who is calling?’

  ‘Detective Inspector Kate Adams, I’m a colleague of Chief Superintendent David Pryke, City of London Police.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  The phone went silent. The wait seemed to go on for ages. Then a deep voice came on the line.

  ‘Hello, Matlik here.’

  ‘Good evening,’ said Kate, ‘My boss, David Pryke, suggested I called you as he believes you might be able to help us. Oh, and he sends his kind regards to Kristina.’

  ‘Is it essential that I should help… Now?’

  ‘Yes, please,’ replied Kate. ‘We’re investigating the Bishopsgate police station bombing and a follow-up terrorist attack.’

  ‘I read of that atrocity; please pass my condolences to David,’ said the colonel.

  ‘Could you ring me back on a secure line?’ requested Kate.

  There was a loud chuckle from the other end of the phone, which turned into a laugh. ‘I’m going to like working with you.’

  Kate looked blankly at the phone and wondered how David knew her comment would tickle the colonel’s sense of humour.

  ‘No need to worry about the phone line. As one of the bosses of the KAPO my line is secure and before you were put through my office traced your call back to Wood Street police station. Isn’t technology wonderful? How can I be of assistance?’

  Kate told the colonel of her pressing need for information on two UK companies with operations in Tallinn and gave him the name and Tallinn address of a former director, Pinja Koit. ‘We sense time is against us. At the moment we’ve identified a network of companies that seem to be involved.’

  ‘I’ll see what I can do to help and get back to you first thing in the morning. If you want to reach me, I’ll be on the number you phoned.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Kate, hanging up.

  ‘While you were on the other line, the commissioner phoned,’ said Emma. ‘John’s now formally on our team. He said we could do with his experience and low cunning.’

  John smiled and nodded. ‘Pleased to help.’

  ‘And we’ve also co-opted Peter Ashby from Traffic. He’s to be our gofer.’

  The phone rang – it was reception for Jeremy. ‘OK,’ he said, ‘I’ll be down straight away.’

  He was soon back, clutching bags filled with steaming cups of coffee and delicious-looking Italian cakes. ‘With Luigi’s compliments,’ he smiled as he passed the coffee around.

  Emma looked across at Jeremy. ‘But we only had our supper a few hours ago. When will your obsession with food calm down?’

  ‘This is the afters! Who was it that said: An army marches on its stomach?’

  ‘Napoleon?’ ventured Emma, pleased to have answered before Kate.

  ‘Precisely. I asked Luigi to prepare us something to keep us going, in case we begin to flag. It’s going to be a very long night. And you try living off crap for two months and see if you can keep away from good food.’

  ‘Point taken,’ said Kate. ‘Now we have Rafi back with us, it would be a good moment to pull together all we’ve been doing over the past four or five hours, so that we can keep an eye on the big picture and make sure we aren’t going off on a wild goose chase. OK, who wants to start?’

  ‘I will,’ said John. ‘My team downstairs has been helping me with the terrorists’ public sector services businesses. They are investigating exactly what they do and who they employ. Thankfully, as incorporated limited partnerships, their businesses have to be registered at Companies House.’John paused and looked at his notes. ‘The scale of these activities is downright impressive or, from our perspective, very scary! Their empire comprises numerous operations: security for police cells -and includes Paddington Green. They also operate prisons, schools and hospitals. They have a number of soft facilities management contracts for the Home Office and the Foreign Office. And through a spider’s web of connected limited partnerships they employ over 200,000 people!’

  ‘Wow, that is impressive.’ exclaimed Kate. ‘What are their finances like?’

  ‘They’re sailing very close to the wind. They’ve got massive debts, and carry unlimited liability if things go wrong,’ replied John.

  ‘So if we take Jeremy’s line that the terrorists will be in destruction mode, this public sector business of theirs is a house of cards?’ asked Kate.

  ‘Precisely,’ said John. ‘And it wouldn’t be difficult to make it collapse.’

  ‘And if it did go bust?’ asked Kate.

  ‘It would leave one hell of a mess across the public sector!’John took a slurp of his coffee. ‘My team has also come up with another angle. With the help of Companies House we’ve drawn up a list of all the people who sit on the management boards of these limited liability partnerships. Several of the names are very interesting. There are a couple of politicians and some professional advis
ers to Government departments! I have given Jeremy’s colleagues the full list of names to see what they can make of it.’

  ‘Oh, I almost forgot to say,’ added John. ‘We had a look at where else they operate. One of their businesses provides the guards to the garage at Bishopsgate police station! MI5 has traced their security man, who was away from his post at the time of the bombing. He’s now on holiday in Spain and, rumour has it, he’s buying a villa out there!

  ‘I’ve passed our preliminary findings to the commissioner and he’s briefing all his opposite numbers that their security may be compromised and that they have to keep this under wraps. So far he hasn’t spoken to the Government departments, given the number of politicians and special advisers that seem to be on the terrorists’ payroll, innocently or otherwise.’

  The atmosphere in the room had perceivably cooled. Kate finally broke the silence. ‘Who would like to go next?’

  ‘MI5 has found another link between Jameel Furud and Basel Talal,’ said Jeremy. They are trustees of a charity, which works with a number of high profile companies, and sponsors students undertaking voluntary work in Africa. It’s not a big enterprise. MI5 are looking into how the airline tickets are booked and where the students have worked.’

  ‘My team has also been looking into their fish processing business,’ continued John. ‘It’s a substantial business and a nicely profitable one at that. It operates a fleet of trawlers out of the UK and Estonia, which gives them a base close to the old Soviet Bloc.’

  Kate looked thoughtfully at John. ‘Their fishing boats could provide a means of moving things and people in and out of the UK… We should locate all of their trawlers…’

  ‘We are already on to it,’ said John. ‘On the internet there are lists of EU trawlers. The information includes lots of details on each vessel and who owns them – shown by port…’

  ‘Can I make an observation?’ interrupted Rafi. ‘I’m thinking practicalities. We’re talking in terms of trawlers being used to get people in and out of the UK. I agree with their usefulness for getting things in, but I’ve a problem with using them for an exit… Wouldn’t they be too slow?’

  ‘I agree,’ said John. ‘How about they use them just to get the terrorists out of UK territorial waters? Thereafter, I personally would want something much faster to whisk me away.’

  ‘That’s a good point John; make sure that we pick it up when we discuss the terrorists’ exit strategy in more detail.’ Kate paused. ‘Where have we got to on the property front?’

  ‘Emma and I were wondering whether they might use one or more of their properties to support potential terrorist attacks,’ said Rafi. ‘Just imagine how much easier it would be to attack something from a secure, nearby property over which you have complete control. And if one takes PREH’s full name – Prime Real Estate Holdings – literally, their portfolio should comprise property investments of institutional quality. Ergo, the properties should be in prime locations. The list of property addresses from the company’s mortgage register runs to three pages and, among those, I’ve identified four properties which look distinctly out of place…’ Rafi studied his scribbled notes. ‘A retail park on the outskirts of Peterhead and three industrial estates in: Prestwick, North Walsham and Hartlepool. I’ve given Emma the addresses. She’s seeing whether they’re near any potential targets.’

  ‘Why do you think that?’ enquired John. ‘Surely that’s a bit over the top. These days a plain van suffices for most purposes, so who needs properties?’

  Emma raised her head from the screen of her PC; her face was sombre. ‘What if one of the properties overlooked a nuclear power station – would that change your view?’

  ‘Oh shit, yes!’ replied John.

  ‘Well, at a first glance, the Hartlepool property is bang next to the nuclear power station. If you follow the energy theme,’ continued Emma, ‘The North Walsham property is only a stone’s throw away from the huge gas terminal at Bacton. Peterhead is one of the major Scottish fishing ports and it’s close to another gas facility at St Fergus… Which is vast. The fourth property is next to Prestwick airport and is not that far from Hunterston nuclear power station.’

  A shocked silence fell over the room. It was broken by Jeremy who spoke to John. ‘Remember when we chatted to Mario about the PhD dissertations?’

  ‘Bloody hell! Yes. Energy targets would fit.’

  ‘How’s about we get a large map, plus several sheets of acetate which can be laid over it with the locations of the properties? We can add the other items as we come across them. For example, Emma will soon have the ports that the trawlers are operating out of and the list of key energy installations.’

  ‘We can do better than that,’ added Kate. ‘Let’s borrow the touch screen monitor and the computer with mapping software from downstairs.’

  ‘Great idea,’ said Emma, ‘I’ll sort it.’

  Rafi felt shattered. It was well after midnight. Sleep deprivation was closing in on him. Slumped over his desk, something nagged at him. On the one hand, his brain told him it needed to turn off; on the other hand, a thought was niggling at him – he felt sure there was something obvious he’d missed. He would reread the property company’s accounts and then get some sleep.

  He opened up the accounts for the current and previous years; some sections had scanned badly. He found the note on properties in both sets of accounts. They were not very clear. Rafi took out a blank sheet of paper and started to decipher what was written there. He picked out the word external and a word beginning with valu… It was as if someone had let off a firecracker behind him. He sat bolt upright. His tiredness evaporated. Of course, how bloody stupid of him! The accounting standards required property companies to have annual revaluations of their assets.

  He called across to Kate. ‘There’s an external valuer out there with the full details of all the properties in the portfolio. Sorry I’ve been a right idiot not to have thought of this earlier.’ He was annoyed by his elementary slip-up. The nagging feeling had stopped and abject tiredness took over.

  ‘I’m off to get some shut-eye, before I keel over. Kate could you arrange for me to be woken first thing, please?’

  ‘Will do. Sleep well.’

  Rafi slept soundly. By 6.40 a.m. he was back at his desk with a steaming cup of strong coffee, wondering what Thursday might bring. First, he rechecked the web to see if he had missed anything on PREH, the terrorists’ property investment company. There was little there to help him. His next task was to find the elusive property valuers and quickly. He was pleased that PREH used an external and not an independent valuer. The latter would be difficult to track down quickly as it could have no dealings with the company other than undertaking its valuations. In contrast, an external valuer could undertake other work for the company, and their property lettings, buying or selling work would, with any luck, be recorded on one of the specialist property databases. Rafi realised this was where he had to look. The cynic in him surmised that PREH’s external valuers would be rewarded with excellent fees for their non-valuation work.

  He shouted across to Kate and Emma. ‘As a matter of urgency, we need a contact at a commercial property agent who will do a search of their property databases for us. Do you know anyone? Unfortunately, I now can’t trust any of my contacts.’

  Kate shook her head.

  ‘Would the commissioner be able to help?’ asked Rafi.

  ‘More than likely,’ said Kate. ‘I’ll give him a call.’

  A couple of minutes later she had the name and mobile number of a Mr Perryman: a director at a major international property agent. Kate smiled. ‘The commissioner hopes that this individual will be more cooperative than the vice chancellor!’ she said as she dialled the number and was put through to voicemail. She left a message asking whoever picked it up to return the call as quickly as possible.

  Kate hung up, then rang back and spoke to the receptionist. It transpired that there was no one in from Mr Perryman’s te
am. The receptionist promised to get the first one who came in to ring her.

  Ten minutes later Kate received a call from Mr Perryman’s personal assistant: Pam Blake. Kate introduced herself.

  ‘Could I speak to Mr Perryman?’

  ‘I’m afraid not; he’s on his way to a property inspection.’

  ‘I have a problem and was wondering whether you might be able to help. What I am about to tell you is in strictest confidence.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘We’re investigating a serious crime; my commissioner advises me that your boss is the man to help us access your databases. We could do with his help, now, please!’

  ‘Leave it to me; I’ll contact Mr Perryman and ask for his permission to help you.’

  Only a few minutes later, Pam was back on the phone to Kate.

  ‘I have confirmation that I may help you – within reasonable bounds, of course.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Kate. ‘May I email you a list of the addresses? What I need,’ she looked down at Rafi’s scribbled note, ‘Are the printouts from your in-house database, Focus and EGi giving details of which agents have done deals at these addresses in the past four years. Could you do this as a matter of urgency?’

  ‘Of course! I’ll get Mr Perryman’s colleague, Justin Smith, to run the searches. As luck would have it he’s just walked in the door.’

  ‘Will you please advise Mr Smith that this information isn’t to be discussed with any of his colleagues. When he’s printed it out, I’d be most grateful if you’d ring me so that I can arrange for it to be picked up. If there’s going to be a delay, could you please let me know?’

  ‘Will do.’

  ‘Thank you, Pam.’

  ‘My pleasure.’

  Kate turned to Rafi. ‘This has all happened so fast. Remind me what precisely you are looking for? And what are Focus and EGi?’

  ‘If we can find the external valuer, we can get hold of the property portfolio valuation report. I’ve a feeling it’ll show properties which are not on the mortgage register and which could be part of the terrorist plans. Focus and EGi are the two huge online databases that property agents use to find information on deals done, amongst other things.’