A Life to Kill

by M. R. Hall

  ‘Sergeant Price. This is Corporal Benson.’

  The young woman gave an awkward nod.

  ‘We need a word with you. Perhaps you’d like to get in the car – out of the rain?’

  He reached for the door handle but Kathleen kept her distance. Something in his manner made her uneasy.

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  ‘Please, Mrs Lyons . . .’

  Kathleen shook her head. The rain grew heavier.

  ‘I’m sorry to approach you like this. We called at your home then spotted you as we were driving away.’ He paused for a moment. His Adam’s apple rose and fell in his throat. His colleague remained silent. ‘You’re Private Lyons’s grandmother. I have you down as next-of-kin . . .’

  ‘What about him?’

  ‘I’m afraid he’s missing. He disappeared from the forward command post where he was stationed yesterday night. We’ve been told he may have been taken hostage.’ The young woman nodded in confirmation. ‘Colonel Hastings would like to speak to you on the phone from Bastion as soon as possible. We can take you there now if you like.’

  ‘I have to get to work.’ The words fell mechanically from her mouth.

  ‘Yes, but . . .’

  ‘I finish at eleven.’

  ‘Mrs Lyons, this is important.’

  ‘So is my job. Or perhaps you can get me another?’

  She hadn’t meant to be rude but couldn’t help herself. The two soldiers stared at her, unable to answer.

  With her head filling with angry, ugly thoughts, Kathleen turned and hurried away into the rain before she said anything else.

  SIX

  Coroner Jenny Cooper took another mouthful of weak, lukewarm coffee and tried to concentrate on the pile of pathologists’ reports and other long-neglected paperwork she had brought with her from the office in anticipation of a long wait for her jury. She had banked on them taking two or three hours to arrive at their verdict, but so far they had been deliberating for six. If they didn’t make up their minds within the next few minutes, she would be forced to send them home and they would all be back to try again in the morning. She couldn’t imagine what the dead woman’s husband was going through. The poor man would be waiting on the hard seats in the public canteen drinking foul coffee and making awkward conversation with his lawyers. The Small Street Courts in the centre of Bristol were not the worst place to conduct an inquest – without a dedicated courtroom of her own, Jenny was often forced to conduct her proceedings in village halls in remote corners of the Gloucestershire countryside – but they were far from welcoming.

  Jenny had grown used to such waits. The Thompson inquest was the last in a list of nine she had deliberately scheduled back-to-back throughout the months of July and August. Her eight weeks in court had been hot, exhausting and often tortuous work, but it had been the only way she could clear the backlog of cases that had stacked up throughout her busiest year yet. After a deceptively quiet winter, the unnatural death business had enjoyed an unprecedented boom during the spring and summer months. It seemed to happen that way: human tragedies were never evenly spaced but seemed to come in unpredictable waves. The reaper really did seem to cut people down in swathes. Thankfully, the end of her ordeal was finally in sight. The next hearing after this would be her last before she left for two weeks’ holiday: the trip to Italy that she had been dreaming of for years but had never quite managed to pull off. Venice and Rome followed by a week on the beach. It would be her first ever holiday with Michael. She couldn’t wait.

  Of all the cases she had heard over the summer, that of Diana Thompson had been the most harrowing. The thirty-two-year-old primary schoolteacher and mother of three had been admitted to the Severn Vale District Hospital, which lay on the northern outskirts of Bristol, for a routine operation to remove a small benign lump from her left breast. The procedure was supposed to have taken forty minutes at most and, all being well, she was due to be discharged the following morning. Such was the unremarkable nature of the surgery that she had persuaded her husband not to take the day off work. He had said goodbye to her as he left the house at eight o’clock and spoken with her again at one thirty, just before she took her pre-med. At two forty-five he received a call from a member of the hospital’s management team to say that his wife had died on the operating table. No further explanation was offered. The surgeon and other staff present in theatre were instructed not to speak to him.

  The first post-mortem had been inconclusive. There was no doubt that Diana Thompson had suffered a cardiac arrest, but the locum pathologist who carried out the examination couldn’t be sure why. A second post-mortem conducted by the hospital’s senior pathologist concluded that there was a slight thickening of the heart muscle, probably due to a congenital condition, which, coupled with an unusual reaction to general anaesthesia, could have caused the arrest. In other words, Diana Thompson was the unlucky one in a million who dies on the table for no preventable reason.

  The case had attracted huge attention on social media and the lawyers had swarmed all over it. Desperate to safeguard their reputation and to prevent a finding of negligence that would open the way to a huge claim for damages, the hospital trust had wheeled in the big guns. A leading QC headed up a team of four lawyers. A twenty-eight-year-old hotshot from London named Kelly Bradford represented the widower, Alan Thompson. One of the new breed of solicitor advocates who were cutting the ground from under the Bar, she had none of the stuffiness of the hospital’s barristers and more than matched them in intellectual prowess. She was also attractive with a ready smile. Each time she rose to speak, the jury was reminded of the young woman who had died so tragically and suddenly.

  The hospital’s case was that Diana Thompson had suffered a cardiac arrest as the incision was being closed. Repeated attempts at resuscitation had failed to restart her heart. In response, Kelly Bradford had called an independent pathologist who claimed that Mrs Thompson’s heart had been healthy, and that even if there were a slight thickening of the tissues, it wasn’t enough to have caused a fatal arrest. Her case was that the young mother must have vomited and suffocated whilst lying unattended in the recovery room immediately after surgery. If this were true, it implied gross negligence and the most cynical and orchestrated of cover-ups. It meant Diana Thompson must have been left alone while still under anaesthetic, and that when she was discovered, a whole team of clinicians acted in concert to cover their tracks. If the jury believed that to be the case, the resulting shock waves would be huge. Clinicians and hospital managers would lose their jobs and criminal prosecutions would follow. Surgeons, nurses and their employers would find themselves in the dock charged with manslaughter and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. Alan Thompson would receive seven-figure damages and Kelly Bradford’s firm would collect 30 per cent.

  Thanks to feverish press reporting, the ten men and women of the coroner’s jury had been made acutely aware of the consequences of their verdict. It was a large responsibility to place on the shoulders of a collection of citizens among whom numbered a delivery driver, an office cleaner, a postman and at least two who were between jobs.

  There was a knock at the door of her stuffy, windowless office. Without waiting for a reply, her officer, Alison Trent, burst through.

  ‘They’ve got a note for you, Mrs Cooper,’ she said excitedly, and handed Jenny a folded sheet of paper. ‘I can guess what it says. They’ve spent the last hour shouting at each other. I can hear it along the corridor. It’s that young lad—’

  ‘I don’t want to hear it, Alison,’ Jenny cut in. ‘Jury deliberations are confidential.’

  Alison sighed impatiently. ‘I’ve never understood the point of that. What if they’re all idiots? More than a few of this lot are, in my opinion.’

  Jenny ignored the remark. Two years after her car accident, Alison was still showing the after-effects of the head injury that had so nearly claimed her life. Sometimes she seemed to lack a filter between brain and mouth and her r
esponses to normal social cues could, at times, be a little hit and miss. There were days on which Jenny seriously doubted the wisdom of having let her remain in post, but after seven years together, she simply didn’t have the heart to let her go. Besides, at nearly sixty years old and with her medical history, Alison stood little chance of finding another job.

  The note was short but clear.

  Dear Madam,

  We reached a unanimous verdict as you instructed, but when it came to completing the Form of Inquisition, two of our number refused to sign. They claim they have changed their minds and no longer agree with the majority. What should we do?

  Colin Lewis (Foreman).

  ‘Couple of troublemakers gumming up the works?’ Alison said.

  ‘I think we may have to settle for a majority verdict,’ Jenny said, folding the note into her pocket. ‘We’d better have them back in for a direction.’ She got up from her desk and headed for the door.

  ‘Oh, I should have warned you –’ Alison added, as if by way of afterthought, ‘you’ll have a bit of an audience. A few more reporters turned up. Some of them seem to have got the wrong end of the stick – keep asking me how much Mr Thompson will get in damages. I told them this is a coroner’s inquest and there’s no money involved.’

  Jenny’s heart sank. A court filled with journalists meant she would have to watch every word she said. The recently appointed Chief Coroner was well known for beginning every working day by reading his press clippings. If he didn’t like what he saw, he wouldn’t hesitate to pick up the phone and make his feelings clear. Jenny had worked hard over the previous year to shed her reputation as a loose cannon and couldn’t afford a backward step. She paused to collect her thoughts as she freshened up her lipstick.

  ‘It’s the one with the tattoos,’ Alison said, ignoring Jenny’s previous warnings, ‘he’s the fly in the ointment. I’ll bet he’s only doing this so he can drag us all back tomorrow and claim another subsistence.’

  ‘He wouldn’t be the first,’ Jenny said, and stepped out of the door before she heard any more.

  Alison was right. The court was crammed with reporters with pens poised. As Jenny took her seat beneath the royal crest, she noticed several other additions to the crowd. Seated between Alan Thompson and his lawyer, Kelly Bradford, on the front bench, was a tall, dark and expensively turned-out man in his forties whom Jenny assumed was one of the senior partners in Bradford’s firm. Several rows behind him sat another man whose hand-stitched suit marked him out from the scruffy members of the media. Simon Moreton was the Chief Coroner’s number two and his eyes and ears on the ground. Jenny hadn’t seen him for more than six months and was amused to see that in addition to a deep suntan he was sporting a carefully trimmed salt-and-pepper beard. Always a late but enthusiastic follower of fashion, Simon no doubt imagined it made him look rather rugged and dashing. He met her gaze and gave her a warm, confidential smile.

  Jenny informed the lawyers that she had received a note from the jury. She had Alison hand it to them for their inspection and also instructed her to bring the jury back from their retiring room. During the few moments in which they waited for the ten jurors to file back into court, Jenny noticed Kelly Bradford in urgent, whispered conversation with her boss. He appeared to be calling the shots.

  ‘Thank you for your note, Mr Foreman—’

  ‘If I may, ma’am.’ Kelly Bradford rose to her feet, sweeping thick, auburn hair back from her face. ‘I presume you intend to give a majority direction.’

  Jenny remained patient. ‘I was first intending to establish whether there remains any prospect of a unanimous verdict being reached.’

  ‘The note says that two of them have changed their minds. Given time for more deliberation, what is to say that more won’t change their minds?’ Kelly Bradford struck a note of indignation: ‘Surely you are not going to accept a verdict this evening?’

  ‘If we are quick about it, there are still at least thirty minutes available. Thank you, Ms Bradford.’

  The young lawyer refused to take the hint and remained on her feet. ‘Ma’am, this really doesn’t seem appropriate. The seriousness of this case surely requires that the jury be given all the time they need without any further pressure being placed on their shoulders.’

  Jenny glanced at Alison, whose eyes slanted towards the heavily muscled and tattooed young man sitting at the edge of the jury box, his arms crossed defiantly across his chest. Next to him sat the twenty-three-year-old delivery driver who looked similarly detached from his colleagues. Neither of them looked like the kind who would be keen to spend a minute longer than was necessary inside a court building.

  ‘The law is very clear, Ms Bradford,’ Jenny said, more firmly now. ‘If no more than two jurors disagree, I am entitled to accept the verdict reached by the others. If I may continue?’

  Kelly Bradford reluctantly sat down and went back into a huddle with her newly arrived colleague.

  ‘Mr Foreman, would you please stand.’

  Colin Lewis, an employee in the city council’s planning department, got nervously to his feet.

  ‘I have read your note. Is it the case that you are unable to reach a unanimous decision?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’ He nodded to add emphasis and cast a disapproving glance at the two dissenters.

  ‘And do you consider that at least eight of you might arrive at a verdict?’

  ‘Eight of us have signed the form of inquisition, ma’am. We’ve already reached our verdict.’ He pulled the document from his jacket pocket. ‘There are just two of us who refused to do so – at the last minute.’ Another glance at the two young men to his left suggested that relations had become rancorous.

  Jenny instructed Alison to pass her the form on which the jury were required to certify their verdict. Eight signatures appeared at the foot of the page. In the box headed, Conclusion of the jury as to cause of death, only one word appeared: Accidental.

  ‘Thank you, Mr Foreman. As eight out of ten of you have arrived at and certified your verdict, I am obliged to accept it. The form of inquisition reads as follows—’

  ‘Ma’am—’

  ‘That’s not right.’

  The simultaneous interruptions came from Kelly Bradford and the man with tattoos. His name was Craig Walters, and he had stated his profession as ‘job seeker’. Before Jenny had a chance to respond to either of them, Walters leaned forward, angrily waving a finger. ‘I don’t agree with any of this, and nor does he.’ He pointed to the delivery driver seated next to him, who nodded. ‘And I know she only signed because she was letting herself be bullied into it.’ He jabbed his finger towards Fay O’Connell, the fifty-year-old office cleaner. The blood drained from O’Connell’s face and she stared hard at the floor as if wishing it would swallow her up.

  ‘Ma’am, this is completely irregular,’ Kelly Bradford butted in. ‘You can’t possibly accept the verdict of this jury now.’ Her colleague nodded his agreement.

  ‘It’s a joke,’ Walters added for emphasis.

  ‘Sit down, Ms Bradford.’ Jenny felt her heart start to pump hard. An angry yelling juror with no respect for the dignity of the court was not something she had had to deal with before. ‘Mr Walters, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Stay calm, Jenny, she told herself. You can handle this. ‘Firstly, it’s not appropriate to call out. As you were instructed, if you have something to say, you should write me a note.’

  Walters responded with a surly grunt.

  ‘And secondly, the correct procedure is for me to note the names of those jurors who dissent from the majority decision, which I will do as soon as I have presented the verdict to the court. Do you understand?’

  ‘What I don’t understand is how anyone can say a healthy woman can die by accident. Something went wrong – stands to reason. That’s probably why they left her on her own. They thought, she’s young, she’s fit, nothing’ll go wrong with her—’

  ‘Mr Walters. I won’
t tell you again.’

  ‘They wouldn’t hear it. Wouldn’t even discuss it.’ He pointed his accusing finger at his fellow jurors.

  Jenny turned to Alison. ‘Would you please escort Mr Walters from the court?’

  He shot up from his seat. ‘It’s all right, I’m going.’ He turned to Alan Thompson. ‘Sorry, pal. You and your kids deserve better. This isn’t justice.’ With that, he marched out of the electrified courtroom. The journalists had their money quote and were tapping it into their phones and broadcasting it over the social networks even before the door closed after him.

  Jenny took a breath in a bid to steady her jangling nerves. Simon Moreton’s eyes were raised to the ceiling as if hoping that by some miracle the last two minutes could be erased from history.

  She forced a smile she hoped might give the impression that she had taken the disruption in her stride. ‘Well, I have the name of the first dissenter.’ She addressed the man who had been sitting to Walters’s right and once again checked her list. ‘Adrian Mallinson?’

  He nodded.

  ‘And you also dissent?’

  ‘Yes. I agree with him.’ He nodded towards the door through which Walters had made his theatrical exit.

  ‘Noted,’ Jenny said.

  ‘When you thought there was something in it for you.’ The whispered comment from the jury box was almost inaudible, so quiet in fact that Jenny doubted whether she had heard it or merely imagined it.

  Kelly Bradford rose to her feet yet again. ‘Ma’am, having heard directly from a juror that substantive issues were not properly discussed, I would urge you to set this so-called verdict aside. This inquest has to be heard again in front of a fresh jury. And if you choose not to do so, on behalf of Mr Thompson we will immediately apply to the High Court seeking a fresh inquest.’

  Her impertinence deserved a firm riposte, but Jenny’s mind was momentarily elsewhere. She glanced along the two rows of jurors in search of the whisperer. She thought about asking the lawyers if they had heard it, too: When you thought there was something in it for you. Was the voice suggesting that Walters and Mallinson had deliberately sought to sabotage the proceedings? Had all the talk of hefty damages given these two uneducated men the idea that they could somehow get a slice of the action by siding against the hospital? Or worse, could someone have sought to influence them? She looked at Kelly Bradford’s boss. A gold Rolex poked out from beneath his shirt cuff. Thirty thousand pounds sitting casually on his wrist. Clearly a man who cared about money and made plenty of it. She made an educated guess that the magic number his firm would be chasing was £3 million. Two for the client, one for them. The scene with Walters was just the sort of stunt she could imagine an arrogant fee-hungry London lawyer like him arranging, but she didn’t have a scrap of evidence, only a gut instinct.