by Damien Boyd
‘No. I was working on the basis that if it had been them, they’d hardly come back later to collect the eels.’
‘Good, so we’ll call it a coincidence.’
Dixon frowned.
‘Did you bring an overnight bag?’
‘Yes.’
‘We’re sending a team to Manchester to liaise with GMP,’ said Potter. ‘The senior investigating officer from the original team is coming out of retirement. Your job is to brief them on what we’ve got. All right?’
‘Is that it?’
‘I doubt it very much.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘There are glaring holes in what they’re telling us, statements missing, names redacted. Read this on the train.’ Potter leaned forward and handed Dixon a red box file. ‘We need to know what’s not in the statements. So, I thought I’d throw a fox in the chicken coop.’
‘It’s a cat amongst the pigeons, isn’t it?’
‘I really don’t give a shit, so long as you ruffle some feathers. Lewis tells me you’re good at that.’
Dixon smiled.
‘Good. Just don’t ruffle mine,’ continued Potter. ‘And remember, you’ll be representing Avon and Somerset Police, so don’t muck it up.’
‘I won’t.’
Dixon stood up to leave.
‘You mentioned a team?’ he asked.
‘A DS from Bristol is going with you. Jonny Sexton.’
‘Where is he?’
‘He’ll be around somewhere.’
Dixon allowed the office door to close behind him and then tapped out a text message to Jane.
If I ever apply for promotion remind me to get a pinstripe suit :-) Nx
‘Inspector Dixon?’
An Irish accent behind him, soft and quietly spoken.
Dixon spun round. ‘Yes.’
‘Jonny Sexton, Sir.’ A hand outstretched, Dixon reached out to take it just as his phone bleeped.
And braces? xx
‘Excuse me a minute, I’ve just got to tell someone to piss off.’ He slid his phone back into his pocket, message sent, and shook Sexton’s hand.
‘There’s a car waiting to take us to Temple Meads, Sir,’ said Sexton.
‘You read this?’ asked Dixon, holding up the box file.
‘I just flicked through it, Sir.’
‘Well, it’ll keep us busy on the train.’
‘You’re having a fling with a fellow officer?’
Dixon was staring out of the window as the train pulled out of Bristol Parkway. ‘It’s a bit more than a fling, but thank you for asking,’ he replied, resisting the temptation to tell Sexton to mind his own business.
‘Me too.’
‘Really?’
‘He’s a firearms officer,’ replied Sexton. ‘It’s how we met.’
‘You were in Armed Response?’ Dixon turned back to Sexton sitting opposite him.
‘Originally.’
‘Why did you leave?’
‘I suppose I might as well tell you before someone else does. I killed an eighty year old man.’
Dixon frowned. ‘What happened?’
‘He pulled a gun on a colleague. Turned out it was plastic, but there was no way of telling. It was dark; it all happened so fast. And he had dementia.’ Sexton sighed. ‘That’s what the enquiry found. Anyway, it was politely suggested I might not be suitable for firearms duty. There’d been protests, and because of what happened to my brother—’
Dixon raised his eyebrows.
‘He was the officer shot and killed a couple of years ago in Montpelier.’
‘I remember that.’
‘He was unarmed.’ Sexton was shaking his head. ‘He didn’t stand a chance. Anyway, they thought it might make me trigger happy.’
‘And did it?’
Sexton hesitated. ‘No.’
‘So you switched to CID,’ said Dixon.
‘Was switched. Back to uniform first though.’
‘Tell me about your partner.’
‘Husband. We got married just over a year ago. He’s on leave at the moment. There was an incident.’
‘Did he have to shoot someone?’
‘He did. Up on the Mendips,’ said Sexton, raising his eyebrows. ‘Near Priddy.’
‘Is he all right?’ asked Dixon, shifting in his seat.
‘He’ll be fine. Your statement helped, apparently.’
‘He did what he had to do.’
‘Thanks.’
‘You didn’t tell me his name.’
‘Jayden Blake.’
‘What did you make of this stuff?’ asked Dixon, opening the red box file on the table in front of him.
‘Some names have been blanked out from the police statements, informers probably. And they had someone undercover by the looks of things. This can’t be all of them either. There are none from the Tactical Vehicle Crime Unit, Brian Hocking’s colleagues. You’d expect something from them, surely?’
Dixon nodded. Then he took a handful of statements from the box file and began flicking through them. He glanced at Sexton. Tall, short blond hair, a DIY job with clippers probably, an old ear piercing, and a striking resemblance to the Tunnel King in The Great Escape. He’d have to google the actor’s name later.
‘I’ll leave you in peace to read that,’ said Sexton, putting in a set of earphones. ‘I’m going to . . .’
‘You carry on,’ said Dixon.
He watched Sexton: eyes closed, head nodding up and down. Dixon smiled and turned back to the statements: a selection from the investigation into each murder, all of them with sections or names blanked out. He frowned. It was to be expected in what the manual would classify as an ‘intelligence led’ operation, the need to protect the identity of the witnesses obvious, and the officers involved in – he glanced at the lid – Operation Bowood would have known who they were anyway. But it made it difficult for those looking back over twenty years later.
In the bottom of the box, in a clear plastic wallet all on its own, was a report from a chartered clinical psychologist, Dr Steven Pearson. Dixon turned to the final paragraph.
‘To conclude, therefore, in my opinion the likely killer is a young (mid-thirties) white male suffering from an antisocial personality disorder (psychopath). He is highly intelligent, likely to have a history of violence in the family, either domestic and/or professional, and is likely to have witnessed and/or suffered extreme violence as a child. He will be prone to violent mood swings and be fastidious to the point of obsession. He is likely to have difficulty forming relationships and will, therefore, live alone, probably in an upmarket flat. He is likely to be familiar with the local area.’
A description wide enough to cover just about everyone involved in organised crime Dixon had ever encountered. Even the Albanians. He dropped the statements back into the box and closed the lid just as a figure appeared standing by the table.
‘Tickets, please.’
Chapter Eight
A tropical fish tank. That was it. Dixon frowned.
‘You’re not a fan of modern architecture, then?’ asked Sexton.
‘That’s not architecture. It’s just a square box with a blue light. Where’s the imagination, the invention in that?’
‘No idea.’
‘I’m in the wrong business.’
Dixon looked up. Arranged over six floors, the Greater Manchester Police headquarters building was more glass than anything else, some of it blue – that must be the imaginative bit, he thought. Plastic and glass over a steel frame probably; at least Express Park had some concrete to hold it up in a strong wind. A bright blue light illuminated the GMP crest and more blue glass in the atrium, which extended the full height of the building at the front. No strip lights swinging in the breeze, though, so that was one improvement on Express Park perhaps.
Sexton had paid the taxi driver and was stuffing the receipt in his wallet.
‘C’mon, let’s get in there,’ said Dixon, looking at his w
atch. ‘It’s gone six already.’
‘DI Dixon and DS Sexton for Chief Superintendent Douglas.’
‘Take a seat,’ replied the receptionist. ‘I’ll let someone know you’re here.’
Dixon dropped his overnight bag on the floor and pulled a copy of the Manchester Daily Post out from under the glossy magazines on the glass table. He spotted the coffee machine only seconds after Sexton.
‘Want one?’
‘Better put a sugar in mine,’ replied Dixon. ‘Oh, for—’
‘What is it?’
He held up the front page of the newspaper.
‘He’s back,’ said Sexton, reading aloud.
Dixon threw the paper down on the table. ‘Looks like GMP have a leak.’
‘We’re looking into it. But it’s big news around here and impossible to keep under wraps.’
He spun round.
‘You’ll be Dixon?’
‘Yes.’
‘Chief Superintendent Douglas.’ They shook hands.
‘This is DS Sexton.’
Douglas nodded, then turned back to Dixon. ‘If it was me, I’d send a troublemaker or the best I’d got. Which are you?’
‘Both, Sir.’
‘Good answer,’ said Douglas, grinning. ‘This way.’
They were standing in the lift before he spoke again.
‘You got to him before he drowned, I gather?’
‘Yes, Sir,’ replied Dixon.
‘Did he say anything?’
‘Just his name. He wasn’t really in a fit state . . .’
‘And the post mortem?’ asked Douglas, nodding.
‘It was a trephine. And a fleam. But the pathologist will need to check the records to see if it’s the same killer. He’s going to speak to Geoffrey Burkett too.’
‘He knows him, does he?’
‘Dr Poland is an old student of his.’
‘Small world.’
‘He was going to fax up a copy of his report.’
‘Not seen it yet,’ replied Douglas, shaking his head.
Dixon watched Douglas in the mirror, straightening his tie. An unusually thick head of hair for a man in his fifties. And artificially dark: not even a single grey at the sides. Trousers slightly too long, pockets too full. Still, at least it wasn’t a pinstripe suit. He smiled. Jane would never let him out of the house looking like that, not now people knew they were living together.
Once out on to the fourth floor it was a familiar sight: open plan, workstations, glass partitioned meeting rooms and a handful of offices along the far wall.
‘I know what you’re thinking,’ said Douglas. ‘I bet it’s not like this down your way.’
‘You’d be surprised,’ muttered Dixon.
‘We’re just waiting for a couple more, and then you can brief the team. We’ve only put six on it for the time being, till we know more. You see the old boy over there?’
Dixon nodded.
‘That’s Ray Hargreaves. He was the original SIO. Seventy-nine he is now.’
‘I’m expecting to learn more from you than you will from me,’ said Dixon.
‘We’ll see.’
‘Is that it?’
‘For heaven’s sake, Manesh,’ snapped Douglas. ‘You’ll have to excuse him, Nick. DI Pandey gets a bit ahead of himself sometimes.’
Dixon sighed. It had taken him no more than twenty minutes to brief the Manchester team on developments so far, the finding of Harry Lucas and what was known about him and his background.
‘I don’t think it’s that bad.’ Hargreaves was cleaning his reading glasses with the end of his tie. ‘Considering it only happened yesterday morning and you’ve spent most of today travelling.’
‘Thank you, Sir,’ replied Dixon.
‘The last police officer who called me “sir” gave me a speeding ticket, young man. Ray will do.’
‘So is it the same killer or not?’
‘DS Rufus Chapman,’ Douglas frowned. ‘Straight to the point as always.’
‘The short answer is we don’t know yet,’ replied Dixon.
‘What d’you know about Operation Bowood?’ asked Douglas.
‘Precious little. We’ve got copies of some of the statements from each murder with bits blanked out—’
‘There was far more to it than that. I’m guessing you don’t get much in the way of organised crime down in the West Country . . .’ said Hargreaves, eyebrows raised.
‘Easy mistake to make.’
‘This was a major operation that ran for the best part of a decade,’ said Douglas. ‘Where the hell d’you start?’
Hargreaves drained his coffee, leaned back in the chair and dropped the plastic cup into a bin behind him.
‘It was fairly quiet in the late eighties,’ he said. ‘Usual stuff. The mafia had a small presence here; the triads used to charge around Chinatown as if they owned it—’
‘Which they did,’ interrupted Pandey.
‘There were a couple of smaller outfits trafficking heroin, street gangs really. Guns were everywhere, but that was about it. Then the Carters appeared from nowhere.’
‘The Carters?’ asked Dixon.
Jonny Sexton was making notes next to him.
‘Michael and Kenny. Brothers. Michael Carter was an evil son of a . . .’ Hargreaves shook his head. ‘Killed a man at the age of fifteen.’
‘How?’
‘Shot him in the head.’
‘Any other previous convictions?’
‘No.’
‘It was a turf war on a scale not seen before or since. Certainly not in Manchester,’ said Douglas. ‘I was training at the time and remember it well.’
‘I was still at school and I remember it,’ said Chapman.
‘They took the pubs, the clubs, protection, gambling, drugs. Within a very short space of time they pretty much cleared everyone out,’ continued Hargreaves. ‘They left Chinatown to the triads though. They weren’t that stupid.’
‘When was this?’
‘The early nineties. We beefed up the organised crime team in response, but the flow of information dried up. Informers were disappearing as fast as we could cultivate them. We shut down a nightclub they were using as their HQ in late ninety-five, then they took over a snooker club.’
‘Did the Carters have someone on the inside?’ asked Dixon.
‘You don’t muck about, do you?’ Pandey shook his head.
‘Yes, they did,’ said Hargreaves. ‘It’s another aspect of this we’re not particularly proud of.’
‘Who was it?’
‘That doesn’t matter now. He died in prison in 2005. Natural causes, before you ask.’
Dixon nodded.
‘Michael Carter was smart. We got someone undercover on the fringes and picked off some of the smaller fry, but we never got close to Carter himself.’
‘Those are the redacted bits in the statements?’
‘Just in the versions we sent out. You never know where they might end up,’ said Douglas. ‘We blanked out the names of the informers who are still around too. You can see the originals though.’
‘Is the undercover officer still around?’ asked Dixon.
‘His identity is classified,’ replied Douglas. ‘He’s a serving officer and it’s just too dangerous.’
‘I never knew that,’ said Chapman. ‘Who is it?
Douglas glared at Chapman, his brow furrowed.
‘How did he get in?’ asked Dixon.
‘We knew they were targeting a snooker club, so we got him a job behind the bar before the Carters bought it.’ Hargreaves shrugged his shoulders. ‘And they kept him on.’
‘Bought it?’ Dixon frowned.
‘Off Hervey’s widow.’
‘What about Carter’s family?’
‘There was a father and the brother, but we never really got close to either of them . . .’ Hargreaves’s voice tailed off.
‘Why not?’
‘The father was serving fifteen years for armed r
obbery and there was never any real evidence the brother was involved. He popped up on the surveillance from time to time, but then so did all sorts of different people.’
‘Where are they now?’
‘The father’s dead. The brother, Kenny, disappeared.’
‘And where does The Vet fit into all of this?’
‘Around about late ninety-one the violence stopped. Up to that point it had been the usual, you know, sawn-off shotguns, knives, beatings; the occasional murder of a competitor and then intimidation of the rest. Then it all went quiet.’
‘And that’s when The Vet arrived?’
‘We didn’t know it at the time. The first we knew was when Brian Hocking turned up dead,’ said Hargreaves, shaking his head. ‘He’d got a kid too.’
‘Did you see his body?’
‘Yes. There were two injuries. That’s it, just two. Hardly Carter’s beat-them-to-a-pulp style. A single incision to the neck opening up the jugular vein and then the forehead.’
‘There were rumours that Hocking had been on the take,’ said Douglas. ‘They were stealing high end cars to order and he was making sure Tactical Vehicle Crime were out of the way each time. Got greedy, we reckon.’
‘So he was killed in a way that would strike fear into anyone else thinking of defying the Carters,’ said Dixon.
‘Several others had gone missing before that, including two informers,’ said Hargreaves. ‘We’ve got nine disappearances in total between 1990 and the end of 1996.’
Douglas gestured to four piles of document archive boxes, each four boxes high, leaning against adjacent workstations. ‘All yours.’
‘And you never saw The Vet?’
‘No one did,’ said Douglas. ‘That was the whole problem.’
‘Where does the name come from, “The Vet”?’ asked Dixon.
‘We have the Manchester Daily Post to thank for that,’ said Hargreaves. ‘It came from the implements used and the surgical precision. GMP used to leak like a sieve.’
‘Used to?’
Douglas gritted his teeth.
‘The public were fairly relaxed about it,’ said Hargreaves. ‘It was perceived as villains killing villains, with the exception of Hocking, of course.’
‘And Hervey, surely?’
‘He ran a snooker club,’ said Douglas. ‘Drugs were changing hands and—’
