by Karl Holton
Wallace stood up. “Ok everyone, let’s settle down now that we’re all here.”
“No DCI Rowe today, boss?” said Scott as he sat down. Her team laughed.
“DCI Rowe is currently looking after Johnnie Garrett and is bringing him here later for questioning,” she said, telling her team to calm down with a hand gesture. She handed out a forensic report to everyone. “Dr Shafir has kindly offered to come here and I’ve agreed to let him go first so that he can get away … Doctor.”
Shafir adjusted a set of small spectacles and looked around the room. “Thank you, DI Wallace. I think we’ll go in order of each crime, but I’ll stick to the primary points. The rest you can read in the preliminary reports and obviously we’re still investigating many items,” he said, opening a thin file. “As you already know the murders of Curt Garrett and Billy Horne and others at Southend are all connected. We’ve now confirmed that bullets from the scene in Great Warley were also from the same rifle,” he said, looking around the room. “So your sniper was involved in all three events.”
“Have you had time to make an assessment of the type of rifle?” Benedict asked.
Shafir’s eyes flashed at him over his glasses. “Between our office and the Essex forensic team we believe the rifle is an L85A2 with a twenty-inch barrel. This is based on the collected data from all the bullets compared with known samples.”
Benedict placed a hand on the desk. “Have you calculated the shot distance of the sniper at Great Warley?”
“Yes, you only went there that night … so we didn’t have the benefit of you finding the shell casings and telling the forensic team what happened,” Shafir said, looking at his file. Everyone laughed, including Benedict. “We’ve found the spot from which he fired; he was two hundred and thirty-eight metres away, north-west on the B186. There was a shell casing in the undergrowth beside the road.”
“Why was he so far away?” Paulsen asked.
Shafir raised a hand to his chin. “Well for someone like this sniper he wouldn’t think it was that far. We’re sure that he has a decent scope on the weapon so this was well within the effective range.”
Paulsen sat forward. “So why did he miss Tommy Gibbs?”
Shafir nodded as he removed his glasses. “We’ve analysed the sniper position and shot profile and suspect Gibbs might have moved towards his car and become difficult for the sniper to see. This meant the sniper had to move. We also have reason to believe the sniper hadn’t chosen the site.”
“How can you say that?” Paulsen asked, noticing some in the room wondering if the question was appropriate. “I mean … is there some forensic evidence that tells you this?”
Shafir looked down at his papers. “That’s a really good question, DS Paulsen. I can tell that the years you spent with Benedict have worked. The answer is more about our experience than forensics. We’ve seen a lot of these over the years and once we’d worked out everything it’s the only circumstances that explain it. From where he was situated he could see the seats outside the pub. But the moment Gibbs moved he became invisible to the sniper. The shape of the road and the way the car was parked meant he couldn’t see him.”
Wallace looked up from the report. “Yes, but how can you tell he didn’t choose the site?”
Shafir put his elbows on the table. “He’s a sniper so he wants to settle himself and calm down to get ready for the shot. If you look at the village and the view of the pub what it offers is poor and there’s no coverage for him; the roads are busy and have traffic. So he found a place up the B186 which was far more secure and provided a good view of the pub. The downside … at the time he was looking straight at the sun, which is never good for a sniper, especially one on the move. Given my experience, I just don’t think he would have chosen this site with the weapon he had.”
Scott put his hands behind his head. “Or maybe he’s just shit?” he muttered.
“Doctor Shafir is right,” Benedict stated. “Given what we’ve seen so far and his approach to the kill shot on Curt Garrett this guy is very skilled … he wouldn’t want to fire his weapon in these conditions.”
Paulsen sighed. “What can you tell us about Tommy Gibbs and how he got away from the scene?”
“We can tell the starting position of the car from the tyre marks on the ground. He reversed very quickly, missing the van that hit the parked car. He drove up Dark Lane and turned right into Green Lane. We know he drove through Brentwood to his home where we found his car abandoned. He and his wife disappeared so we assume they’ve taken another car. We’re still working on finding where they went with Traffic, but they think he didn’t use major local roads.”
Benedict touched his beard. “I think his getaway from the scene is telling. Tommy knows his way around the area and knows which roads to take if he was trying to hide. It worked to get him away from the scene so he used the same tactic getting away from his house with his wife. The attackers lost him and hadn’t considered all the getaway options; this suggests that they are not locals.”
“What about tracing him – maybe with mobile phones?” Wallace asked.
“Nothing,” Shafir said. “Both their mobiles were left in the house. So they must have had alternatives ready to use that they don’t have registered to them.”
Wallace sighed. “They were ready to run.”
“Just as you would expect for someone in their profession,” Benedict said.
Shafir returned his gaze to his papers. “As you also know, we have forensically proved that it wasn’t Gibbs sitting in the chair at dinner in the hotel. His DNA doesn’t match the sweat DNA we’ve found. In fact, we’ve now matched this to one of the other members of the gang who were killed at the pub.” Shafir looked around the room. “In fact, all six DNA profiles in those dining chairs match the dead gang members and Gibbs isn’t one of them.”
Wallace glanced at Benedict, before addressing the room. “Plus we know that the ten-pound note was from Tommy Gibbs … it has his fingerprint. This proves that Tommy was trying to make the hotel his alibi and deceive us. He must have travelled back to London after killing Billy Horne’s brother with the shotgun as revenge.”
Shafir looked at her, placing a hand on the table. “Your conjecture works on the basis of those facts.”
Benedict noticed Shafir’s face. It had a look which told him there was more information. “Conjecture? Do you have something to tell us, Jonathan?”
Shafir’s eyes glinted over his glasses. “Benedict knows that I don’t call forensic evidence ‘good’ or ‘bad’ … but I do like to use ‘intriguing’ and ‘revealing’. I’ll let you have the intriguing one first,” he said, looking at another paper. “The assault rifles used to help the Gibbs gang in Southend were the same ones that killed them outside the pub. The bullets match.”
The tumult in the room was tangible.
Wallace looked at Benedict knowing that this supported what he’d been telling the team about a third party. The questions in her head were firing like those bullets. He can’t really be this good … he must have a source. Is someone like that Hanson feeding him information? Does he think this third party is somehow involved in the art theft?
Benedict scratched his temple quickly, wanting to return calm to the room. “And the revealing one?”
Shafir smiled at Benedict’s desire to remain on point. “We used the warrant to search Tommy’s house thoroughly … we’ve found the shotgun and it hasn’t been cleaned. It forensically connects him to the murder of Rich Horne.”
A thrill swept around the room.
Scott clapped his hands loudly. “What a cock.” Everyone laughed.
Wallace let everyone enjoy the revelation for a few moments, before raising her hand. “I’m sure we can read your reports once written so can we move on now to the next matter? The theft of the art.” She looked at Grant. “Doctor, what can you tell us about the murder of Mr Davidson and the three people at the Parker Shipping Company?”
“Davidson
was killed with a knife to the back of the neck. The other three were killed with a single pistol shot all from very close range.”
Paulsen looked at Shafir. “What about forensically?”
“Obviously the scene in East Ham was almost destroyed by fire and I must say that Doctor Grant did a tremendous job of discovering the cause of death,” Shafir said, as if announcing it. “We’ve cross-referenced the bullets and the only thing to say at the moment is that all three were shot by the same gun."
Wallace and Benedict glanced at each other. She could see he wasn’t going to ask if there was any link between the murders. At their meeting with Hanson earlier, just before they left he said he knew of no connection between the art theft and the drug gang murders. She didn’t believe him. She also sensed that Benedict knew more than he was saying to her. I’ll kick his arse if tells me he was protecting me.
Benedict looked at Shafir. “Don’t you think the three shootings were unusual?”
“In what way?” Shafir asked, sitting back smiling.
“The woman was shot through the front of her head from about forty centimetres away while she was seated. The men were shot through the ear while on the phone and through the back of the neck; both shots were point blank. If all three people had been alive in the room at the same time as the killer before he started shooting, what do you think the likelihood is he could achieve this?”
Shafir nodded, almost starting to laugh. “Zero,” he said. “Given the accuracy of all three shots and lack of defence positioning or other wounds means these all happened individually and most likely by surprise.”
“Exactly,” Benedict said tapping the table with a finger. “The killer must have used something to get them to relax and then enter the room … so he could kill them one by one. Probably a fake ID.” He looked around to see the expectant faces staring at him. “I don’t think this tells us much more than the guy is cool, organised and ruthless.”
Shafir and Grant made it obvious that they needed to leave and after a short time they left the team discussing what they now knew.
Scott sat forward. “Well at least we think we know what happened with the art,” he said, checking a piece of paper he had in front of him. “We have it driving from central London down to Folkestone all on camera. The van went under the channel on the Shuttle at 13.36pm yesterday.”
Wallace looked at Scott. “Have we spoken to the French police and notified Interpol?”
Scott nodded. “All done; the van left Calais but there is nothing later tracing it. They don’t have as many cameras as us. They’ll let us know if they find it.”
“What about the van driver’s passport?” she asked.
“We have the details but it’s fake. It’s a very good one and the French police are looking for him but he’s unlikely to use it a second time,” said Scott. “We’re running the face through the databases but we’ve not had anything yet. We’ve asked Interpol for their most likely suspects for this type of crime.”
Wallace moved a copy of the passport in her file, staring at the face. “The guy clearly wanted to move it offshore quickly. He’s taken quite a chance driving the van straight onto the shuttle.”
Benedict rubbed the muscle between his thumb and index finger, thinking about each piece in turn. “He needed to get it to the most likely place to sell them quickly … Paris.”
Wallace glanced at the clock in the room. “We’ll obviously need to discuss the art theft with the French police further and get them on the case. Let’s keep going on the drugs gangs and follow up everything. We need anything that might give us an insight into the ‘third party’ theory. If someone unknown is driving this we need to discover who it is quickly.”
Paulsen nodded. “Well at least we have Johnnie Garrett in custody,” he said. “Once we get him here, he needs to start telling us what he knows.”
Chapter 45
Day 11
Sussex Square, Brighton
12.11 p.m.
Sam checked that he had the right number one more time and dialled it.
Within twenty-four hours of Pip asking him to hack the banks, he’d traced the transactions that had happened in Hong Kong. Since then he’d worked on those in Zimbabwe and Paraguay.
His breathing was heavy as the phone rang on the speaker. He expected her to answer the phone quickly.
“Hi, Sam,” she said. “What’ve you got for me?”
“Hello, Pip, I think I have what you need. I’ve sent you some secure emails with the details.”
“Great. I’m just going to put you on the speaker so Ray can join the conversation,” she said.
Sam started to blink rapidly. “Um, I uh hadn’t prepared I …”
“Relax Sam,” she said. “We just want to talk things through.”
“I would, would err — have been …”
“It’s ok Sam,” she said, in a calming tone.
“Hi Sam, this is Ray. I’ve had a look at your work on Hong Kong. It’s Fantastic and has some superb details; it will be very well received,” Hanson said. “Can you summarise what you’ve found in relation to Paraguay and Zimbabwe?”
Sam listened without breathing. Slowly, he took in a deep breath. “I’ve copied various statements and records. I was able to follow the transactions from the sale of Curt Garrett’s hedge fund units by the unknown investor. I’ve traced them into the bank systems in both countries and I have the names of the original investors and a few corporates that seem to be holding the money. I’ve sent you the details.”
“Where are the companies based?” she asked.
Sam noticed that the label on his coke bottle was not facing him. He reached out and turned it towards him. “There’s a couple in both countries. The money in Zimbabwe hasn’t left the country but it’s moved to a few other bank accounts held by these companies. I’ve found where it went in the last few hours and got copies of the records. I’ve also added some emails and internal information that I thought you might find interesting.”
“What about Paraguay?” Hanson asked.
“The money that originally went to Paraguay has been moved. The investment company that originally had the funds has moved it on. Some is sitting in other companies but about half of it has done something odd.”
“What’s happened?” he asked.
Sam stared at the image from ‘Blade Runner’ that had just rotated onto one of the screens on his desk. His mind meandered. ‘All those moments will be lost in time’, he thought.
“Sam, are you with us?” Pip said. “Can you tell us about the money in Paraguay.”
He sensed the speech in his thoughts drifting away. “It went to a bank in Curaçao in the name of one of these companies from Paraguay. It’s been moved again into a separate client bank account for this company … into an internet gaming company based in Curaçao.”
Chapter 46
Day 11
Clerkenwell Road, London
1.23 p.m.
Rowe rubbed his forehead as the police van crossed over the junction from Old Street to Clerkenwell Road. He was sitting in the back with Johnnie, who was allowing his nervous tension to show.
“When I was first selling ecstasy, it was a struggle to keep up with demand.”
Johnnie seemed to have changed his attitude since he’d heard about the attack on Tommy’s gang and Rowe had arrested him. Rowe could see that he just wanted to speak to the police and get on with it.
“The guys you’re bringing me to better be ready to do a deal for information. I want new identities for me and SJ. I want a job and a house … and a nice school for the baby.”
Rowe laughed to himself in silence. Your information is worth shit but the stupid bastards here will probably buy it.
He’d been ordered by Watkins to bring Johnnie to Holborn. Right now, all Rowe wanted to do was drop Johnnie at the police station and leave. He knew Benedict and Wallace would be here so the faster he left the better.
As he looked out of the win
dow, Rowe thought about his actions over the last few days. He didn’t know exactly who these other people were that had killed both the Horne and Gibbs gang. He didn’t care. He was just glad that they’d done it, cleaning up the streets. Rowe had told them to take the smuggled drugs out of the country and they had agreed. By killing the gangs they’d got rid of some major distribution channels in the UK, so they would probably take the drugs elsewhere now. A few good days work, Rowe thought.
“Do you have any idea how much ‘charlie’ is snorted in the clubs around ‘ere,” Johnnie asked, staring out the small back window. “I bet I’ve sold more nose candy in this part of London in the last twenty years than anyone.”
Rowe shook his head in disgust. “You sound proud, Johnnie,” he said. “Do you want to claim that it was some noble pursuit?”
Johnnie stared at Rowe but remained silent. The smile on SJ’s face came to mind; the joy when he’d told her that she was pregnant. He felt his lips curl.
The van came to a stop near a set of traffic lights.
Johnnie laughed as he noticed where they’d arrived. “That’s Turnmill Street; years ago we were selling coke in the clubs down there nearly twenty-four hours a day. It was hard to get the stuff into wraps fast enough. I had people doing this for me full time; fuckin’ employees.”
Rowe didn’t speak.
“Some posh punter told me that it’s been well known for crime for centuries. He said that Shakespeare quotes it; shame he wasn’t writing when we were selling like Columbian ‘narcos’ on it. We could’ve given ‘im some crackin’ stories.”
The van pulled away and he watched Johnnie look down the street as if getting a final glimpse when leaving an old friend.
Rowe thought about the latest text request on the mobile he’d been given. ‘Find Tommy Gibbs’. “Do you have any idea where Tommy might be?” Rowe asked.
Johnnie looked at him. “How would I know where he is?”
“You went missing at the same time as Tommy. You might have helped him disappear before giving yourself up,” Rowe stated. “Is that what you did?”
