“Can you describe the woman to me in a bit more detail?”
“D’you think she might be part of the gang that stole my wallet?”
“I don’t know for sure, but it’s possible that she deliberately distracted you while the others moved in to make the lift.”
“Oh, my goodness! She was about 5 foot 6, very young-looking, maybe late teens, with long dark hair. She was tanned . . . sort of olive-skinned. She was wearing a black mini skirt and low cut white blouse, with a hip length fur jacket, which was undone.”
Jane glanced up from her notebook. Clive Hughes seemed to have a detailed recollection of the girl.
“Her fur jacket was undone?”
“Deliberately, I suppose, to reveal her cleavage.”
“Did she say anything to you?”
“No, not a word.”
When Jane returned to the Dip Squad office, Stanley and Maynard had become frustrated. The suspect who had been wearing the heavy leather coat was refusing to talk. However, they had discovered hidden pockets throughout the lining of his coat containing watches, jewelry, wallets and other trinkets that had all been stolen. Blondie Dunston was instructed to list all the stolen goods, while the younger dark haired suspect with acne was given a good grilling. Stanley was slapping him around the back of the head.
“I know you can speak English, otherwise you wouldn’t be able to find your way around the Underground or buy a ticket . . . so, stop fucking us about, and tell us where the guy in the black raincoat has pissed off to.”
“No hablo ingles, Senor.”
Stanley looked at Maynard.
“If we know where he’s from we could get an interpreter in.”
“That’s just going to waste more time . . . he’s pissing us about. Aren’t you?”
“No hablo ingles, Senor.”
“Is he Spanish? He sounds Spanish,” Maynard muttered.
“Español?” Stanley asked.
“Colombia,” the suspect replied.
Stanley pushed his face in front of the young man. “Oh, a lying thief and a drug dealer then!”
“No soy traficante de drogas . . . No soy un ladrón.”
Maynard slapped him again. “Stop speaking that fucking language . . . Speakee de English so we understand. YOU understand?”
Stanley raised his hand to slap the suspect, but Jane interjected. She had witnessed her male colleagues physically assaulting prisoners before but she never understood why they resorted to violence—it never seemed to get them the information they wanted.
“Colombians speak Spanish. He said he’s not a drug dealer or a thief.”
There was silence in the room. Both men turned, looked at Jane with surprise and spoke in unison.
“You speak Spanish?”
“A little. I did it for A level, but it’s been a few years now . . . I’m nowhere near fluent.”
“Well, I’m sure he can understand you, so start asking what we need to know . . .”
“You’d be better off getting an interpreter,” Jane replied.
“We need answers right now. If we get an address there could be tons of nicked gear there. We’d clear up loads of pickpocket thefts, and it’d be a good result for the team. We need to find the older guy in the raincoat. Thanks to your near miss with the train, he got clean away.”
Maynard, like Stanley, was annoyed with Jane. He turned to the suspect.
“You obviously just understood what my colleague said about being a drug dealer so I’ll ask you again, you piece of shit . . . where is all the nicked gear and where’s your older mate?”
Jane moved in between the suspect and Maynard. She spoke slowly.
“Quál es su nombre?”
“Miguel Hernández.”
“Miguel . . . um . . . sabemos que había una señorita joven contigo.”
The suspect reacted, looking nervous, and avoided eye contact with Jane. Stanley nudged her.
“Whatever you just said got to him.”
“I told him we know there was a young woman working with him.”
“What’re you talking about, Tennison? It was three men!” Stanley shouted. “And thanks to you one of them got away.”
Jane handed Stanley Clive Hughes’s statement.
“Read the last paragraph, Stanley. I’d say the woman is part of the gang and was used to distract the victim so the others could dip him.”
“You saying we’re all blind?” Maynard asked, angrily.
“No, I’m saying the platform was so busy we were all concentrating on the mark and the three male suspects . . . so we missed the female.”
Jane bent down and, placing her fingers under the suspect’s chin, raised it so she had direct eye contact with him.
“Estos hombres seguirán lastimándote . . . dime dónde está la mujer y el otro hombre y se detendrá . . .”
The suspect looked Jane in the eye and was close to tears. She had told him that the officers would continue to hurt him, but if he told her the whereabouts of the girl and other man they would stop. The suspect said nothing and sat looking up at Maynard as he stepped forward with his hand raised. Miguel winced in anticipation but Jane held up her hand to stop Maynard.
“Let him talk . . .”
There was a brief pause, then Miguel looked at Jane.
“Gracias, señorita.”
“Habla usted Inglés, Miguel?”
“Yes, I speak leeetle English.”
“Good. Was there a girl with you?”
“Si . . . She my sister, Regina. They say if we no help them then they hurt us.”
Jane pulled up a chair to sit next to Miguel.
“We can help you and your sister, but in return you have to help us.”
It wasn’t long before Miguel revealed that he and his fifteen-year-old sister, Regina, had been brought to London by their uncle, Andres Hernandez, on the promise of employment and somewhere to live. Andres had subsequently taken all their money, and their passports, and was now forcing them to steal for him.
After further lengthy, and tedious, interrogation, Miguel was put into a cell while DCI Church was given an update. As he listened to them and glanced through their notes he looked up at Jane.
“Well that was a right fuck-up this afternoon, wasn’t it, Tennison? On your first day, you nearly get swept under a train, and we lose our number one suspect! Have we got an address for this uncle?” Church asked Stanley.
“Yes, it’s in the interview notes. Miguel said that the uncle owned the house they were living in. It’s in Shepherd’s Bush, not far from the flyover and near Portobello Road. If these guys are professional dippers, then Portobello Market would be the perfect location to off-load their stolen goods. When we ran a check on the uncle, Andres Hernandez, it turns out he’s wanted for aggravated burglary and a brutal sexual assault eighteen months ago. So, we’ve already got a file on him . . . he’s a nasty customer. Miguel is terrified about his uncle finding out that he’s talking to us . . . he’s very concerned for his young sister’s safety.”
“I don’t believe a word these Dagos say. That girl’s probably not even his sister,” Maynard retorted.
“I disagree,” Jane replied. “I think Miguel is telling the truth, and if his sister is only fifteen then she’s vulnerable and we need to find her.”
Church interjected. “We’ve now got grounds to get a search warrant, and find this girl . . . as well as a shed load of nicked stuff. This is sounding much more promising. Perhaps your first day hasn’t been such a total disaster after all, Tennison.”
“Thank you, sir . . .”
“Don’t thank me yet. Go back to your boyfriend and get him to give us a diagram of the floor plan of the house in Shepherd’s Bush. Then he can show us where it is.”
Church turned to Dunston and handed him the interview notes.
“Blondie, get over to Bow Street Court and get a search warrant from the magistrate for the address Miguel Hernandez gave us . . . then we’ll pay this uncle a
surprise visit.”
Chapter Two
By early evening, the whole team were in Shepherd’s Bush. Miguel’s information had brought them to a rundown premises situated above a seedy Moroccan café. From where she stood across the road with the rest of the Dip Squad, Jane could see it was lit inside by red paper lanterns and decorated with a garish Middle Eastern carpet. The charity shop next door had been boarded up. A notice hanging on the graffiti-daubed boards read “NO JUNK MAIL—OPEN AT WEEKENDS ONLY.”
Two patrol cars pulled up by the group. Handcuffed, Miguel sat fretfully in the back seat of the front car looking out at his uncle’s building.
Stanley leaned through the front passenger window to talk to Church. “According to my Moroccan friend who runs the cafe there, an older man entered the premises at around 4:30pm. As you can see, there are lights on in the first and second floors. There’s a back yard, but it belongs to this junk shop . . . and is full of junk. Fire safety would have a field day here . . . there’s no fire escape or back exit. The only way in or out is through the front door.”
Church turned around to look at Miguel in the back seat. “When you open the main front door and go up the stairs, is there another door at the top of the stairs?”
Miguel looked blankly back at him.
“Front door . . . stairs . . .” Church mimed a stair-climbing action with his fingers. “Second door?”
“No . . . only front door,” Miguel replied.
Church opened the passenger door and climbed out of the patrol car.
“Stanley, see if you can gain entry. Jane, Blondie, Maynard . . . I want you to follow me.”
He instructed the other Dip Squad officers to wait in place outside until the first group had gone in. Stanley jimmied open the front door. The threadbare brown carpet on the steep wooden stairs muffled the sound of their steps as they moved upward. When they reached the top of the staircase, they could hear the muted sound of a television set.
Church shouted “Go, go, go! This is the police! Stay where you are! I have a search warrant for these premises.”
A startled man appeared in the doorway of a room at the end of the corridor and quickly retreated as Stanley, Church and Maynard rushed toward him. Dunston pushed open the nearest bedroom door, with Jane behind him. The scene that confronted them shocked Jane to the core. Regina was tied to a bed, naked and gagged, her hands bound together to the metal bedstead and her legs tied apart so they were open. The man who had escaped from them in the Underground was having sex with Regina. He quickly rolled off her, hampered by his trousers and underpants, still halfway down his legs.
Jane was sickened by what she saw. Enraged, she ran at the semi-dressed man, kicking him as hard as she could in the groin. He collapsed in agony onto his knees raising one hand in a plea for her to stop, but she kicked him again. Dunston pulled Jane to one side.
“That’s enough, Jane. He’s scum and ain’t worth getting in trouble over.”
Dunston quickly handcuffed the suspect, dragging him out of the room. Jane went swiftly over to the bed to untie Regina, who was writhing in terror and attempting to scream through her gag.
“Bloody hell—it’s all going on in here,” Maynard said. He and Stanley were standing in the doorway, taking in the scene. “Church has just arrested Andres Hernandez at the end of the corridor.”
“Get out . . . Get out!” Jane screamed, still struggling with Regina’s bonds. Released from her gag, the girl was in floods of tears.
“Back off, you two!” Church said sternly behind Maynard and Stanley.
When Jane released her, Regina didn’t move; she was clearly in a state of shock. Jane sat on the bed next to her and gently wrapped a blanket around the young girl’s shoulders.
“It’s okay,” she said. “Está bien, Regina. You’re safe now. We are police officers . . . policía, somos la policia. Those men won’t ever touch you again . . . Esos hombres no te tocarán nunca más.”
Regina was in no condition to speak, but Jane could tell from the way she clung to her that the girl knew she was safe in Jane’s arms.
Back at Vine Street, Church wanted everything done by the book. He, like Jane, had been shocked by what Regina had been subjected too. He was not a man who revealed his emotions easily, but he took time to talk to Miguel and reassure him that his sister was safe.
Jane took Regina to the medical examination room and called for a female police doctor to examine her. She made the girl a hot cup of coffee and left her safely with a uniform WPC while she returned to the Dip Squad office to start making out her report.
Church was sitting at his desk and glanced toward her.
“You all right? Dunston told me you lost it in there.”
“Yes, sir . . . I just . . . She’s only fifteen years old, sir . . . I shouldn’t have reacted like I did.”
“No, you shouldn’t have. But the offender hasn’t complained; it’s done and forgotten as far as I’m concerned. Anyways, I had a word with the Deputy Assistant Commissioner to ask him to personally contact the Colombian Embassy. They are going to send an embassy official to the station to speak with Miguel Hernandez and see if we can secure temporary safe accommodation for her with the family of a resident diplomat.”
“Can we arrange for her brother to see her?”
“He’s being held in the cells, Tennison . . . I might be able to get her off any charges, but I can’t do anything about him.”
At that moment, Stanley walked in carrying a large evidence bag.
“Guv, we’ve finished searching the Hernandez flat . . . We found drug paraphernalia, a lot of money, stolen credit cards, as well as two more addresses for premises we believe Andres Hernandez also owns.”
“Bloody hell! We’re going to have paperwork coming out of our ears with this one.”
“Not necessarily, guv,” Stanley responded. “Take a look at what we found under the floorboards.”
Stanley pulled a bundle of passports out of the evidence bag, splaying them out like a deck of cards in front of Church. “These belong to fourteen different girls, all under the age of sixteen. This has to be handed over to Vice now . . . it’s no longer Dip Squad territory.”
“Nice one, Stanley. Thank Christ for that. Vice can deal with all the paperwork now. We just need to follow procedure with the arrested suspects for the pickpocket charges, then they can go up in front of the Magistrates. And we don’t need to worry about Regina’s rapist after you dealt with him, Tennison . . . that’s one hell of a right foot you’ve got. But you’d better stop making a habit of this . . . I know what happened when you were a decoy.”
Jane had a flashback to the time when she had been acting as a decoy in London Fields, Hackney. A man had attacked her with intent to rape, and she had never forgotten the feeling of violation.
“You’d better get on with completing your report, and you can make the bail objections at court tomorrow morning.”
As Jane and Stanley left Church’s office she felt flattered to have been trusted with this task, but at the same time wasn’t at all sure how to make out the objection to bail, as she was not certain exactly what it should be.
“Stanley, this bail objection . . . could you just fill me in on what’s required?”
“Sorry, luv, I’m off to the pub to celebrate. Ask Blondie. He’ll tell you what you need to write. Oh, and photocopy these girls’ passports for our records; they might also be dippers.” He handed her the wad of passports and walked off.
Jane copied the passports first and left them on Stanley’s desk with the copies. With Dunston’s help, she spent the next hour writing out the report for the arrests they had made. She thanked him, and as it was now after eight in the evening she said she would head off home.
“I wouldn’t if I were you. The team will be expecting you at the pub. I’ll walk you over there . . . and be prepared for getting some stick.”
“Do you know what time I should be at court in the morning?”
“No, but call in first thing. Just make sure you’ve got all the paperwork.”
Jane hesitated. She was unsure whether she could take police documents home with her, but as Dunston didn’t appear concerned she picked up all the reports and put them in her briefcase.
The favored watering hole for the Dip Squad was the Snug Bar at the Dog and Duck, an ornate Victorian building with lavish interior tiling and grand gold-leafed mirrors. As Blondie Dunston had predicted, she was the butt of all their jokes. DCI Church laughed as Stanley relayed how Jane had nearly been “squashed like a fly under the oncoming train.”
“Well, Tennison, you know the train drivers on the underground get time off for a jumper. Here you go, have another glass of wine on me.”
Jane took the stream of repetitive jokes about how she had fouled up on her first day and almost ended up under a train. While they were all getting plastered, especially Stanley, she made her escape.
Jane was exhausted, after her first day, but on returning to her flat she immediately felt better. It made such a huge difference to have a place of her own to go home to. She had just run a bath, and was wearing her dressing gown, when the phone rang. The sound took her by surprise, but then she smiled realizing that it was her own phone.
“Jane? It’s Edith. How did your first day go?”
“It could have been better . . . I think I’ll have a lot to learn. It’s very different from Bow Street. I was on an arrest of two pick pockets, and I’ll be taking the case to court tomorrow.”
“Oh, jolly good. Now listen, I know you advertised a room in The Job. Have you had any takers?”
“Well, I’ve been out all day and didn’t get back until quite late, so there’s nobody yet.”
“Listen, dear, you really need to monitor any applicants. And if there are no takers then you should put an advert up at one of the colleges close to your flat. You don’t want any one too old, or too young, and you need to make out a list of questions to ask them, especially about their diet . . . God forbid you should get a vegan moving in! And check if they have boyfriends. You don’t want a man moving in at weekends as well, because that’s what happens . . . You need to make firm rules, no visitors . . . it’s best to make sure they are single and employed. And you must get references, as well as six weeks rent in advance. Plus you’ll need to declare any lodgers to the Met, as I told you . . .”
Good Friday Page 4
