A Duty of Revenge Read online

  From beat copper to detective superintendent, I had always felt empathy with the victims of the crimes I dealt with, particularly those who were weak or vulnerable and thus more likely to experience long-term mental anguish alongside what was often physical pain. Lisa Holland, her dad and the rest of her family would never get over what happened to her, however loving they were and however tough she might be. Despite that empathy, I tried never to get “involved” with the individuals concerned, as along that route lay mental anguish of my own. Instead, I allowed myself to feel aggrieved on their behalf and use my time and effort in getting revenge or retribution for them. As a professional, I should describe my goal as justice. Maybe for crimes like theft or damage, justice fits the bill. But a personal attack like this one? Surely justice needed to deliver some tangible revenge. Justice. Revenge. A dichotomy? Different words, with different definitions, evoking different feelings – but are they the same?

  Lisa Holland didn’t receive justice. The delivery mechanism ran its course – but failed – so her father took a small measure of revenge. Can justice only be given? Or does it sometimes have to be taken?

  I’d wrestled with such dilemmas ever since I’d joined the police at nineteen, and was none the wiser after twenty-eight years. My interest in the concept had been spawned by my first sergeant, a blunt Yorkshireman, whose guiding mantra was “do right or do nowt”. His beliefs guided his methods. Do the right thing morally – if the law allowed. If the law didn’t facilitate it, his morals would not allow him to take a lawful course of action that was likely to result in consequences that did not support the right outcome as he saw it. Over my service, I have come to realise that police work, like life – like justice – is rarely black or white, but shades of grey. Furthermore, how the police are allowed and enabled to achieve justice through the law has changed and shifted over time, like the sands on an exposed beach.

  Sean Grantmore had escaped justice. The court case should have delivered it, as the evidence had been legally gathered and well presented. There was no way now I could help the Hollands gain revenge, but I was planning to do “right by doing nowt”. Grantmore was scum – owning a number of brothels fronting as massage parlours and in that role had gathered previous convictions for several physical and indecent assaults. I thus had no qualms about flouting procedure and not charging Lisa’s father. My first sergeant, now in his eighties and long-retired, would have been proud of me.

  I was dragged from my somewhat sanctimonious and depressing thoughts by a knock on my door.

  ‘Got a problem, boss.’ DS Braggs walked into the office without ceremony and joined me at the window. ‘He’s as good as gold, admits assaulting Grantmore, but he won’t accept a caution. Says he wants to be charged so he can tell his story in court.’

  I had anticipated that Holland was so wound up that he might take that approach, and I didn’t want to get Braggs involved in my breach of police procedure. On its own, an assault that necessitated a trip to the hospital in an ambulance, as it had done in Grantmore’s case, should have led to a charge and a court appearance. Throw in the witnesses of judge, jury and three coppers and there was no doubt a caution was inappropriate. Furthermore, a caution had to be accepted by the accused and proved by their signature, as it is essentially a finding of guilt.

  ‘Don’t worry, Gav, you get off home. I’ll sort it out.’

  He dug his hands into the pockets of his suit trousers and stuck his chin out. I was in for an argument.

  ‘Gavin, go home. I’m not charging Holland. He’d get a conviction he can well do without.’

  ‘I don’t agree…’

  ‘Go home.’

  Still with his hands in his pockets and with his chin stuck out like a belligerent schoolboy, he stomped out of the office, knowing further discussion was not an option.

  *

  The Police and Criminal Evidence Act of 1984, or PACE as it is commonly known, is often referred to as a watershed in modern policing, and for coppers like me who actually learnt their trade before then, it had certainly proved to be a massive shift in the balance of power between delivering justice and the rights of the suspect. Yet here we are today, years later, with every TV detective carrying on like we’re still in the seventies. I tell you, it pisses me off – and spoils all the cop shows for loads of officers and their families, as the legal mastermind on the couch rubbishes the storyline accompanied by a lecture on PACE. We watch as the TV detective cuts massive legal corners with barely a murmur from the custody sergeant. In the real world, most custody sergeants want to reach their pension and follow PACE rigidly, protecting their prisoners like a lion protects its cubs. Everything, and I mean everything, is recorded on the electronic custody sheet. Video and audio recording in custody suites renders any actions or words that could be interpreted as contrary to PACE as likely to ruin any prosecution. The vast majority of pre-PACE coppers just rolled over, left the police force and joined the police “service”. The small minority of those who wished to remain on the force either got caught big style and were “retired”, or after some smaller misdemeanour begrudgingly toed the line. An even smaller minority just got ever more careful and crafty.

  Custody Sergeant Howard Mulligan had opted for the service approach, and like many career-long uniformed officers, he was no fan of the CID, viewing us as arrogant, vain, elitist, lazy, womanising pissheads. Add to that his views, shared by many, that any officer above the rank of inspector must have got there through brown-nosing and were, as a group, over-educated tossers who had never experienced real police work, then detective superintendents were about as welcome in his custody suite as moths in your wardrobe. He was the custody sergeant that evening. The one I now had to convince to see things my way. Fortunately, I had no problem with Howard Mulligan.

  As a newly promoted inspector, I had attended the scene of a violent domestic incident when a young and inexperienced PC Mulligan had requested urgent assistance. I arrived to a veritable bloodbath. A drunken man had slashed his wife across the cheek with a Stanley knife as a permanent reminder not to flirt with other men, an action he claimed to have witnessed in the local pub earlier that evening. He had drunkenly explained his thought processes to the young PC, while still clutching the bloodstained Stanley knife, with his sobbing and bleeding wife watching on. Trust me, this is a fairly average type of incident a beat copper regularly faces, and as a new recruit from a stable middle-class home, Howard Mulligan found himself frightened, disconcerted and angry.

  As the drunken husband continued to justify his actions, young PC Mulligan snapped, head-butting the man and breaking his nose. This was the point at which I entered the scene. The man was arrested and charged with wounding but obviously wanted to complain that he too had been assaulted. At three in the morning, I was the most senior officer on duty, so it was with me he raised his complaint.

  PC Mulligan was distraught, ashamed at his lack of control and unprofessionalism and couldn’t stop saying so when I took him into my office. He knew he had committed a crime and feared the sack and made no effort to justify his actions. After he had unburdened himself, I let him read the statement I had taken from the injured wife. With some coaching from me, she had agreed that her husband had waved the Stanley knife in a threatening manner at the calm young officer and he had had little choice in view of their close proximity but to defend himself with a single head-butt. Mulligan still failed to grasp the lifeline I had thrown him, as he was so traumatised. It took me some minutes to convince him that this was exactly what had happened. I then formally cautioned him and together with the duty sergeant, we interviewed him for the assault the man alleged. As tutored, he responded to give a complete and legal defence to an assault – that of proportionate self-defence. Six months later in Crown Court at the man’s trial, Mulligan described his act of self-defence and the judge commended the young constable for his honesty and his courage. Mulligan was forever gratef
ul and when he got promoted a few years later, when PACE had been enacted, I got a tame custody sergeant. We had never spoken about that night since. Originally, he had been all too keen to show his gratitude by covering up minor PACE infringements, but as my career progressed and the villains and crimes I dealt with became more serious, I knew he was becoming progressively out of his depth – and also growing to hate my guts. But hey-ho, there you go; shouldn’t go nutting prisoners and getting into the clutches of Matt Darnley.

  I rang the custody suite. ‘Evening, Sergeant. Detective Superintendent Darnley here. Don’t reply until you have heard what I have said… remember… that tape is running.’

  I paused and could hear his breathing quicken.

  I looked at my watch – it was 5.10pm. ‘Record on the custody record that Holland was formally cautioned by me at 5.15pm and then formally release him. Leave the custody suite as if you were escorting him to the front exit of the nick but bring him up here. Straight up to my office. Don’t explain to him. He’ll just be pleased to be on his way home. I know you want to know how I am going to cover this one but you’ll have to trust me. Make that entry and it covers you, and I’ll take care of the rest.’

  I hung up, knowing they’d soon appear.

  I checked my watch again. I needed to get this matter sorted and get to the briefing at Driffield by six. I mused again on the course of action I was about to take, the rules I was about to flout and likely repercussions if I was found out. I was doing the right thing.

  I was standing at my window looking down on Queens Gardens, watching folks making their way home from work, thinking that I still had to persuade Crabbe to give me additional staffing for the incident, when Mulligan ushered Holland into the room.

  ‘Thank you, Sergeant, the paperwork I need to complete will be done before you go off at eleven. Come in, Mr Holland. I’m Detective Superintendent Darnley. We’ve never met but DS Braggs and DC Young are members of my team. I was in court this afternoon for the verdict and I wanted to speak to you before you leave.’

  Before Holland could respond, Mulligan stepped forward in front of him and through gritted teeth hissed, ‘I’ve had enough of this. This is the last time.’

  With a friendly smile, I beckoned a clearly angry yet distressed Mulligan forward and whispered in his ear, ‘You will have had enough when I say you’ve had enough. It’ll be sorted with my head on the block if it goes wrong, not yours.’

  Still smiling at Mr Holland, I guided the sergeant out of the office and offered my hand to Lisa’s dad. ‘I am so sorry about the verdict. I wanted you to know that we all believed your daughter and I hope that makes some difference to you and your family.’

  Holland just stood staring at me, his gaunt face expressionless. I felt extremely uncomfortable and would have preferred open grief, anger, disgust or indeed any of the emotions I would have expected, but I now felt at a loss as to what to do or say next. All I wanted was to persuade him to sign a caution form and get him out of the nick and myself to the briefing. Rules dictated that a caution must involve a tape-recorded admission of guilt, but I knew he’d never go for that in his state of mind and I didn’t blame him. I knew that the chances of the custody record ever being cross-referenced with an admission on tape and matched up to the caution form was negligible.

  After about ten seconds, Holland moved to the window and looked out at the scene below. ‘It’s ruined my daughter’s life, this whole experience. She barely leaves the house and when she does, she returns in pieces. That bastard must pay for that… he will pay.’

  ‘Lisa was brave to come forward, to stand in court and face him. She’s not a quitter. She’ll get better, give it time.’ I realised as I said it I sounded trite and condescending, and was not surprised when Holland erupted.

  ‘I know that… don’t lecture me about my own daughter… but he can’t get away with it. I’m her father. It’s my job to protect her… always. Her mother’s dead… there’s only me. I couldn’t protect her that night or today in court, but by God, I can make recompense and I’ll have him.’

  I put my hands on his shoulders, hoping I could calm him and try and reason with him, but he shrugged me off, squaring up to me with his fists clenched, albeit held low at his sides. He looked me square in the eyes with undisguised malevolence. I feared he was about to attack me and stepped back and away from him, my thighs backing into my desk, so that I was trapped. He followed and grabbed my upper arms with such strength and ferocity that I was unable to move as he thrust his face close to mine and almost growled.

  ‘The man’s an animal, a dangerous fucking animal…’

  He suddenly seemed to realise where he was and what he was doing. He released his grip, stepped back and then seemed to collapse inwardly, his shoulders slumped and his fists relaxed.

  ‘Sorry, it’s not your fault. Gavin and Jo were great… it’s the system. We used the system and it’s failed us. Oh, just let me go home.’ He was close to tears now.

  Although my instincts were to try and smooth things over, I knew this was not the time, so I moved over to my desk, picked up my pen and said, ‘Come on, let’s get you home. Just sign this release form.’

  I was banking on the fact he would be too distraught to read it and sure enough he just grabbed the pen and dragged a line across the caution form where I had indicated. Good enough for my purposes. When I filled in the form and sent it for filing along with the detected crime report for the assault on Grantmore, the paper and computer records would all match and the Holland case would be officially closed.

  Before he could ask any further questions, I put my arm across his shoulders and guided him out of the office and along the CID corridor. As we made our way downstairs, he remained quiet, lost in his own thoughts, but as we neared the front foyer of the station, he stopped and turned towards me, his icy blue eyes again locking onto mine.

  ‘How can you do your job knowing that an animal like Grantmore can just rub your nose in his shit? Did you see him wink at Lisa, when he got off? Rubbing her nose in it too. Well, he’s not going to do that to me. Dangerous animals need caging… or rendering harmless…’

  He turned, wrenched open the door to the street and walked rapidly away. I stood there thinking, Darnley, you may well have dropped a bollock.

  If only I’d known.

  Six

  Four Days Later

  Saturday, 19th December 1998

  Busy days, however, soon dispelled the worry that my altruistic, albeit slightly dodgy dealings with Russ Holland would come back to bite me on the arse. As well as the Emmerson murder and robbery, I was still SIO on a domestic murder that had taken place in October. It had reached a crescendo of activity as we amassed the evidence to arrest and charge Oliver Daggett for beating his wife to death with a cast-iron lamp stand, when he discovered her affair with his business partner. His alibi of a business trip, and finding her body when he came home, although a fairly obvious lie, had taken us several weeks to dismantle. This was Daggett’s first foray into crime, and his efforts to cover his tracks, although impressive, had proved ultimately inadequate.

  Two or three days after I had seen Holland storm out of Central, I had all but forgotten about him and his poor daughter. The evening after Grantmore’s acquittal, the Hull Daily Mail had carried the story of the court case – and how he had got his swollen knackers. The young reporter had sacrificed short-term glory for my promise of bigger and better stories and his piece was sympathetic to the Hollands, leaving the reader in little doubt as to how fortunate Grantmore was to be acquitted. As I had hoped, Grantmore had also kept a low profile and had been “unavailable for comment”. I rang the reporter, Richard Wilde, as promised and gave him some steamy “off-the-record” inside stories about the murdered Sonia Daggett’s love affair with her husband’s business partner, Chris Knowles – who also happened to be a very prominent local councillor. Sonia hadn’t
deserved to die but neither did Chris Knowles deserve to take full control of D & K Engineering, so a bit of public embarrassment for the pompous arse fitted nicely with my idea of getting justice done – and got young Wilde owing me a favour in the future.

  On the Saturday morning after we had charged Daggett, I’d had a much-needed lie-in before popping into the incident room at Driffield. I intended to work for just a few hours to catch up with my reading on that job – which was getting nowhere fast. I parked my Honda Accord in the rear yard of Driffield nick, which on a Saturday morning was virtually empty, and made my way to the incident room, and within forty-five minutes I was wading through a whole tray load of statements trying to catch up with the finer detail of the crimes. My efforts to try and persuade the Chief to give me additional staffing had failed, despite my usually successful manipulations. I guess his desire to put on the additional Christmas uniform pantomime had overridden his earlier worries. So with not quite enough staff, the necessity of me reading every statement and considering every angle became even more vital. I also had several statements from the Daggett murder with me, as despite the charge, there were still several inconsistencies that were nagging at me.

  Once again, unlike on the telly, it’s often after the murder charge is laid that the detailed work really begins. Okay, we all go to the pub straight after the charge, but unless you want some clever barrister pulling your case to bits, you then make sure the job is watertight. In my experience, it doesn’t even pay to relax after the conviction, as very few murderers just give in gracefully and sit in their cell making matchstick models. Appeals are almost automatic and the science of hindsight is then applied to your investigation in a second concerted effort to rubbish it. Equally, the ace TV detectives never seem to have to balance being SIO on two non-linked murder enquiries at once. On the telly, just the boss and his trusty sidekick find the serial killer in an hour – or less if there are adverts. In reality, the bulk of the effort is in the mundane piecing together of the known facts to make a coherent and thus convincing sequence of events, which will initially convince the Crown Prosecution Service there is a realistic prospect of a conviction. Then there’s a judge and jury. I can tell you, switching your mind from one set of names, dates, times, witnesses, suspect and evidence to an entirely different case is not easy.