Shadow Line

by Stephen Edger

  The undercover operation had been looking into the affairs of Nikolai Stratovsky, a very senior member of a Russian crime syndicate, operating in the South East of England. The Crown Prosecution Service had spent ten months working with both the Metropolitan Police and Hampshire Constabulary to pull together sufficient evidence of the Stratovsky family’s actions to bring the case to trial. Vincent’s evidence was only a small part of the package to be used but he had been told that, when his testimony was added to the rest, the case was quite compelling.

  Organised crime in the UK had always been prevalent and every police commissioner sworn-in promised to double the efforts to end it. By his reckoning if each had lived up to their promise it would now be a thing of the past. Still, at least it kept him in a job.

  The train had arrived at Waterloo just before nine thirty and he had then caught a Northern Line train to Embankment before switching to a District Line tube to Blackfriars. He had managed to force down a bacon baguette he had picked up on the way but now the cold wind meant he desperately needed to go to the toilet. He scuttled along New Bridge Street and then onto Ludgate Hill. He had an appointment at ten o’clock with the senior prosecuting barrister, a forthright gentleman by the name of Renton. The purpose of the appointment was for Vincent to recount the evidence he was due to give in court the following Monday.

  He showed his warrant card as he entered the building and was waved through to a small reception area. He explained whom he was here to see and was told that Mr Renton was running late due to signal failure at Gloucester Road. Vincent excused himself and found a visitor’s toilet. Twenty minutes later, he was ushered into Renton’s office.

  ‘Good morning, Detective Inspector,’ Renton declared thrusting out his hand.

  Vincent took the hand and nearly winced at the bigger man’s grip.

  ‘Sit down, please,’ Renton said, turning and striding back to his desk.

  He obliged, removing his coat and scarf in the process.

  ‘Apologies for my tardiness,’ Renton continued in his stiff upper lip way. ‘How was your journey?’

  ‘Fine,’ answered Vincent, who had only ever spoken to Renton on the phone before today. Vincent had expected him to be old and fat, much like Rumpole of the Bailey but, by contrast Renton was a tall, athletic man with a neatly cut moustache and perfectly manicured hands. If ever there was a man who took pride in his appearance, this was him.

  ‘Good, good. I’m going to record our conversation if that’s agreeable to you?’ Renton said placing a small MP3 recording device on the desk between them. ‘I will also be taking some handwritten notes during the process. If you could begin by telling me what you knew of Miss Jacobs’ case, and end with what and who you witnessed at the Waterside Hotel in Southampton.’

  Vincent nodded his understanding.

  ‘I will interrupt you with arguments that the defence will likely make, so please don’t take any offence to my questions. As you answer I will try to give you pointers about how you could have better replied to the challenge.’

  ‘I have been cross-examined at court before, you know,’ Vincent replied defensively.

  Renton smiled broadly. ‘I’m sure you have Detective Inspector,’ he said. ‘Forgive me if I appear condescending; I am used to speaking with timid witnesses who’ve never set foot in a court let alone played an active role in a trial. Why don’t you begin?’

  ‘Okay, well, Ali had…’

  ‘You should refer to her as D.C Jacobs, rather than Ali,’ Renton interrupted.

  ‘Oh…yes…of course,’ he replied, beginning to feel queasy. ‘D.C. Jacobs had been working undercover as a Georgian prostitute with the identity Natalia Sporavic for several months, initially within Southampton, but the role took her to London in late 2011 as her cover grew deeper.’

  ‘You should probably say she was Eastern European, rather than Georgian,’ Renton interjected.

  ‘Okay, well as I was saying, the work took her to London as her character became romantically involved with one of the senior figures in the family.’

  ‘I want you to be more specific at this juncture. Her case file says her character was in a relationship with the second defendant, Victor Stratovsky. We have photographic evidence of the two of them together so I doubt the defence will dispute this point, in fact they will probably claim that Jacobs was guilty of entrapping Victor. What we want your evidence to show is that he was present at the hotel when she was shot and killed.’

  He nodded, although a wave of nausea was preventing him from concentrating properly. He asked for a glass of water and Renton threw him a small bottle from a mini fridge in the corner of the room.

  He continued to recount how Natalia Sporavic had been arrested and held overnight by Hertfordshire police following Saunders’ execution, and that she had been passed into his care. Renton would interrupt the testimony every minute or so to reword the statement.

  ‘So what happened when the two of you returned to Southampton?’

  ‘D.C. Jacobs received a phone call on the journey down the M3 and started acting cagey afterwards. I suspected the call had come from an escaped prisoner…’

  ‘Stop there,’ said Renton. ‘If you are about to say the name Mark Baines, please do not. I am well aware of D.C. Jacobs’ involvement with this prisoner but I don’t see any relevance to you mentioning it at this time.’

  ‘But it was her change in behaviour on the car journey that led to me putting a trace on her mobile phone.’

  ‘Okay, well maybe you should say that you suspected the call came from within the organisation and it was this that led to your suspicions. If you mention Baines, you will weaken her credibility.’

  ‘Okay, well I put the trace on her phone and was able to monitor her movements around the city. She had been suspended from duty and I had given her specific instructions not to continue with her investigations…’

  ‘So she ignored your order? Was D.C. Jacobs in the habit of ignoring commands and undertaking activities under her own steam?’ Renton challenged.

  He knew the barrister was right.

  ‘Perhaps if you were to leave out that part it would be better,’ Renton continued. ‘You could say that your suspicions peaked when you saw her phone signal at the hotel wasn’t moving. Perhaps you feared that some misadventure may have befallen her, and that was what led to you and your team storming the hotel and disturbing the meeting?’

  ‘You want me to lie?’

  Renton smiled broadly again. ‘No Detective Inspector, I do not want you to lie. However, I think you need to be careful about giving the defence ammunition to shoot down the case. They will try and paint Jacobs as a lone wolf, an officer with a vendetta against the family, determined to entrap them into meeting her at the hotel to frame them for a crime they did not instigate. So far, everything you have told me about her will paint such a picture.’

  Vincent drank from the bottle.

  ‘Who did you see at the hotel when you arrived?’

  ‘I arrived at the hotel bar in the aftermath of a gun fight. I found D.C. Jacobs lying in a pool of blood but still alive. I saw two men fleeing for the patio doors that led out into the car park.’

  ‘And can you describe what either of these men looked like?’

  ‘One of them was a large IC-1 male with dark hair and a beard who I have subsequently been told was Boris Cradlec.’

  ‘Who told you who he was? How can you be certain this man was Cradlec?’

  ‘Let me rephrase, blood samples taken at the scene have been subsequently confirmed as Cradlec. Having reviewed pictures of him, I am certain he was one of the men fleeing the hotel.’

  ‘And who was the second man?’

  ‘I believe…’

  ‘You believe? Do you not know?’

  ‘The man I saw fleeing the hotel bar with Cradlec was Victor Stratovsky. CCTV footage of the hotel car park has also subsequently identified that he was the man exiting the patio doors when I arrived.’


  ‘And did Jacobs manage to tell you anything?’

  ‘Sadly, D.C. Jacobs had been shot during the exchange and she passed away there on the floor in front of me.’

  Vincent felt his voice crack.

  ‘Thank you, Detective,’ Renton said solemnly. ‘I will have my notes typed up and emailed across to you by tonight, and we can speak again on Monday morning just to make sure that you are comfortable with what you have to say.’

  Vincent smiled glumly.

  ‘How is the rest of the case going?’ Vincent asked.

  ‘You mean aside from last week’s set-back?’

  ‘Set-back? What set-back?’

  ‘One of our key witnesses was killed on Friday morning.’

  ‘Really? Can the Stratovsky family be tied to it?’

  Renton laughed. ‘Whilst it has proved a stroke of luck for their case, I don’t actually think they are involved in the slightest this time.’

  ‘How come?’

  ‘Well the witness was one of many victims in an office shooting. In fact, you should know all about it, it was in your neck of the woods.’

  Vincent forced back the nausea again as he tried to process what Renton had said.

  ‘You’re kidding, right? Your witness worked for IPSA?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Renton, standing to put his blazer jacket on. ‘I hope you will forgive me, but I have another meeting to attend.’

  ‘What was the witness’ name?’

  Renton seemed to miss the question as he packed some papers into his briefcase.

  ‘Mr Renton?’ Who was the witness?’

  ‘Hmm? Oh, sorry…errr…McGee, Mike McGee.’

  The name didn’t ring a bell with Vincent but he could check up on it on his return to the office later.

  ‘And what was the nature of his evidence?’

  Renton smiled. ‘I can’t share that with you I’m afraid, as I don’t want it to influence your own testimony. All I will say is that it is a shame he won’t be able to testify next week.’

  28

  Who is Mike McGee? That was the question that Vincent kept returning to on his journey back to Southampton. The name was so familiar but for the life of him he couldn’t place it. He tried to remember historic cases where the name may have appeared but remained at a blank. He could not recall any investigations of IPSA employees in recent history, and yet somewhere in the deep recesses of his mind was a connection that he just could not see.

  He had followed Renton out of the CPS building, badgering for any more information the barrister could provide him about the nature of McGee’s evidence, but even as Renton had climbed into a taxi, he refused to yield. Vincent had seen no point in hanging around the capital and had caught a taxi back to Waterloo station and then boarded the first train heading south.

  His mind was still thinking about McGee’s name when he walked back into the Police Headquarters building. A champagne cork popping caught his attention. As he looked up he saw Capshaw and Barrett pouring the alcohol into plastic drinking cups.

  ‘What the hell is going on here?’ bellowed Vincent.

  Capshaw nearly dropped the bottle at the interruption but Barrett was quick to explain their actions.

  ‘We’ve solved the Securitas heist case, Guv,’ he said eagerly.

  ‘Solved it? You’ve caught the culprits?’

  ‘Not exactly…we’ve had two significant breakthroughs in the last two hours. First of all, we received a telephone call from Interpol. The bodies of Ray Sampson and Alex Grundy were discovered in a cabin on a Brittany Ferries boat that docked in Caen at lunchtime. They had both been shot once in the head.’

  Vincent was astounded.

  ‘One of the boat’s maids discovered the bodies and the local police were called. The passports that the victims were carrying had false names but photographs and fingerprints were taken and passed to Interpol who identified them as two of our gang.’

  ‘Well that accounts for two of them, that still leaves three on the loose.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be so sure about that. We had an anonymous tip off that the rest of the gang were hauled up in a farmhouse on Hayling Island. We contacted our colleagues in Pompey to go and take a look, but they reported that emergency services had been called to the same farmhouse earlier this morning as the place was in flames. Three bodies were removed from the building eventually but were so charred that it hasn’t been possible to make formal identifications yet. What we know is that the three bodies were male and that two fake police cars, believed to have been used to get away from the DIY store after the heist, were also found on the property. The bodies are at the morgue as we speak and we should have identities in the next day. What a result, right?’

  Vincent rubbed his chin. Barrett was right, it was a result.

  ‘Who got the anonymous tip off?’ he asked.

  ‘I did,’ replied Capshaw. ‘I was manning the phone when a call came in. The person didn’t identify himself, but just said they had spotted five men at the farmhouse the previous night and thought two of them matched the descriptions of Grundy and Sampson that had been circulated in the media. Before I had chance to ask any more questions the line was dead. I assumed it was a local resident or maybe the landlord of the property.’

  Vincent wasn’t sure if he should be happy or not. Ultimately, if the five gang members were now dead then it was effectively case closed and would free up resource to work on the other cases. The trouble was it just seemed too convenient.

  ‘Have they confirmed the cause of the fire yet?’

  ‘Not yet, Guv,’ Barrett confirmed. ‘There were some gas canisters found towards the rear of the property that could have started the blaze, but the fire service is still investigating. They only got the fire stopped in the last hour or so.’

  ‘Any trace of the money?’

  ‘Some stray notes were found smouldering apparently so we have requested the serial numbers be compared to those that were taken. There is every chance that the money was in the house when the fire started, and if that is the case, it’s gone.’

  ‘I assume the Pompey team will be keeping us informed of events?’

  ‘Yes, Guv,’ Barrett replied. ‘I’ve agreed to be liaison between the cities and I’m going to head over there in a while to share what we had. Hopefully we can get it all sewn up by the end of the week.’

  Vincent nodded and moved across to his office; Beth Taylor followed him.

  ‘Is everything okay, Guv?’ she asked taking a seat across the desk from him.

  ‘Does the name Mike McGee mean anything to you?’

  Taylor shuffled through the papers she had been carrying before pulling out a sheet.

  ‘He was one of the victims in the IPSA shooting. His body was found by a fire exit in the basement of the building. We believe he may have been attempting to escape the building when he encountered the shooter and was executed. The M.E. said that Simpson shot himself moments later so if only McGee had managed to hide he might have survived the whole thing. It’s quite sad, really.’

  ‘Can you do me a favour and look into McGee’s background for me? You know, see if we have investigated him for anything before?’

  ‘Course I can, Guv. How come?’

  ‘I found out this morning that McGee was due to testify at that trial-thing I have in London.’

  Like the rest of the team, Taylor was more than aware of the Stratovsky trial, particularly as it had been the main headline on most news programmes recently.

  ‘Really? Small world, huh?’

  ‘Well exactly,’ he replied. ‘It seems too coincidental to me.’

  ‘And you suspect that the shooting maybe wasn’t as random as we first thought?’

  ‘I’ve been in this game too long to believe in coincidences, Beth. Do some digging for me; find out how well McGee knew Simpson and whether there are any other connections between them. We’ve been assuming that Simpson’s motive was revenge, but what if it is part of somethin
g bigger?’

  ‘You think that someone paid Simpson to kill McGee? I’m not being funny Guv, but surely they would hire a professional hit? Simpson had no experience of weaponry that we’ve found and if it were me ordering an assassination, I would want to be certain that whoever I hired would carry out the job properly.’

  He nodded his agreement; the same thought had been troubling him too, but his gut was telling him that something wasn’t quite right.

  ‘But if a professional had been used, it would appear more likely that Stratovsky had ordered the hit wouldn’t it? At least this way, the act seems random. Hell, even the CPS doesn’t see a link between the two.’

  ‘I’ll look into it, Guv,’ said Taylor as she left.

  *

  Vincent hung up the phone and looked at his watch. It was just coming up to five and he had just finished briefing Agent Smart on their cases. He had not heard from her since Laboué’s shooting the previous afternoon, and she had ended the call saying she would probably be returning to London to pursue other lines of enquiry. She told him that she had no real interest in the IPSA shooting and as the AAIB had finished their investigation into the plane crash, the Securitas gang had been found dead and Laboué had been executed, there was little need for her to stay and support him. It was the best news he had heard all day. He still didn’t trust her and was even starting to doubt the reason she had invited him along to the safe house.

  Beth Taylor’s knock on the door caught his attention.

  ‘Guv, I think I might have found something,’ she said eagerly.

  He beckoned her in and she produced several pieces of paper.

  ‘There wasn’t a criminal record for him, but I phoned a contact at a credit risk agency and got her to pull his financial history.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And McGee was subject to a County Court Judgement back in 2010. It seems he had run up a significant amount of debt; we’re talking loans, credit and store cards, the lot. Whilst my contact could not give me a reason for the accumulation of debt, she was able to confirm that he had made several large payments to a casino here in Southampton before his creditors came calling.’