Nothing To Lose

by Steven Suttie

  “We’re sure that it’s right, though?” Miller suddenly looked serious, for the first time since he’d entered the office.

  Saunders answered. “Nearly almost a hundred per-cent. We’ve got a motive, as stupid and pointless as it was, plus the damning question mark over Adrian Wilson’s property being the most famous burnt-out property in Great Britain, yet he hasn’t even phoned the estate agent about it. We’ll have to see what he’s got to say when we go in.”

  “Got a plan?”

  “Yes, working on it now. We just need evidence of him out and about on the night of the fire, so we’ve got the details for his motor and we’re just waiting to run it through ANPR, see if anything turns up.”

  “We’ll need more than ANPR.”

  “Relax, boss. We’ve got this.” Rudovsky seemed a bit pissed off that Miller was wading in and throwing bad vibes into the mix, particularly as the ground work had been done without his input.

  “Sorry, yes, it’s just… I didn’t get the impression from the guy’s house that he’s the right man.”

  “Why?” It was Saunders and Rudovsky’s turn to look a little concerned.

  “Don’t know. Can’t put my finger on it. It just seemed a bit, I don’t know. Not the kind of bloke who can sort out nicking cars, getting fake plates made up, or…”

  “Or what?”

  “Or even having any mates to go and do all that with him. It just seemed like a very lonely house, lots of cider cans in the bin.”

  “Well, maybe he’s turned to cider to blot out the fucking evil that he’s responsible for. It’s him, I’ll bet my next two wage packets on it. The estate agent is terrified of him and he’s very wary of what he says. Besides, my gut feeling is always spot on. If I had any doubts…”

  “I know... I know. It’s just, I need to update Dixon, pretty sharpish. There’s a lot riding on this, I need to be totally convinced that the information I’m presenting to him is legit.”

  “Well just tell him that we need a couple more hours and we’ll have a bomb-proof charge sheet ready for the CPS.”

  “A couple of hours?” Miller glanced at his watch.

  “A day, then.” Rudovsky’s massive upgrade to the time scales received a big laugh from her colleagues.

  “You want twenty-four hours cooling off period?”

  “Look, boss, it’s your call. But all I’m saying is, we’ve got the man who owns the flat in custody. He’s been playing dickheads with the Ozols family for months and now they announce they are moving out of his property, and he isn’t getting his back-rent, the place burns down in a fire-bomb attack and the man we have in custody hasn’t even lifted the phone to police or the estate agents to ask what the fuck is going on. That’s enough of a starting point for me, Sir.”

  Rudovsky’s passionate speech worked. Miller’s face relaxed as the skilfully presented monologue painted a rational overview of the facts as they were presently known.

  “Okay. That’s a reasonable point of view to present. I’ll go and see Dixon now while you guys figure out the next stage of this investigation.”

  “Well I’ve got it pretty much sussed Sir.” It was Saunders’ turn to speak. “We need to build up a full picture of Adrian Wilson, his lifestyle and history, criminal past or associations. We’ll get back what we can from ANPR on Wilson’s vehicle while his house is getting the full-works from Forensics, every finger-print in the address will need explaining, as will every trace of DNA. His computer, his phone and laptop have been seized and are being examined now, IT investigators will be looking through e-mails, phone contacts, text messages etc. We’ll work out who his accomplices are and build up a solid picture. All the while, he’ll be sat in the cell stewing it over. He’s been booked in now and he’s already asked for a solicitor, so he knows that there’s going to be some turbulence ahead.”

  “Any thoughts about the interview?”

  “I think we’ll set all these wheels in motion first, then let Jo give him a few things to think about in the interview room, and once all that is completed, we’ll have a charge sheet good to go.”

  “Fair enough. I’ll pass that onto Dixon, there’s not too much to complain about there, looks like you guys are on it.” Miller looked happy again.

  “Cheers.”

  “Thanks Sir.”

  “I’ll go back to HQ and organise the troops, so e-mail me what tasks you want doing at our end and I’ll give you a call in a few hours to see how things are progressing.”

  With that, Miller turned and set off walking out of the office, bidding farewell to DCI Katy Green as he went.

  *****

  ANPR technology has revolutionised police work in the UK over the past decade. The automatic number plate recognition system has been at the heart of intelligence gathering by the authorities for a variety of sophisticated reasons. As far as the general public are concerned, ANPR is just an easy way for the police to do people for not possessing car insurance or a valid MOT. But this is only one of the advantages of the technology, and by no means the main reason that millions of pounds are invested each year in installing thousands of new cameras in every part of the UK.

  Very little is known about the locations of ANPR cameras. They are not required to be “hi-vis” like the speed trap cameras. They are in fact, quite the opposite, and their fixed locations are kept secret, to such an extent that their locations cannot even be disclosed in court-cases, even if the information provided by the ANPR is the strongest piece of evidence in the prosecution’s case. The technology is only allowed to be used to assist the police to build cases and provide clues. The rest of the story has to be told by good, old-fashioned detective work on the ground.

  Many police forces have found so much benefit from the ANPR technology that they have installed the cameras into retired undercover vehicles, and park them in locations which are recognised crime hot-spots. These discreet vehicles keep a constant eye on every vehicle going in and out of an area, which in turn helps the police to understand who is behind drug dealing activities, or burglaries, or terror-related activities and as such, these hidden cameras make life very hard for people who are up to no good.

  With this remote, automated and completely undercover police work taking place by computer software, it enables police officers to identify who is who, what they are up to, and can carry out investigations into people without even making an arrest. It is this power that ANPR technology has unleashed which makes the scheme so shrouded in secrecy. You cannot go into a city-centre without your vehicle details being logged, nor travel more than ten miles without being “pinged” by one of these invisible devices.

  It is not just used for criminal investigation, either. Supermarket car-parks have installed ANPR cameras to help make sure that visitors don’t stay longer than the two-hours permitted. If they do overstay their welcome, Tesco, or Sainsburys buy the car owner’s details from the DVLA and send out a £100 fine in the post. It is almost as though George Orwell gave the authorities the idea for this incredible surveillance system himself. The only down-side was that they had to wait the fifty or so years for the technology to arrive.

  Today, MCP’s ANPR software was being asked to look into the activities of a certain Mr Adrian Wilson of 15 Sterling Street, Guide Bridge. His vehicle, a black Ford Mondeo, registration, BK12 JBC was having its past twelve months of activity scrutinised by the software.

  Extremely good news came in quickly. The vehicle was active on the night of the fire, for several hours before, and several hours after. The vehicle had pinged a number of cameras near Hyde, close to the location where the Vauxhall Zafira was burned out. It also pinged a camera at the all-night McDonalds in Ashton, where it stayed for twenty-five minutes between 2:18 and 2:43am, before passing several other cameras around the Tameside district in the following hour. The vehicle, it appeared, hadn’t been used again since the early hours of the night of the fire.

  In short, what the ANPR logs told DI Saunders and DS Rudovsky wa
s, to put it bluntly, that Adrian Wilson was well and truly fucked. They high-fived each other as they headed out of the small office that they’d been “hot-desking” in Tameside CID dept, their next location was McDonalds, about five minutes around the corner.

  *****

  Less than an hour later, DI Saunders and DS Rudovsky were back at Ashton police station, sitting in interview room 2, face to face for the first time with Adrian Wilson and his duty solicitor. Once all of the interview room formalities were out of the way, it was finally time to see what kind of opponent Adrian Wilson was likely to make for the SCIU senior detectives.

  “You have been arrested on suspicion of three counts of murder and one charge of attempted murder. Do you understand the reason that you are here?” asked Saunders, who was taking care of this section whilst Rudovsky planned her strategy.

  “No comment.”

  “Are you the owner of the property at the junction of Seymour Street and Windmill Lane, which was destroyed by fire in the early hours of Monday morning?”

  “No comment.” Adrian Wilson looked scared, and stressed, but defiant none-the-less.

  “Either you own it or you do not?”

  “No comment.”

  “Can you tell me your activities on the night of Sunday 16th of November, into the early hours of Monday the 17th of November?”

  “No comment.”

  “Did you go out at all on Sunday evening, or in the early hours of Monday?”

  “No comment.”

  “Okay, I can see that your solicitor has advised you to provide a no comment interview, so we know the score. You know that you don’t have to answer our questions and all that, so don’t worry, we won’t take very much more of your time up at this stage.”

  This comment appeared to induce a flicker of something on Wilson’s face. Rudovsky was studying him closely, but she couldn’t be sure what that flicker was, whether it was relief, or humour, or what. But Saunders’ rather vague comment about Wilson’s time had certainly gained a positive reaction.

  Rudovsky decided to chuck the hand-grenade in.

  “Sorry Detective Inspector Saunders,” said the DS. “Before you make plans to release Mr Wilson…” that flicker of something in the suspect’s face was there again. It was a conceited look that she’d seen so many times before on arseholes who were getting away with stuff because the police didn’t quite have enough evidence to charge them. The difference on this occasion was that Saunders had just been toying with Wilson. The horrible bastard wasn’t going anywhere.

  Rudovsky genuinely couldn’t wait to slam that smug, piss-taking look into reverse. “…I just wanted to ask Mr Watson a few questions about these photographs.” Rudovsky took her time opening the A4 wallet on the desk, before taking a similarly relaxed amount of time taking the photographs out of the folder. She began placing them on the table-top, facing Adrian Wilson.

  “These photographs show yourself and three other men enjoying a laugh and a Big Mac meal at a McDonald’s restaurant, not very far away from here. Could you please confirm that this person is you?” Rudovsky pointed at the blatantly clear photograph of Wilson. He looked a bit unnerved by this sudden change of direction in the proceedings.

  “No comment.” He sounded stressed as he said it.

  “What about these people? Any idea who they are?”

  “No comment.” He didn’t look at the pictures.

  “For the benefit of the tape, these photographs are stills taken from the McDonalds CCTV. The time that these images were captured are two-twenty-one, two-twenty-seven and two thirty-three am, respectively. This was just over an hour after the fatal fire at Mr Wilson’s property in Denton. Do you still not recognise any of these people Mr Wilson?”

  The suspect took a long time to reply this time, but eventually he did. “No comment.”

  Rudovsky noted that the flicker of smugness had been extinguished, which pleased her greatly. Her detective experience told her that in these circumstances, nobody, other than a guilty person, would sit and no comment a question like this. Miller had been wrong in his assertion that Wilson didn’t “seem right” and she couldn’t wait to get out of here and show him the proof.

  “We do have the full video of this very jolly and humorous encounter. It does look like you and your mates are having a bloody good laugh here…”

  “No comment.”

  “Would you like to watch the full video?”

  “No comment.”

  “Now, I know this is going to sound bonkers. But, did you pay for this food on your debit card?”

  “No comment.”

  The solicitor huffed loudly, it was clear that he’d been fed a load of bullshit by Wilson thus far and now he was seeing the true magnitude of what his client was involved with. The sound of the huff suggested that Wilson was going to have to find another solicitor, pretty soon.

  Rudovsky pulled out another photograph and placed it with the others on the table. “Is this you, paying for food at McDonalds, using contactless?”

  Wilson refused to look at the picture. “No comment.”

  “Do you think that when we seize your bank details, your statement will show a purchase from McDonalds at two-twenty-three hours on the seventeenth of November?”

  “No comment.”

  “I think that’s enough for now, DS Rudovsky.” Saunders began collecting the pictures off the table. The DS knew what her superior’s tone of voice implied. It implied that she should go in for the kill.

  “Okay, well, I’m not saying that this is you, or it isn’t, that will be for the jury to decide. But what I will say Mr Wilson, is that if you think you’re going to get away with this, as your no commenting suggests, then you really are as thick as your own shit, aren’t you?”

  “No comment.”

  “See you on Britain’s dumbest child-killers, you sick, evil, depraved bastard.”

  “Interview suspended at 13.01 hours. Mr Wilson will be taken back to his cell as our enquiries continue. Thank you.”

  Wilson’s solicitor stood, nodded politely towards the detectives and walked out of the room without so much as a glance at Wilson. That smug look was well and truly gone from the suspect’s face.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  “And… breathe…” Rudovsky was pleased with how that had gone, it was always a pleasure to mess with evil people. She and Saunders were walking towards the Tameside CID office after escorting Wilson back to the custody sergeant, who was going to bang him up in a cell, for the first night of the rest of his life.

  “Reckon Miller’s managed to get anything from the McDonald’s CCTV yet?” Asked Saunders.

  “Hope so, but if not, he can stick the faces on a press release. It won’t take long to round those bastards up. I’m more interested in letting Tim and Charlotte go now, I bet they’re ready for home.”

  “We’ll need to sort out an announcement first. They might have trouble at the door when they get home.” Saunders was concerned, he knew that the public were often keen to take the law into their own hands, particularly on a case such as this.

  “Miller’s on it. The press release will have gone out by now. Anyway, I was talking to them both before we went in with Wilson. Tim says he’s going to check them into a hotel and stay there until we’ve got the others banged up. Just to be safe.”

  “Bloody hell, where was I while all this was going on?” Saunders looked mildly irritated at the realisation that he was out of the loop.

  “You were flirting with that DCI Green.”

  “I wasn’t flirting! God, you boil my piss sometimes Jo!”

  “Okay, well, you were talking to DCI Green, whilst blushing and fidgeting with your hair and laughing at her every sentence, the whole fucking time. It was excruciating to witness.”

  “Bollocks. Anyway, what was said with Miller?”

  “Basically, he said that he was sending out an urgent press release which would explain that the arrests of Tim and Charlotte were a mistake
, with an unreserved apology for any distress caused, and an offer of compensation for any damage at the office.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “He also told me to send the CCTV from McDonalds over as a matter of urgency and he’d get the geeks to run it through the automatic facial recognition system and see if any of the three have any snaps on the PNC.”

  “Heard anything on that?”

  “Not yet, but he’s only had forty-five minutes.”

  Saunders was scrolling through his phone. He stopped in the corridor as he found what he’d been looking for.

  “Ah, here we go. The press statement has gone out.”

  “Let’s have a look.”

  Saunders and Rudovsky stayed rooted to the spot as they both read MCP’s press release about Tim and Charlotte.

  “URGENT PRESS STATEMENT

  Following our arrests earlier today in connection with the fatal arson attack in Denton, MCP would like to apologise unreservedly for the arrests of two individuals in Ashton town centre this morning. These arrests were made in error, following incorrect information which had been shared with officers at Tameside police station. We apologise for any distress, loss of earnings or damage to the premises, and will be working closely with those people affected by this mistake. Our unreserved apologies are sent to these individuals and we would like to assure the public that these individuals have been released from police custody without charge and we wish to make it clear that they have absolutely no involvement in any police inquiries. This statement is exclusive to the incident at Bingley’s Estate Agents in Ashton town centre this morning, and in no way refers in any respect to any other arrests made in Tameside in relation to the fatal fire in Denton in the early hours of Monday the Seventeenth of November.”