Thornwyn

by Laurence Todd

  “What do you think’ll happen to him now?” I asked. Despite what he’d been convicted of, I still had a soft spot for my old boss. I’d learnt a lot about the realities of policing in Thornwyn’s team, and I still couldn’t get my head around thinking of him as a convicted criminal on his way to a lengthy stretch inside.

  “Now? He’s been remanded for psychiatric reports, probation reports and the like. MI5 will also want a word with him ’cause he’s a commander, in possession of some quite sensitive information about operations involving both CID and MI5. Unofficially, that’s one main reason why the judge deferred sentencing. Once MI5’s satisfied he’s not sitting on anything they need to know, or that could cause any damage if it came out, the judge’ll decide how long and where. But he’ll go down, that’s a certainty. It’s just a question of how long the judge gives him.”

  “Yeah,” I sighed. I’d liked working under Thornwyn, but his list of transgressions was as long as my left forearm and had made wretched reading. I briefly wondered what Richard Clements had made of the trial and the verdict. I’d seen him around the Old Bailey a couple of times and once inside the courtroom. We’d nodded but hadn’t spoken.

  “The unspoken thing, of course, is the issue of putting a police officer in prison, especially someone of his rank and distinction. You know what happens when police get put in prison, don’t you? His offences are too serious for an open prison to be a possibility, so it’ll be the real thing for Mr Thornwyn, and that’ll raise concerns about his safety. They’ll be looking at where’s the safest place to put him, but there’s no guarantees there either. It could be he ends up spending a lot of time in solitary as he may have to be kept isolated, if for no other reason than his own safety.”

  Putting a convicted police officer in prison for any length of time poses a real dilemma for the authorities. Prisons are populated by people with long stretches ahead of them and even longer memories. Prison is a jungle and the grapevine reaches everywhere inside the system. Even if Thornwyn ended up in a prison where no one he’d arrested had been placed, the chances were good there’d be someone who knew someone whom he’d helped put away, and ex parte reprisals against him were a very real possibility. The future for Commander Neville Thornwyn was not one he’d be looking forward to. If he’d ever thought he was on his way to a long and leisurely retirement in some sunny clime, he could forget it.

  “Anyway, I’ve asked you here because I wanna talk to you about your stint in Thornwyn’s team.” He paused, still staring at me directly.

  I was starting to feel uncomfortable.

  “I’ve been looking at the record about your time with Thornwyn. You were in on several notable arrests, and you testified in a few trials involving them, didn’t you?” Again, this wasn’t a question.

  “Yeah, I did.” I was confused and wondering where this was going.

  “Lawyers are already re-examining a number of trials involving people he arrested. That’ll mean arrests and trials you were involved in will also be scrutinised and, because you were a DC in his team, any testimony you gave will be scrutinised, almost line by line, to ensure there are no inconsistencies with the facts as now known. Lawyers are gonna go after anyone who gave evidence in trials where Thornwyn or his team were involved in the arrests. You were on his team, which’ll mean they’ll also put you and any evidence you gave or any statements you made under the forensic microscope.”

  Smitherman adjusted his posture in his seat and fixed me with an almost inscrutable stare. He leaned forward.

  “You were part of the team who arrested Max George, weren’t you?”

  Max George was a particularly vicious criminal who was part of a large North London crime family, the Chackartis, and he’d been responsible for collecting protection money from small businesses, usually run by immigrants who’d borrowed money from dubious lenders and couldn’t afford to obtain insurance in the usual manner. I agreed I’d been part of the team.

  “His brief was screaming intimidation and fit-up all the way to the appeal court. I heard earlier this morning his lawyers are already looking at a fresh appeal. He wasn’t the only one, either. One shylock claimed to have documentary evidence he was making payments to police to keep operating, and he said two of Thornwyn’s team were also in on this. He was asked to produce this evidence of corruption and he did, and the evidence he produced was what got the case against Thornwyn started. He produced files detailing payments to police officers going back several years. You remember what the media made of all this?”

  I nodded. Allegations had been made about miscarriages of justice in the broadsheets and it had made for some very unpleasant media stories for a while.

  “But, whatever, the fact is you’re on my team now, so never mind about what the IPCC want; I need to be sure about what occurred when you were with Thornwyn in cases such as this.” He took a deep breath. “So I want you to look me in the eye and give me your solemn word” – he jabbed his right index finger on the desk, his eyes almost boring into my soul – “the IPCC won’t discover any fraudulent testimony given by you, or anything at all relating to your conduct at any trial you gave evidence at.”

  Was I under suspicion of something? The bewilderment must have shown on my face. I was silent for a few moments, but then Smitherman raised his eyebrows and nodded, indicating he wanted an answer.

  “I’ll stand by everything I ever said in open court,” I said firmly.

  “You never knowingly gave perjured testimony to get a conviction?”

  “No.” I shook my head.

  “You ever give testimony where you couldn’t honestly say whether the evidence was true or not? You just said what you did to get a conviction?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Off the record, strictly between you and me, did Thornwyn ever tell you to embroider any testimony you gave? You know what I mean: the evidence isn’t exactly overwhelming, so tart it up a bit, exaggerate a little, distort it somewhat, make sure the jury gets the idea what the defendant’s been charged with?”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “Never?”

  “Never.”

  “No implied pressure to do so? No nods or winks implying you know what to do?”

  “No.” I shook my head.

  “You’re certain?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Did anyone in Thornwyn’s team, a DS, a DCI, ask you to do anything like this?”

  “No, they didn’t.”

  He seemed satisfied for the moment. He then continued, “When you wrote up your arrest reports, were you under any pressure to distort the facts or embellish the circumstances to help ensure whoever was arrested drew the more serious charges? You know what I mean: saying a burglar was carrying a weapon or used violence against a home owner, or inflating the value of any property stolen?”

  “No, I wasn’t. Everything I wrote up was as I saw it.”

  Smitherman nodded sagely. “Okay. Next thing: again, I want your solemn word, when the fraud squad subpoenas your financial records, as they most certainly will, they won’t find any large deposits, cheques, cash, whatever, you can’t adequately account for or justify.”

  “My bank manager would love to find a few of those; so would I.” I grinned. Smitherman didn’t; his face looked like it was carved from stone and his stare was almost hypnotic. If I looked at his eyes long enough, I’d lapse into a trance. “No. They’ll find no large deposits and no movements of large sums into and out of my account, apart from the small fortune the police pay me every month,” I stated, calmly but with a smile on my face.

  “Anyone who’s served with Thornwyn over the last decade is going to have their finances looked at going back several years. They’ll turn your accounts inside out looking for cash deposits or any evidence of abnormal or unusual financial activity. You know the kind of thing: a large cash deposit or a big cheque and then a withdrawal of the same amount a few days later once it’s cleared. You comfortable with this? Shoul
d I be worried?”

  “No. I’m not worried.” I sat back in the chair.

  “This’ll include looking at your credit card spending as well. So, if you’ve put an American holiday or a brand new car on your credit card but paid it all off in one go soon afterwards, that’ll also get them asking questions. You see what I’m saying?”

  “You seen that piece of crap I drive?” I laughed. “Also, my last two holidays were in Southern Ireland and North Wales. Quite the jet-setter, aren’t I?”

  “Have you made any substantial purchases in the last few years? Substantial in the sense of costing a four-figure sum.”

  “Only my car. I bought it from a reputable Volkswagen dealership and put it on my card. You can check that on my Visa statements.”

  “How much?”

  “Four and a half thousand. I’m still paying it off.”

  He nodded. “Was any money paid into your partners’ accounts for you?”

  “No.”

  “Any money paid into the accounts of any member of your family or friends?”

  “No.”

  “You’ve no offshore accounts anywhere?”

  “Only the one in the Cayman Islands, and even then it’s only used for tax purposes.” I smiled.

  “This is serious, DS McGraw.” Using my surname indicated this wasn’t an informal chat and I should be aware of this. He nodded. He wanted an answer.

  “No. I’ve no accounts offshore anywhere.”

  “I know you’ve been positively vetted and all that, but to operate in Special Branch you’ve gotta be seen to be above board and beyond reproach. I can’t have anyone out there” – he nodded at the window – “who I don’t have complete trust in.”

  He paused for a moment, sighed, then continued. “So, is there anything at all that happened when you served in Thornwyn’s squad I should be in front of where you’re concerned? The IPCC is very likely going to examine several cases where you were involved. Everyone who served with him can expect to be looked into after some of the evidence presented against him, because it’s obvious he couldn’t have done all this on his own. Someone has to have helped him frame defendants and testify everything was done righteously, by the book. The IPCC’s just following standard procedure after cases like this. But have they got any reason to go over your time in Thornwyn’s team and expect to get a result?” He was emphatic.

  I held Smitherman’s stare. “No, they haven’t. On my mother’s soul, hand to God, I swear there’s nothing for them to find, except my overdraft, and they’re welcome to that.”

  He seemed satisfied for the moment. I noticed my heartbeat, which had increased somewhat when Smitherman had first started firing questions at me, was slowing down and approaching a normal rhythm again.

  “Did you ever see anyone getting a confession forcibly extracted from them by the use of or the threat of violence?” he asked. “Someone signing a statement under duress, anything like that?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Never?”

  “No, never. I mean, a couple of people were assaulted in the process of being arrested. We’d go to arrest someone, they’d come at us swinging and we swung back, if you know what I mean, but any force used was reasonable. I’ve no doubt there was the odd punch or kick now and then that probably wasn’t Queensbury rules,” I said, raising my eyebrows to indicate he’d know what I meant, “but nobody went over the top.”

  Smitherman gave a dismissive shrug. Accepted police wisdom was, if someone swung at you and you swung back, the victim deserved what he received, so long as it was not excessive. “And you personally, did you ever use force to get a confession from anyone? Can anyone come forward and say they only admitted guilt because you used violence or intimidating behaviour or the implied threat of violence?”

  “I’ve wanted to,” I admitted.

  “Haven’t we all, but it doesn’t answer the question. Have you ever used violence in any form to secure a confession or an admission of guilt?”

  “No, I haven’t.”

  Smitherman kept me transfixed in his forensic gaze. “You’re not lying to me, are you? If the IPCC tell me they’ve found something against you, and it turns out you’ve been lying to me . . .” He didn’t have to finish the sentence. I knew exactly what he was implying; I’d be a dead man career-wise.

  “Everything I’ve told you is the whole truth.”

  Smitherman kept me fixed with his iron stare for a few more moments. Then his expression changed to one of relief, and he relaxed.

  “Good.” Smitherman smiled and sat back in his chair. “I knew all this anyway, but I had to be sure. I had to be certain there were no twinges of conscience and you weren’t thinking you’d got away with something untoward after what’s become of your old boss.”

  I must have looked surprised. “Huh?”

  “Up to his trial, you were adamant he couldn’t possibly be guilty, weren’t you? You were so sure of that. Everyone who asked, you said he was a good cop and couldn’t have done what he’d been charged with, so I wanted to know if that was because you were in on it and because the evidence was buried so deep it couldn’t possibly be found.”

  “No, it was nothing like that.”

  “So, as I said, Thornwyn’s arrest record is being investigated and anyone who’s served under him can expect to be investigated by the IPCC as well as the fraud squad. So I had to be absolutely certain you weren’t feeling there but for the grace of God go I about Thornwyn’s fate.”

  “I’m not.”

  Smitherman got out of the chair he’d been sitting in and went around to sit behind his desk. This was the distance I preferred him to be from me. Having a desk between us was much more comforting, much less scary. My heartbeat returned to normal.

  “If you knew all this, why were you asking me about it?” I wondered aloud.

  “As I said, I had to be sure. If the IPCC found evidence of police misconduct, and there was some suspicion about what you’d said in court, or anything wrong with pre-trial procedure, you’d be looking at the wrong end of a disciplinary hearing, and you know what that’d mean.”

  I did.

  Smitherman grinned, almost evilly. “But I also wanted to be sure because Thornwyn’s asked to see you,” he said casually.

  “Me? Why’s he wanna see me?” I was baffled. I wanted to see him about as much as I wanted to catch a sexually transmitted disease. I still had some warm feelings for my ex-boss, but I didn’t want to spend any time with him.

  “He needs to open up about a few matters before he’s sentenced. We think he knows a few things he ought to share with us before he goes down. He’s agreed to talk but said he’ll only talk to someone he trusts, and he specifically asked for you.”

  “Aren’t I the lucky one?” I said with more than a hint of irony.

  “He was initially told by IPCC he couldn’t see anyone in his old team because of the suspicion of colluding to pervert the course of justice, but he said you could be trusted because when you served with him you were the only person in the squad whose honesty he was 100% certain of and who wasn’t in the Fund, and the IPCC have accepted that.”

  “The Fund? What’s that?”

  “You didn’t know about it?”

  I shook my head. “No.”

  “Thornwyn and two others in his team were skimming money from drug dealers and others, splitting it between themselves. They’d opened accounts under different names and you’d not believe how much was found in the bank accounts of these three; ran into hundreds of thousands. This was the Fund.” Smitherman said this in a disbelieving tone. “They also had other scams on the go. As you heard at his trial, a couple of shylocks only operated because Thornwyn gave them his blessing in return for a share of the proceeds. They were actually paying him to operate.” Smitherman shook his head. “Some of the allegations made against Thornwyn in earlier trials were true, it seems. Apparently you weren’t invited to become part of the firm within a firm, so to speak, be
cause you were considered to be too honest. They didn’t trust you.” Smitherman smiled.

  I wasn’t sure if this was a compliment or an insult.

  “Two detectives are currently suspended from duty pending inquiries into their role working with Thornwyn,” Smitherman said.

  I was trying to remember who else had been in Thornwyn’s team and who might be the two Smitherman was alluding to. There were several candidates I could think of.

  “I know what you’re thinking but, before you ask, unless and until charges are brought, I can’t tell you the identities of the two detectives in question. IPCC is looking into the entire squad and some of its activities. That’ll include you.”

  “What about the rest of the team?” I inquired.

  “A few of them thought they knew something shady was going on but didn’t know exactly what and didn’t take any part; turned the other cheek, if you like. You know how it goes; see no evil, and all that.”

  This was understandable. Unless it involved sex with young children or farm animals, no police officer in any team was going to rat on other squad members. Teams like the one I’d been part of, going after violent criminals, depended on total cooperation, trust and an unspoken willingness to go the extra mile for each other when the situation demanded. This means every member of the team had to trust others in the team would have his back should the situation require. No one wanted to risk being on the outside looking in because you were suspected of disloyalty to the team. I briefly wondered what I’d have done had I known of Thornwyn skimming money from drug dealers. Would I too have seen no evil?

  “What sort of evil, exactly?” Was I being naïve here?

  “You name it; evidence planted where it could be found, putting undue pressure on a defendant’s family if he won’t cooperate. In some cases they knew money was being paid but, even though they didn’t take anything themselves, they turned a blind eye to it. Things like that. They mentioned one case where someone wouldn’t cop to being part of the team turning over a number of warehouses in North London, kept maintaining his innocence, said he had nothing to do with it. Thornwyn got someone he knew in the Social Security office to have the benefits for his whole family stopped. His daughter, who was a single mother of two kids, had her family allowance and housing benefit stopped. The family had their housing benefit withdrawn. The suspect’s jobseeker’s allowance was suspended. This person ended up admitting guilt and, almost immediately, benefits are paid out again.”