An Unwatched Minute

by J. M. Peace

  As they walked through the station to the top office at the back of the station, Roy noticed the staff present all seemed to be extremely interested in whatever they were doing. Everybody kept their back to him and no one acknowledged his presence.

  The detective from Brisbane was waiting in the Colonel’s office. Had he flown up for this meeting? He wouldn't drive. He was with the government.

  They all sat down. The office smelt like coffee but no one offered him one.

  "We have investigated this incident at length," the detective said. "We have interviewed everyone involved as well as any witnesses. We have reviewed all footage, both CCTV and from the officers’ body worn cameras. We have come to the conclusion that Mr Hegarty..."

  "Angus," Roy interrupted. "Call him Angus. The only time anyone called him Mr Hegarty was the magistrate."

  "Okay," the detective said. "Angus received the fatal injury at the back of the police station. There was an accident as Angus was removed from the rear of the paddy wagon. Senior Constable Morten has explained at length and re-enacted this accident. He opened the door to the paddy wagon to get Angus out. The door has started to swing close again. As Senior Constable Morten grabbed the door, Angus has jumped out of the rear of the paddy wagon. He has lost his balance and fallen forwards. Because his hands were handcuffed behind him, he has been unable to break his fall. He dipped his head and hit the concrete with this spot under his hairline." The detective rubbed a spot on his own forehead. "The results of the autopsy and the exact description provided by Senior Constable Morten confirm this as being the blow to the head that caused the brain injury that killed Angus. The forensic pathologist has confirmed that this injury is consistent with the mechanism of the fall."

  Roy shook his head, stunned. "What...? How...? Why is this the first I've heard of this?"

  "We have been investigating. Senior Constable Morten mentioned it in our first interview with him. He didn't realise it was so serious. None of us realised initially that this was the fatal blow. Senior Constable Morten couldn't see the lump on his head because it was under Angus’s hair and he was lodged immediately after that. The lump would still have been forming. Due to his level of intoxication, the immediate effects of the fall were masked. I have to tell you too, toxicology results have come back and shown that not only did Angus have a blood alcohol level of 0.26%, but he had also ingested synthetic cannabinoids."

  Roy remembered to look surprised. "What?"

  "He was drunk, five times the legal limit and he was stoned on synthetic pot," the detective said.

  Roy shook his head. "No. No."

  "So, we have concluded that this was an unforseeable accident. If the door of the pod hadn't been swinging shut, Senior Constable Morten may very well have been able to catch Angus as he has lurched forward and lost his balance. But because he had turned slightly and grabbed the door, there was nothing to break Angus's fall. The pathologist has confirmed that his momentum and the weight of his body were enough to cause this injury to Angus."

  "An accident? Unforseeable?" Roy couldn't keep up with the barrage of information.

  "That's correct. There was negligence involved in the way he was lodged in the watch house and Constable Danaher is being held responsible for this."

  "The chick?"

  "Yes. The female police officer. We are taking disciplinary action against her. But there will be no further action taken by police."

  Roy shook his head again. "What?"

  The detective rose to his feet. "I understand this is a lot for you to process, Mr Hegarty. May I suggest you have a think about this? I know you will have a lot of questions and I encourage you to write them down and make another appointment. I will be returning to Brisbane, but Senior Sergeant Cornell is up-to-date on the investigation and will be happy to help you out in the future. Thank you for coming in today."

  With that, Roy was ushered out of the station, his head spinning.

  56.

  Brad was used to seeing coppers at odd hours at the pub. He understood that shift work could stuff around your body clock. But Mort had been the first in the door on Saturday and Sunday and now he was here again. And he was alone. That definitely wasn't like Mort.

  Yeah, he was under some pressure right now. Brad had heard all the gossip. But it sounded to him like the sort of stuff that was an occupational hazard for cops, almost to be expected.

  It was Monday afternoon and the bar was nearly empty. He came across to where Mort was sitting at the counter. He'd always gotten on well with him. Mort was more a mate than a customer. So he should do the right thing and check up on him, see if there was anything he could do to help.

  "You alright mate?"

  Mort looked up at him. He widened his eyes slightly, looking surprised at the question but Brad didn't quite buy it.

  "Yeah, mate, I'm fine," Mort replied.

  Brad held his gaze until Mort dropped his eyes.

  "Are you waiting for someone?" Brad asked.

  "Yeah, yeah," Mort replied without looking at him.

  "Do you want me to give Sharpey or Piero or someone a call?"

  "No mate." Mort looked at him again now. "I just need some space. It's kind of weird at the barracks," he said. "The new chick's living there. She's nice but we've been working the same shifts and with the shit that's gone on, I just feel like I need some air sometimes."

  Ah. That made sense then.

  "She doesn't really have any friends in town," Mort said. "She just kind of hangs around the barracks."

  Brad considered this. "You know, a lot of the guys have been talking about her. You know, new girl in town and she's a hell of a looker. Is she single? Should we set her up with someone? That would get her out of your hair."

  Mort's eyebrows shot up. "No way!" he said quickly. Then added, "I think she's got a boyfriend."

  "He's not up here though, is he? Long distance relationships don't seem to last long. How old is she? I reckon she'd get on well with Jamie."

  "Jamie the plumber? Are you kidding?" Mort said.

  "Yeah, he's a nice bloke. He scrubs up alright..."

  "No," Mort said, with a grimace on his face. "Leave her alone. She's under a bit of stress too. The last thing she needs is some guy hassling her."

  "It might solve..."

  "Leave her alone." There was an edge in Mort's voice that sliced through Brad's words. "Leave me alone too."

  He picked up his beer and walked away from the bar.

  57.

  Roy tossed his cigarette butt on the dirt in front of him. As he ground the butt underfoot, he opened a pouch of tobacco, deftly rolled another smoke, lit up, and passed the pouch and lighter onto his brother. They were sitting on mismatched chairs at the back of his house. There was a patio of sorts. He and Skeeter had started building it, but had never finished all the roofing. It gave no shelter against the breeze whistling through.

  Stan performed the same ritual with the tobacco pouch, but cursed as the flame on the lighter blew flat again. Stan shook the lighter and flicked it again, cupping his hand around the rollie which dangled from his lips.

  "So it was all an 'accident'," Stan said.

  "Yep. Mort would have saved him, but something about the paddy wagon door swinging shut," Roy replied. He'd driven around out in the back blocks, just thinking things through until he'd nearly run out of petrol. Only then had he come back to try to explain to his brother what they had told him at the cop shop. That was difficult because he didn’t quite understand it himself.

  "So they reckon Angus just jumped out, with hands handcuffed and head butted the ground?"

  "Yep. Like it was his own fault. Because he was drunk. He jumped out and smashed his head on the ground."

  "That's fucking ridiculous," Stan said. "Did they say how come they didn't mention it earlier, like when they were chasing Mick?"

  "They just said it all real quick and shoved me out the door. I was like, 'What? What?' They said, come back if you've got question
s."

  "We've got fucken questions alright," Stan growled.

  "I reckon the detective from Brisbane just wanted to drop the bomb and piss off. We're going to have to deal with the Colonel now."

  "Who's the Colonel?"

  "The boss of the station here. He's a dick. Thinks he's better than what he is. I'm pretty sure that's why all the staff call him the Colonel. He just runs around giving orders."

  "So even his own officers don't like him?"

  "Nah, I guess not." He drew back on his cigarette and tapped the ash off on the arm of the chair.

  "How can they expect us to believe Angus just fell over and that's what killed him. He's fallen over stacks of times when he was drunk. It never killed him before. You don't just die from falling over when you're drunk. We'd all be fucken dead then. They've done something. They've given him a touch up or something at the back of the station where no one could see."

  Roy grunted. "I've never minded Mort. He seemed to be decent enough. But this is fucken wrong."

  Stan stood up. He smacked the sheet of corrugated iron at which formed a wall of the patio area with an open hand, so it clanged like a bell.

  "He didn't fucken deserve that shit. It makes me wild. But what makes even wilder is the way they're treating it. Like it was his fucking fault. His fault that he died. Like he fucking killed himself."

  "'Accidental death' my arse," Roy spat. "You don't get a fractured skull just by falling over. Even with fricken handcuffs on. Mort smashed him one. They're trying to cover it up by saying he was drunk and fell over. It's a dog act."

  "Angus liked a drink. He could hold his booze. He didn't just fall over because he'd had a few," Stan said. Roy realised Stan knew nothing about the synthetic pot that Mick had given Angus. Now wasn't the time to bring it up, anyway.

  "I'm coming up the station with you this time," Stan said. "We've got to show them we're not taking this laying down. We've got to show them they're fucking with the wrong family."

  "Yep. We'll go in the morning," Roy said.

  "Are they still investigating?" Stan asked, putting air quotes around the word 'investigating'. "Or is it all finished now?"

  "They're done. Nothing was ever going to happen," Roy replied immediately. "How's a copper ever going to get found guilty of anything if they're investigated by other fucken coppers? Of course they want it to look like Angus was at fault."

  "What about the coroner. Who’s that? Doesn't he override the cops?" Stan said.

  "I think so. But I don't even know what sort of red tape they'd make us do to get it in front of the coroner. They're all in it together. There's no justice for people like us. People like Angus. We'll go to the station tomorrow. But we've got to have a plan."

  "What do you mean?" asked Stan.

  "If we just go in there banging desks and telling them what we think of them, it's not going to change anything, is it?"

  Stan glared at him. "You reckon you know something that will make a difference?"

  "Let's just think about it for a minute. The local coppers aren't going to do anything other than fob us off. I reckon they can't even do anything. They don't have enough power. Even if they wanted to. Maybe the detective from Brisbane could do something but I wouldn't bank on him being there tomorrow."

  "You reckon we should go to Brisbane? Go rattle some cages at their headquarters?"

  "No. It would still be just our little family against all of them. We need to play this smart. Show how they're all lying to save one of their own. " He rolled another smoke while he thought, then handed the pouch to Stan.

  "We can record them," Roy said. "They record us all the time. You've seen the little recorders they've got. Most of them have videos on their vests too. They never ask our permission. We should record them."

  "How's that going to help?"

  "We'll take it to the media!” Roy smiled, please with his brainwave. “Yep. There were all those news crews sniffing around after straight after it happened. I bet someone would be interested."

  "Sixty Minutes," Stan said with a smile. "We could take it to Sixty Minutes. They could do a big story on how the police are corrupt, covering up the death of a good old boy having a quiet drink at the pub."

  "Yeah," Roy said. "Let's see what we get first."

  Stan nodded. "Where can we get one of those recorders before tomorrow?"

  "My phone,” Roy said. “I'm sure I can record on my phone. Skeeter will know how."

  "We could put it in a backpack so it can film through a hole in the bag or something," Stan said.

  "They're not going to let us bring in a backpack without searching it," Roy said.

  "They wouldn't search it," Stan insisted. "There's nothing unusual about carrying a backpack around."

  "Mate, they know we've got the shits with them. If we have a bag and we want to come into their office, they're going to search it."

  "So are you going to just put in in a pocket or something."

  "Yeah," Roy replied. "Even if there's no pictures, if we can just record everything they say, that should do it."

  "You should bring Patricia along," Stan said.

  Roy screwed his face up. "Why would I bring her along?"

  "She's pretty good at turning on the waterworks. She could burst into tears if they tell us there's no justice for Angus. That would sound good on the recording."

  Roy considered this. A woman crying did seem to make most men uncomfortable. The idea of the Colonel um-ing and ah-ing, looking for a tissue did appeal to him. But this was serious business, that would just be a side show.

  "No, we need to play this straight. We need to try to wind them up, or get them to admit it's all shit, and Mort did it deliberately."

  "Do you think they'd say that?" Stan asked, sounding skeptical.

  "I doubt it. But that would nail them, wouldn't it."

  "But we won't need to do anything if they change their minds and lock that prick up," Stan said.

  "And pigs might fly," Roy said.

  They both laughed.

  58.

  Krista said little more than 'yes sir' repeatedly during her meeting with the Detective Inspector. But when she walked out of the Colonel’s office, she didn't stop. She just kept walking. Straight out the back door of the station and across to the barracks. She'd been too stunned to cry. She'd changed out of her uniform, left her phone on her bed and driven away.

  She was walking the coastal trail, ignoring the sweat trickling down her back. It was steeper than she remembered it from last time, and it seemed to take longer this time walking by herself. She focussed on each step, moving forward and away from the police station. She did not let up the pace and she could smell her own body odour by the time she reached the last lookout in the national park.

  She looked back towards the bay. The water was a sublime shade of blue through her sunglasses. The sand was a powder dusting of icing sugar. Lush green forest ran down to the beach. She couldn't help but be impressed by the view, again. Except there, sprawling through the middle of her field of view was the town of Tannin Bay. Bloody Tannin Bay. She wished she'd never even heard of the name.

  She pulled a water bottle out of her rucksack, giving the water a swish round to see how much was left before taking a couple of sips. She wouldn't need anywhere near as much for the walk back down.

  She went to check her phone before remembering she had left it behind. She hadn't really known where she was headed. Just had to get away from everyone and everything. No one had probably even noticed she was gone. Or if they did, they were probably glad she was no longer hanging around the station like a bad smell. She'd return back to the barracks before dark and go into work tomorrow like nothing had happened.

  But something had happened. There had been a change, a shift. For the first time in her adult life, she was the baddie. And she was being punished. The Ethical Standards Command investigation had come back with a verdict. And she was the guilty one. The only guilty one. She had taken the
oath to 'serve and protect'. But she hadn't protected Hegarty.

  Unbidden, the mental movie reel started playing again. Pulling up at the back of the station with Mort in the passenger's seat and Hegarty in the back. The walk into the station. Why didn't she run? What if she hadn't stopped to answer Comms on the radio? What if Mort had gone in to get the keys? One minute. That's how long she had been gone.

  So many questions. The 'what-ifs' were driving him crazy. What if she had filled out the watch house register before putting Hegarty in the cell? Would she have realised that he had a head injury, that he was dying in front of her? Or would she have put it down to the bloke being under the effect of alcohol? The autopsy had showed drugs involved too.

  Hegarty with his head hanging down. Hegarty unable to walk by himself. Hegarty throwing up. Putting him into the cells face down on the bed. The handful of minutes - how many? - it had taken her to grab the property out of the car, to hose away the vomit. There had been many questions about this. She had re-enacted it for ESC at the back of the station.

  What did you do next? What did he do next? What happened then? Why didn't you check on him? Why didn't you notice that he was hurt?

  Krista wanted to believe the injury was fatal, that no matter what she had done, the man couldn't be saved from the bleeding onto his brain. She had to believe it. The thought that a man's life had rested in her hands and she had been negligent horrified her. That her inaction, her inexperience, her ineptitude had killed a man.

  A noise behind her startled her. She turned quickly, back against the railings. A man had rounded the last bend and was approaching the lookout. He was stout and barrel-chested. His face was red beneath his baseball cap and sunglasses as he marched towards Krista. She froze.