by Paul Gitsham
‘It’s the twenty-first century, Dad; girls can watch football as well, you know,’ admonished Susan. ‘Besides they might prefer rugby.’
Warren grinned. His father-in-law was not a fan of the oval ball.
‘Well, I’d like some more granddaughters,’ said Bernice. ‘I have to put all of my best china on the top shelf when Felicity brings the boys around.’
‘Maybe we’ll have one of each,’ said Warren, diplomatically.
‘When will you know?’ asked Dennis.
‘When they are born,’ said Susan immediately. She and Warren had decided long ago that they wanted to be surprised.
Dennis frowned slightly. ‘I can understand that, but twins take a lot of preparation. It’ll help if you know what you’ll be getting, so you can paint the nursery and everything.’
‘And I have to start knitting two of everything,’ said Bernice. ‘I need to know what colour wool to buy.’
‘White will be fine,’ said Susan firmly.
‘The most important thing is that they are healthy,’ said Warren quickly, not wanting the moment spoiled.
‘Of course,’ said Dennis, taking his daughter’s hand and giving it a squeeze. He smiled. ‘Let me know when you want me to come down and help you get the small bedroom ready. I’ve just bought a brand-new drill; I’ve been itching to put it through its paces.’
‘As far as we can tell, neither Biljana or Malina Dragić or their aunt, Silvija Wilson, had any online social connections to Stevie Cullen,’ said Grimshaw. Warren and Susan had made good time on the motorway, leaving her parents shortly after breakfast. It was now just after midday and Warren had scheduled a briefing. He’d been gone barely eighteen hours, yet the pace of the investigation made it feel longer. By the time he’d poured himself another coffee, he was fully in work mode, the previous evening with his in-laws a distant memory.
‘Their social media contacts don’t overlap with his, and neither do any of their closest friends,’ continued Grimshaw. ‘He doesn’t obviously appear in any of their shared photographs, nor they in his. Their text and phone logs don’t list any calls linked to either of the phones that we know he used. There are some texts and calls to unlisted pay-as-you-go phones, and we can’t rule out that either they or he had another handset that we don’t know about.’
‘From what we’ve learnt about Stevie Cullen so far, a burner phone would be just his style,’ said Ruskin.
‘Cullen did call the massage parlour business line on a regular basis, using his personal phone,’ continued Grimshaw, ‘but these calls were short and broadly corresponded with times that we know he had appointments. If either of the girls, or their aunt, had a social relationship with the late Mr Cullen it was either offline or they used a different phone. Similarly, we’re drawing a blank on Ray Dorridge.’
‘Thanks, Shaun. Wilson was adamant that they had no relationship with Cullen outside of work; if they did, we’ve caught her in a lie. Have we identified the girls’ friends for interview?’
Grimshaw nodded. ‘If their contacts are anything to go by, they pretty much socialized exclusively with the local Serbian community. We’ve identified a list of about ten that they seem to meet on a regular basis.’ He passed across a list to Warren.
‘Anybody particularly special? Boyfriends or girlfriends?’ asked Pymm.
‘Nobody obvious. They’re a tactile pair; especially after a few drinks, they seem to be hugging everybody. I asked the translation team to keep an eye out for terms of endearment that might give us a clue.’
‘Good work. Hutch, can you arrange for these people to be interviewed? Use translators if necessary. I want to know if they were aware of any contact with Stevie Cullen and his family. I also want to know if they’ve seen or heard anything about the killing or have any suspicions.’
‘There are also two other, unidentified people that I think we should look at,’ said Grimshaw.
‘Go on.’
Grimshaw held up two sheets of A4 paper, both with several coloured images. ‘The girls tended to tag most of the people appearing in their photographs. Anyone who wasn’t tagged in a photo, I was usually able to match to a name by looking for them in different pictures where they were tagged.’ His lip twisted slightly. ‘That’s a large chunk of my life I’ll never get back.’
‘But these two couldn’t be identified?’
Grimshaw shook his head. ‘The first is a young woman. She only appears in a few of the more recent photos, usually in the background.’
He passed the sheet of photographs around.
The woman appeared to be slim, with dark hair, and of average height. Even the best photographs had only a three-quarter profile. Warren hoped it was enough for someone to recognize her. The chances were that she was just an occasional friend that the girls hadn’t yet ‘friended’ on social media; regardless, Warren wanted to know who she was.
‘The second is an unknown male, of average build and height, probably in his mid-twenties. He appears in several different pictures from various parties that the girls attended in the first few weeks after they arrived here. If I had to guess, I’d imagine he’s one of the Serbian community. He stopped appearing in the photos about three months ago.’
‘Well he fits the physical profile of the supposed attacker,’ said Ruskin.
‘So do half the men in Middlesbury,’ said Pymm, ‘and that’s assuming the girls’ accounts are even accurate.’
‘If he did have a relationship with one of the girls, that might explain why they tried to cover for him by giving such a vague description, and it might explain his motive,’ said Martinez, ignoring Pymm. ‘He could have been jealous of Cullen.’
‘If they wanted to cover for him, why not say the attacker was a twenty-stone black man? That way we’d be looking for someone completely different,’ countered Pymm.
‘If they made the description too distinctive, we’d soon question why we haven’t had any eyewitness sightings or CCTV of the attacker. As it stands a nondescript, average bloke might just have slipped through the net,’ said Grimshaw.
‘That sounds a bit sophisticated to come up with on the fly,’ said Hutchinson.
‘Who says they came up with it on the fly?’ asked Grimshaw. ‘They could have been planning it for months.’
‘And besides, we know they didn’t call the police immediately,’ agreed Martinez.
‘OK, OK, people, let’s not get carried away,’ said Warren. ‘We’re building a very flimsy house of cards here, based on not a lot.’ He took a breath. ‘First of all, let’s find out who he is. Show those photos to someone else who was at one of the parties he attended, see if they can identify him. Next, let’s ask why he no longer appears in their most recent photos. Is he even in the area anymore?’
‘Could they have deleted photos that he appeared in?’ asked Hutchinson. ‘They could have done the most recent ones and not quite managed the earliest ones.’
‘It would certainly be a big enough job,’ said Grimshaw. ‘They’ve posted hundreds over the past year or so, on several different social media platforms.’
‘Nothing’s ever completely deleted,’ said Ruskin. ‘We could raise a warrant and ask for the data from Facebook and Instagram.’
A chorus of groans rang around the room.
‘You’ll be collecting your pension by the time that comes through,’ said Martinez.
‘Besides, why was he the only person not tagged? If they deleted him as a contact, would that have automatically untagged him?’
There was a silence, followed by a series of shrugs around the room.
‘We’ll need to find out if that’s the case,’ said Warren.
‘Sounds like a job for young Moray,’ said Grimshaw. ‘Us old folks find these new-fangled social media platforms far too complicated.’
Chapter 26
‘I’ve figured out who Malina was calling immediately after the murder,’ said Pymm, triumphantly, the moment Warren re-entered the office.
Warren hurried over to her desk, the rest of the team also dropping what they were doing. Mags Richardson sat next to her, a satisfied look on her face.
‘It was a team effort,’ said Pymm, turning to Richardson. ‘You tell them, Mags.’
‘No, you tell them, you had the brain wave.’
‘Ladies …’ warned Warren; Pymm’s flair for the dramatic and her inability to pass up the opportunity to tease had started to infect other members of the team, including Richardson.
‘The number was saved in the address books of both Malina and Biljana’s handsets, which IT finally figured out how to open. Thank God for dirty fingers and swipe access. The problem was that I don’t read Cyrillic or Serbian for that matter. Translation services are really swamped at the moment, so I figured why not use an online translation tool whilst we’re waiting?’
‘Good idea,’ said Warren.
‘Anyway, I started copying the Cyrillic entries into a translator one at a time to see what came out.’
She maximized her internet browser, which was open on a page with two boxes, side by side.
‘Now look at this.’
There were two words, neither of which meant anything to Warren, the Cyrillic completely meaningless to him.
Тетка силвија.
Pymm pressed translate, and the translation appeared in the right-hand box.
Aunty Silvija.
‘That’s the number we already have for Silvija Wilson, and it’s the number Malina called that afternoon after she had been interviewed. So next, I tried translating each individual word, and it seems that this one, pronounced “Tetka”, means Aunty – specifically a maternal aunt – and the other word, is the Cyrillic form of Silvija.’
‘OK.’
‘Well this is what’s recorded next to the unknown number.’
She clicked on another entry.
Тетка – посао
‘I assumed of course that was another aunt. I figured that for whatever reason, she’d decided to call another relative, perhaps for advice, but when I enter the other word, which I won’t even try to pronounce, this comes up.’
Copying the Cyrillic into the left-hand box, she pressed translate.
The result was clear: Aunty – job.
‘And before you ask, she doesn’t have an aunty called “Job”, it means job as in work.’ She smiled smugly. ‘Aunty Silvija has a separate work phone, and Malina phoned it immediately after Stevie Cullen was killed.’
‘I want to know what Silvija Wilson was doing on the day of the murder,’ said Warren.
Grimshaw flicked through his notepad. ‘She told us that she had been with her father-in-law all day, after completing the bank run first thing.’
‘Do we have an address for him?’ asked Warren.
‘No, but we know he’s in a care home out in Stenfield,’ replied Grimshaw.
‘Speak to that helpful neighbour again; she seems to know the family. Now we know that the phone belongs to Silvija, I want you to track its movements that day.’ He thought for a moment. ‘You could also try cross-referencing its location with Silvija’s personal phone that we definitely know belongs to her.’
‘I’m expecting the data any time soon,’ said Pymm.
Warren thought back to the aunt’s arrival the evening of the murder. ‘Mags, see if you can also track down her car’s movements that day.’
‘I’ll run it through the ANPR system, Sir.’
‘We’ve interviewed all of Biljana and Malina Dragić’s friends,’ said Hutchinson.
‘Give me a summary,’ said Warren.
‘Well the good news is that most of them spoke sufficiently good English not to need a translator.’
That was very good news; translation services weren’t cheap and DSI Grayson was already dropping none-too-subtle hints about budget constraints.
‘What did they know?’
‘Not a lot, to be honest. They’d all heard about the murder, obviously, but most hadn’t spoken directly to either of the girls or their aunt since it happened. None of the people we interviewed admitted to knowing Stevie Cullen, or even hearing of him and his family before the attack. Which is probably not too surprising – they are all college kids or bar workers in town. Most don’t even own a car, so they’re hardly going to be driving out to the White Stag for a pint and a plate of scampi and chips. I can’t see how their social circles would ever overlap with the Cullens’.’
‘What about anyone who has spoken to the girls since?’ asked Warren.
‘Three women, identifying themselves as the girls’ best friends, had been around to see them. We asked them what they knew about the incident and all three parroted exactly what the girls told us in their original statement.’
‘Which we know was incorrect,’ interjected Grimshaw.
‘Do you think they were simply repeating what the girls told them, or do they know more than they’re letting on? You say they describe themselves as the girls’ best friends. Could the girls have confided in them what really happened? Did they look cagey at all?’
‘Sorry, I really couldn’t say,’ said Hutchinson. ‘They were all quite nervous and excited about the whole affair.’
‘I’m surprised they didn’t ask you to pose for a selfie,’ muttered Grimshaw.
‘OK, we’ll take a look at the video interview again, and see if there are any obvious signs they’re lying,’ said Warren. ‘Now, what about these two unidentified people in the girls’ social media posts?’
‘I think we can rule out the young man. Several interviewees positively identified him. Apparently, he didn’t live here; he was the cousin of one of the regular gang, over for a long summer holiday to practise his English. He turned up to a few parties, but nobody really knew him. He was a bit of an idiot apparently, which is why no one friended him on Facebook. We’ve spoken to Border Force who are tracking him down to make sure he wasn’t in the country at the time.’
‘What about the unidentified young woman?’
‘Less luck. Everybody claimed not to know who she is, which is strange given that she was in several different photos, taken over a period of time.’
‘Gut feeling?’
‘I spoke to the interviewing officers and they reckon that at least a couple of them were lying. Exactly why, they weren’t sure.’
Warren pinched his lip thoughtfully. Something didn’t seem quite right. ‘Could it be an immigration issue?’
‘That might explain the caginess. All of the people we spoke to were keen to stress that they had the correct visas or were British citizens.’
With Serbia not part of the EU, the correct visas would be necessary to live, work or study in the UK. Had the mysterious young woman overstayed her visa? Was she in the country illegally? If so, that might explain why she was keeping a low profile and her friends were reluctant to acknowledge her existence.
‘Keep on digging. It could be nothing, or it could be something.’
Chapter 27
Mags Richardson grabbed Warren the moment he set foot back in CID. It was late afternoon, and the toast and marmalade he’d had at Bernice and Dennis’ seemed a long time ago. As much as he loved custard creams, he’d needed something more substantial. The franchised coffee shop that had taken over from the station’s canteen had sold out of anything Warren considered remotely edible hours ago and he’d been forced to seek sustenance from the local garage.
The excitement on Mags’ face meant the sorry-looking ploughman’s sandwich he’d finally settled upon could wait. Half of it would be going in the bin anyway, after he’d dismantled it and discarded the superfluous lettuce, tomato, cucumber and red onion.
Richardson had moved her workstation next to Pymm, so the two of them could work more efficiently. Judging by the piles of printouts, and the fact that all three of Pymm’s screens were filled with data, the two sergeants had been busy.
‘Forensic IT have been going over that security footage from the massag
e parlour on the morning of the murder, and we think we know what Malina was doing at the reception desk after the attack. But I warn you, you’re not going to be happy,’ said Richardson.
‘Go on,’ said Warren, warily.
‘The keyboard, mouse and monitor for the desktop computer are also connected to the digital video recorder for the surveillance system. They use a switch to swap between the two.’ She looked apologetic. ‘I’ve watched the footage back in slow motion and it’s clear that she flicks the switch before she starts typing.’
‘For fu …’ Warren bit his tongue. It was hardly Richardson’s fault. ‘And nobody thought to tell us this before?’
‘Sorry, Boss. Don’t shoot the messenger.’
Warren sighed; he had a good idea where this was going.
‘The video surveillance system is a pretty basic system: two cameras, the one we’ve already watched from the front of the parlour, and another over the back door, which has supposedly been broken for weeks.’
Warren noticed the qualification in what she said.
‘You don’t think it has been broken for that long?’
‘Nope. According to the techs, this CCTV unit is really simple. The disk has enough space for about four weeks’ footage from a single camera. Plug in two cameras and it’ll store about two weeks from each input. You can add up to four cameras and it records on a rolling system – the newest footage overwrites the oldest footage. If you disconnect a camera, the system automatically allocates that unused disk space to one of the other cameras and overwrites what was there before. The system tries its best to fill as much of the disk as possible.’
‘OK, so what’s the discrepancy?’
‘Silvija Wilson claims that the rear camera has been broken for weeks. If that was the case, the stored data from the working video camera in reception should have overwritten the unused hard disk space from the broken camera.’
‘And it hadn’t?’
‘Nope. In fact, almost exactly half of the disk is empty.’
Warren would be the first to admit that he wasn’t a technical expert, but even he could see what Richardson was getting at.