by Paul Gitsham
‘Back in 2002 the Lilac Lane Community Hub was Middlesbury’s central meeting point for the Muslim community. A community that has since moved to the Middlesbury Islamic Centre. Which was set on fire at approximately the same time as Mr Meegan was being murdered. What were you doing at that time, Mr Singh?’
‘DCI Jones, my client has admitted that he has somewhat ambiguous views towards Islam, and in the past – as a youth – was involved in some petty vandalism. However, I don’t think it automatically follows that he was involved in that arson. The town was overrun by racist thugs espousing Islamophobic rhetoric only a couple of miles away from this tragic incident. Surely they are more likely culprits.’
‘Please let Mr Singh answer the question,’ responded Warren, trying his best not to let his growing irritation with the solicitor show.
‘No comment,’ said Singh.
Warren passed over photographs of the rear of the community centre.
‘This wheelie bin was pushed in front of the rear exit, making escape impossible.’ He tapped the picture. ‘You can see how rusty it is.’
‘It has already been established that my client has perfectly legitimate reasons for the rust marks on his clothing.’
Warren bit his tongue; the solicitor was really starting to get on his nerves.
‘Are you sure that the rust on your clothes came from your workplace and not this bin, Mr Singh?’
‘Yeah.’
Warren passed another colour photograph across the desk.
‘When we visited your workplace, your workmates were adamant that you and your colleagues all wear overalls. And disposable gloves. In fact, according to one of your co-workers, you are quite fussy about making sure you don’t get dirty.’
‘No comment.’
‘This evidence is circumstantial.’
‘Mr Stock, this is not a court of law and you are not a barrister. Please do not answer on behalf of your client again, or I shall be forced to terminate the interview.’
Stock flushed bright red, but wisely said nothing.
Tony Sutton cleared his throat.
‘The rust stains on Mr Singh’s trousers weren’t the only interesting thing about this piece of clothing. This is an image of the trousers under a high-powered microscope.’ He passed over yet another colour photograph. ‘You can clearly see that in amongst the fibres are tiny, microscopic spheres. I’m told by forensics that they are melted nylon from the polyester that makes up the material. One interpretation is that you were a bit clumsy when you slopped the petrol through the letter box of the community centre and when you lit it there was a very brief flash as the fuel burnt off, leaving behind these melted spheres. You were bloody lucky you didn’t set yourself on fire.’
Singh Mahal’s eyes widened slightly.
‘No, I had an accident at work.’
‘Try again,’ snapped Warren. ‘You wear overalls at work.’
‘We sent the clothes off for petrol branding,’ continued Sutton. ‘The lab tests identified trace residues on the clothing as matching the petrol used as an accelerant in the community centre fire. The same brand of ESSO petrol that your accomplice, Philip Rhodri admitted to buying on the seventeenth of June.’
‘Would you care to comment?’ asked Warren.
Singh Mahal’s body language radiated defeat. The defiance and arrogance was gone. It took over an hour for him to describe the events that had taken place over the past few weeks and months, his story matching that of Philip Rhodri’s perfectly and confirming much of what the team had suspected. By the time he finally finished he was exhausted.
Warren was unsympathetic.
‘Binay Singh Mahal, I am charging you with the murder of Syeda Fahmida…’
Chapter 64
The atmosphere in the CID unit was a mixture of relief, satisfaction and weariness. Somebody had found some cheap fizzy wine and was trying to divide it fairly amongst the dozens of officers present.
‘Tony, would you like to say a few words, since you led on this?’ asked DSI Grayson, uncharacteristically forgoing an opportunity to bask in the limelight.
Sutton cleared his throat and clambered onto a table, before raising his polystyrene cup.
‘Well done, everybody, for putting in the hours and bringing this to such a speedy close. I’d also like to thank our visiting colleagues from Welwyn for their support and assistance.’ A ripple of applause ran around the room as Sutton took the opportunity to thank a few individuals by name.
Warren smiled his congratulations, but inside he knew the job was only half finished. The events of the week before had resulted in the deaths of two people. Nobody in their right mind would claim they were both innocent victims, but Tommy Megan had still been unlawfully killed; in a civilised society he was as deserving of justice as anyone, and it was Warren’s duty to deliver it to him. Raising his cup one more time he turned towards his office; he’d let the team celebrate a little longer and then try and get everyone back into work-mode.
Unfortunately, the team had different ideas and despite his protestations, Warren found himself being pushed towards Sutton’s impromptu stage. The cheap office furniture creaked alarmingly under the weight of the two men but held.
‘I’d just like to echo everything that Tony said,’ he started. ‘It’s hard to be too upbeat after the sad news that Mrs Fahmida didn’t make it, but we can at least be satisfied that we did everything in our power to bring her killers to justice.’ A few muted ‘hear hears’ showed the room’s agreement.
‘On a more positive note, her great-grandson Abbas was moved to a regular ward this morning and the prognosis is a full recovery.’
After taking another swig of the too sweet liquid, Warren asked for quiet again.
‘The full story will emerge in due course, but I’m sure many of you are aware that the motive for the fire was in large part religious and could well be classified as a hate crime.’ He had everyone’s attention now.
‘The details have not yet been released to the press. I’m sure that you will all understand the potentially explosive fallout from this incident and agree with the Chief Constable’s insistence that we continue to refer all press enquiries to the press office. We’re sitting on a potential powder keg here. Keep away from reporters and keep your mouth shut online. Make sure that you aren’t the spark.’
A chorus of muted ‘yes, sirs’ signalled compliance.
‘This is still an active investigation. So drain your thimbles and get back to work, we’ve got another killer to catch.’
A smattering of polite applause followed him as he hopped awkwardly down and finally headed towards his office. Sutton fell in behind him.
‘Beautiful, boss. You have the soul of a poet and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.’
‘Sod off.’
* * *
‘What a bloody mess.’ Assistant Chief Constable Mohammed Naseem was on speakerphone in John Grayson’s office. After congratulating Warren and his team on their success, the senior officer’s voice turned sombre.
‘At least Binay Singh Mahal’s legal team won’t be able to plead it was a spur of the moment. He and Philip Rhodri were planning this for weeks. Did he say what the trigger was?’
‘An article was posted anonymously on the Sikhs Against Jihadis website when news of the proposed “super mosque”, as they insisted on calling it, was announced. He was pretty incensed about it and he decided to share it with the BAP,’ replied Warren. ‘It looks as though he created a Facebook profile just for the occasion. He’d read somewhere about the Meegan brothers being from Middlesbury originally and it seems he had a flash of inspiration.’
‘So where does this Philip Rhodri come in?’
‘That’s the interesting bit,’ said Warren. ‘Singh Mahal and Rhodri had never met in real life before, but the two of them worked as part of an online collective who trolled far-right social media sites with fake profiles. Rhodri was also involved in real world direct action, with groups
such as Students Against Fascism and was well known in the anti-racism movement. Theo Garfield and his Hate Crime Intelligence Unit have been following him for a few years and he’s been arrested enough times to carry business cards for his lawyer as a matter of routine. Rhodri claims that he had no idea that Singh Mahal was also a member of Sikhs Against Jihadis, and for what it’s worth I believe him.’
‘Sounds like he was duped by Singh Mahal?’
‘Yes and no. I don’t think he had any idea that the BAP’s decision to come and march on Middlesbury was so heavily encouraged by Singh Mahal, and he certainly didn’t know that Singh Mahal had decided to gamble and connect directly with Tommy Meegan. However, when Singh Mahal proposed that they use the march as an opportunity to frame the BAP for some sort of attack, Rhodri went along with it immediately.’
‘Say what you like,’ interjected Grayson, ‘but that was a pretty ballsy decision by Singh Mahal. He must have known that the likelihood was that the moment Meegan realised that Singh Mahal was an Asian himself he could have turned around and gone for him.’
‘Perhaps, perhaps not,’ interjected Garfield. ‘We’d already been picking up indications that Tommy Meegan was a lot cleverer and nuanced than most of these idiots; Singh Mahal may well have got the same impression. Either way, the gamble seemed to work.’
‘OK, so Binay Singh Mahal puts the idea into Tommy Meegan’s head to do a protest march on Middlesbury, surely that’s job done? Why did he need to contact him again? Was it to lure Tommy Meegan down that alleyway to kill him?’
This time Sutton answered. ‘Singh Mahal claims not. He denies sending the email that arranged the alleyway meeting and seemed pretty confident that anything we can get from Facebook won’t implicate him in Meegan’s murder. Forensic IT are treating it as top priority.’
‘What about their phone calls then?’
Warren took up the story again. ‘Unfortunately, we can only ever have his word for it, but he reckons he rang Meegan to discuss the logistics of the march. He claimed to have promised Meegan the support of a few dozen of the local Sikh community on the day of the march, which we know was a complete fabrication. In reality, he was making sure that Meegan didn’t change his mind and back out. The BAP have cancelled a couple of marches in the past because of low turnout.’
‘And Meegan fell for it?’
‘These guys have a real blind spot. They are so convinced that they are in the right, that they have no problem believing that everyone else will see the light eventually,’ said Garfield.
‘What I don’t understand is why he nearly scuppered the whole thing by picking Rhodri up in front of a load of witnesses in that car with fake plates?’ asked Naseem.
‘Rhodri claims that wasn’t part of the original plan. He says that his role was to lay a trail pointing towards the BAP. He ordered those neo-Nazi tattoo sleeves online and cut his hair so he could easily wear a bald cap, then made sure he was seen buying petrol, and purchasing the car. He even sprayed racist graffiti on the community centre wall and took out the security cameras, although it seems that nobody actually witnessed him doing that.
‘The plan then was to attend the rally as himself and build his alibi. Then, later that night, Binay Singh Mahal was going to sneak back to the Islamic Centre and start the fire. He reckoned that as long as he took his turban off, nobody would think anything strange about seeing an Asian man hanging around the local Islamic Centre.’
Warren grimaced slightly, remembering Singh Mahal’s earlier tirade. He suspected the man was probably right.
‘So what changed?’
‘I think Binay Singh Mahal got cold feet. He figured that the police would want more evidence that the BAP had set the fire, so he called Rhodri and insisted that he pull out his dressing-up box and do his far-right turn again near the Islamic Centre at the same time that the BAP were in town, making sure plenty of people saw him.’
‘And Rhodri went along with him? Why? He must have seen it was a bad idea?’
‘Rhodri claims that Singh Mahal threatened him. He knew where he lived and said that if Rhodri tried to back out, he’d let Tommy Meegan and the BAP know the address of one of their least favourite people.’ Warren paused for a moment. ‘If you ask me, I think Rhodri is a bit of a coward. He’d get involved in protests, but only when there’s a line of burly coppers standing between him and his targets. He’s never actually been done for assault, just resisting arrest. He’s what my mother used to describe as “all mouth and trousers”’.
‘Sounds about right,’ agreed Garfield.
‘So what happened?’
‘They turned up and found that there was a police car around the corner. Rhodri wanted to just abandon the plan, but Singh Mahal insisted they wait, if nothing else it would increase the likelihood of Rhodri being spotted near the scene. Singh Mahal cranked the seat back and hid himself from view.’
‘Makes sense,’ interjected Grayson. ‘They’d have made a pretty odd couple.’
Warren continued. ‘Rhodri was using Snapchat to keep in touch with friends in town and was aware of what was happening and they decided to wait and see if the police guard got pulled away to assist. It seems that decision was the correct one.’
‘From their perspective, maybe,’ muttered Naseem darkly, his tone reminding Warren that solving the case so quickly wasn’t going to get the force off the hook for some of the poor decisions it had made that day and since.
‘So how culpable is Rhodri in what happened next?’
‘He knew that Singh Mahal was going to set a fire, and of course he bought the petrol, but he swears the original plan was to do it late at night when it was empty. Obviously he agreed to the change of plans to during the day when the centre was occupied, but he claims to have been horrified when he found out that Singh Mahal had poured the petrol through the letter box. It’s why he tried to get rid of his disguise down the toilet and left the car with the spray cans he’d used to graffiti the community centre in the boot and the keys in the ignition where he knew it’d be nicked. I thought he was going to have a stroke when I told him that Singh Mahal had blocked the rear entrance.’
‘We’ll let the courts and the CPS decide if they want to nail him for murder or manslaughter. Now, one last little matter.’
Warren knew exactly what he was hinting at.
‘In light of everything that Singh Mahal and Rhodri have told us, Councillor Kaur has decided to make a clean breast of it. Or so she tells us. She claims not to have known anything about the plans in advance and knew nothing until Binay Singh Mahal phoned her after his release and demanded that she give him an alibi.’
‘Be that as it may, she must have had a suspicion why he needed an alibi, if not for the arson then the murder of Tommy Meegan. Why did she give him one?’
‘She claims that it was because she had known Singh Mahal since he was a young child and that she was convinced that he was of good character. She said that Singh Mahal had claimed to be scared that the police were framing him by finding his Kirpan at the scene and that she had been naive enough to support Singh Mahal whilst she got to the bottom of it. I think she may even believe herself.’
The noise from the other end of the conference line was halfway between a snort of disbelief and a guffaw.
‘In reality, Singh Mahal claims that his parents have been supporting her re-election bid, both financially and through their influence in the local community. Draw your own conclusions.’
‘That sounds more like it. I’ll bet she’s furious with Singh Mahal right now. If he hadn’t had cold feet at the last minute, she’d never have been involved,’ said Grayson. ‘Well, even if she squirms her way out of a prison sentence, at least we can be sure that her political career is over. We’ll be a lot better off without her popping up on TV every five minutes telling us what we’re doing wrong and how we’re all closet racists.’
‘I’m sure they could find her a place in House of Lords, they’ll let anyone in there,’ said
Garfield.
‘I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.’ Naseem’s voice boomed out of the speakerphone, before hanging up.
Warren looked at his watch reluctantly. The day’s result had been hard won and he knew his team wanted to savour it a bit longer, but there was still work to be done.
‘I want a briefing in one hour. Binay Singh Mahal still claims that he knows nothing about Tommy Meegan’s murder and if his story holds up, there was no way either Philip Rhodri or he could have killed him.
‘Somewhere out there is a cold-blooded killer, twisted enough to try and frame Binay Singh Mahal. We need them off the street.’
* * *
Despite their success in solving the community centre blaze, Warren couldn’t risk the team falling into a slump. The murder of Tommy Meegan was still unsolved and he wanted everyone to raise their game again. Warren snagged Hardwick to help him roll a wheeled whiteboard into the main briefing room. The force had invested heavily in case management software and Warren was a keen advocate of its use, in particular HOLMES2 – nevertheless, sometimes marker pens, Post-it notes and Blu Tack could help make sense of the bigger picture more easily. He pretended not to hear the stage whispers about clay tablets and Mount Sinai from the more technologically savvy members of his team.
Warren and Sutton had spent the past half-hour drawing parallel timelines for the day of the murder. The top line, in blue, included key time-points related to the murder of Tommy Meegan. A red line at the bottom of the board did the same for the fire. Between the two, they’d used a range of different colours to mark the whereabouts of key suspects during the day.
‘Right, folks. Whilst it is remotely possible that both of Saturday’s events were unrelated, a message luring Tommy Meegan to that alleyway was sent from Binay Singh Mahal’s email account. I want everything entered into HOLMES ASAP, but I also want it on the whiteboards.’ He held up a large packet of multicoloured Post-it notes. ‘I didn’t steal these from my wife’s school bag for nothing.
‘There are a lot of suspects and there’s still a huge amount of CCTV to trawl through, so we need to keep on top of everything. In other news, the results for the blood tests on Bellies Brandon’s shirt show no match to Tommy Meegan.’