Addley looked around the room. His body language gave the impression of someone who was about to be interviewed for promotion to a higher position and was nervous as his answers would likely determine his immediate future. Whatever answers he gave me, his immediate future was a stone-cold certainty.
“You seen my brother lately?”
“Why would I want to see your brother? I know he’s in prison somewhere,” I lied again, “but I don’t know where and, frankly, I don’t care either.”
He nodded. His brother had provided valuable assistance to Special Branch by pointing out that Dennis Reagan was back on the scene again and looking to get busy. Simon Addley didn’t know this.
“So, what does being at the front end of twelve years look like to you?” I asked.
He was only a few weeks into a long sentence and I was wondering whether the reality of his situation had sunk in. Some prisoners, especially old lags, immediately adjust to the prison environment with little difficulty but some, especially first-time inmates and those continuing to plead their innocence, struggle to accept the reality of their new life and take some while to fully grasp the fact of incarceration. Which is why some first-time inmates are placed on suicide watch for the first few months of their sentence.
He shrugged his shoulders and looked indifferent. “With parole and all that, I can be out in eight, nine years. I’ll still only be mid-thirties.” He made it sound quite casual, as though losing eight to nine years of his life was nothing to be unduly concerned about. “Plenty of time left.”
He spoke as he was looking around the room. There was nothing to see other than bare walls and a metal door. I hoped he liked what he saw as he had years in front of him to savour this view. He was still nodding and grinning to himself. I was about to begin my questions when he leapt in with a surprise.
“Did you know I’ve begun meditating again?”
“Didn’t know you ever did.” I was amazed. There’d been nothing on his file indicating a spiritual dimension to his life.
“I used to do it regularly at one time but stopped when I got into other things.” I knew what he meant. “But I’ve started again, and it’s wonderful; cleanses the mind and lets the positive thoughts just flow.” He sounded almost ethereal and his eyes seemed somehow brighter.
“When I was in custody after I was arrested, I sank into a depth of despair I didn’t think I’d ever escape from. I really did think there was no point living. In bed one night I felt my heart going mad and I started trembling and sweating profusely. I thought it was a heart attack but it was just a major panic attack. But after that, over the next few days, the way was pointed out to me.” He touched the side of his head with his left index finger. “I remembered my meditation days, so I assumed the lotus position and just let my mind empty itself of all the negativity and the hatred. I remembered the mantra I used to chant to myself. I said it to myself several times and you know what? I suddenly came over all relaxed and joyful. Everything just fell away from me. I could see again. I knew I had to leave my life as it then was behind me, and I have. Now? I’m totally calm and I have inner peace and tranquillity.”
He closed his eyes for a few seconds and drew a deep breath.
“That’s why I agreed to what the security people said at all the pre-trial meetings, when they were talking about pleading guilty to whatever charges and all that. I didn’t care anymore, you see? The spirit was pointing the way. I was leaving my life behind and going on to the next stage of my journey.”
I’d been in court when the judge had passed sentence. I remembered Addley’d looked almost sanguine but I’d assumed it was just the shock of hearing twelve years of his life being taken from him. Apparently not.
“It’s beautiful, man. You should try it; really, you should. Especially with your job, all the hassles and the danger you must face. I’m at peace, despite my surroundings. Nothing they do can get to me now, because I’m in here.” He touched his chest with both his index fingers. “Every new day’s a gift from God, that’s why it’s called the present, and it’s there for you to shape your own life and destiny. I’ve chosen a different path for my life, one free of hatred and anger. It’s as the Dalai Lama says: you can’t live a positive life with negative thoughts.”
I’d been expecting Che Guevara and I get Timothy Leary instead.
“As I’m an enemy of the state and a threat to society,” he said slowly, in a mocking tone, opening his eyes wide, “they’ve put me in a single cell, and it’s so much nicer. I can meditate whenever I want and for as long as I need to. No one disturbs me. I can lose myself in the ether and it’s wonderful.”
“You’re also isolated from the general prison population, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I’m in the isolation block for the moment. There’s a few others there as well but I’ve not seen them yet. I’m told the two guys who sliced up Lee Rigby are just around the corner from me. One of the warders said I’m not an ordinary prisoner; I’m a terrorist and so I’m there for my own safety. I only see the others when we’re allowed out to exercise; I can see them across the courtyard, but I’m kept away from them. I’ve had a few of the ordinary criminals yell insults and threats at me but” – he shrugged – “I’m above them now. They don’t understand, do they?”
Listening to him talk, I seriously doubted Addley’d yet become fully aware of the reality of his situation. He was a category-A inmate in a maximum-security prison, which meant any pretence of normal life for him was over. His every movement, eating, exercising or showering, would be constantly monitored. He was also locked in behind almost escape-proof security precautions, with some extremely homicidal maniacs for company. In prison, certain categories of prisoner were at extreme risk of serious injury or worse from those he’d referred to as ordinary criminals; child molesters and anyone associated with terrorism might just as well wear a large bull’s-eye across their chest, as they were the targets for the spiteful desire for retribution to be meted out on society’s behalf by those already incarcerated by that same society. IRA personnel were especially at risk as, somewhat bizarrely, many prisoners were also very patriotic and took an intense dislike to anyone who regarded bombs on the mainland as a legitimate political strategy, particularly where a threat to the royal family was involved.
Whilst it was known he’d been sentenced for a terrorist-related offence, I hoped for Addley’s sake the prison population didn’t discover what he’d been planning to do the night he’d been arrested along with his brother Colin. Because prisons were not a place where secrets could be kept secret for long.
“Congratulations on your elevation to the Third Bardo,” I offered facetiously. “But I’d like to talk to you about something a little more worldly. I’m after some information on a couple of individuals and, if you can steer me in the right direction, it’s quite possible your sentence could have something lopped off the other end, but,” I emphasised the word, “only if what you say can be verified. Which means, you give me a whole crateload of bullshit, you’ll do every day of your sentence, guaranteed, and you’ll be much older than mid-thirties if you’re ever released. This is your chance to do something to help us and also yourself.”
He looked uninterested, like nothing I’d said had any resonance with him. He settled back into his uncomfortable chair and folded his arms. “Meaning what, exactly?”
“I just want you to confirm a couple of things for me. The people I’m interested in aren’t even in the country, so no one’ll be arrested. I simply want to know what you know about a couple of other Red Heaven pilgrims. As I mentioned, you help us out, we could be willing to cut you a little slack.”
He sat quietly for several seconds, looking down at the table with his arms folded. I could hear him tapping his feet on the concrete floor. I knew what he could tell me would be limited, but I wanted to know whether he and Mendoccini knew each other. At that point I would have incontrovertible evidence my old friend was linked to terrorism.
/> He sucked in his cheeks and pursed his lips in thought. He did this for nearly thirty seconds, then he sighed.
“How did you even get involved in Red Heaven?” I decided to go for it without waiting for his reply. To my considerable surprise he answered.
“You know how it goes,” he eventually said after several seconds. “You come across people at various events; demos, sit-ins, squats, rallies, things like that. You get talking, find you’ve got political ideals in common and a desire to do something about achieving them, and then one thing produces another.”
“Is that why you and your brother went to Italy a couple of years ago, to be indoctrinated into what Red Heaven was all about?”
Addley’s file revealed he and Colin Addley had flown on Ryanair from Stansted Airport to Milan just over two years ago. Ostensibly they were tourists but, given their association with the anarchist fringe, their departure had been logged and Italian police, the Carabinieri, had been notified and asked to keep an eye on them. The eye seemed to have been kept mostly closed because, apart from a few random notes about their drinking in a number of bars in the city centre, there was little mention of whom they met and what they did whilst in Milan.
Gavin Dennison had mentioned his belief the Italian police were corrupt. Was this an example, someone paid to look elsewhere, or simple incompetence?
“We weren’t indoctrinated, man. We just listened and liked what they had to say. They told us about how they were part of something aiming to strike a blow at the heart of a morally and politically bankrupt capitalist society. Colin and I agreed we’d do what we could in England to help them out.”
“And that’s where you were admitted to the fold?”
“Some people and I shared similar viewpoints, if that’s what you’re implying. Yeah, we helped them out.”
I took out my pictures and laid them on the table. “These two, for instance?”
He was looking at Poletti and Mendoccini’s pictures which I’d placed before him.
“You know these people?” I casually asked.
From the way his eyes briefly flickered, it was obvious he recognised at least one of the persons in the pictures. I kept my stare on him.
“Yeah, him.” He nodded at Poletti’s picture.
“Where from?”
“Met him here in London. He stayed with Colin and me at our place for a little while. He invited us to see him in Italy. We stayed at his place for a few days and after a while he asked if we wanted to help their cause. I said yeah. We kept in touch and things happened, you know how it goes. You already know some of the things we did or were accused of doing.”
Kader hadn’t mentioned Poletti ever staying at the house when he was operating as an undercover agent. “How did things happen?”
“Through Kader, mainly. He was in touch with this guy” – he nodded at the picture again – “and he met up with him last time he was in London.”
“Kader met him?” I shouldn’t have been surprised. Kader would have been able to do this. He was an MI5 operative working undercover, so meeting someone like Poletti in the line of duty would quite likely arouse no suspicion.
“Yeah. Kader supplied him with the explosives to do the synagogue. Even helped him evade being arrested for it, though I don’t know how he did that.”
“Poletti planted the explosives at the synagogue? You’re sure about that?”
“I’m sure.” He nodded sagely.
There’d been a very small quantity of hydroxilyn used in this explosion, which was what had helped cause such devastation with such a small quantity of explosives. It was this that’d alerted the security services to the fact a small amount of hydroxilyn had gone missing. Thankfully, no one had died, but there had been considerable damage to the synagogue and nearby properties.
Mendoccini had also been in the country at the same time, according to our files. Had he been involved in this action?
“Did you ever meet him again?”
“Yeah, a couple of times. Met him at some café in Soho. I was there with a magazine writer I was talking to. His mag was doing some piece on ‘terrorism’ ” – he used his index fingers to indicate quotation marks – “and afterwards I told him my friend’s an Italian with an interesting perspective on what he was looking for information about. Poletti said he’d be interested in talking to him if he wanted, and he did. They had quite a long chat,” Addley said, almost conspiratorially.
So that was how Richard Clements had met Poletti. “What did they talk about?”
“Don’t know.” He shook his head. “I went outside and strolled around for a while.”
“How long did they talk for?”
“They were still talking when I got back about an hour later.”
“How did you come across this writer?” I was curious. “I wasn’t aware you counted intellectuals amongst your contacts.”
“He found me; I didn’t go looking for him. I’m guessing he knew someone who knew me. He got in touch and said he’d like to talk to me about this piece he was writing, so I agreed to meet up with him.”
I smiled to myself, remembering how disparaging Clements had been about Simon Addley’s lack of political nous.
“What about the other guy?” I pointed at Mendoccini’s picture, hoping not to hear any bad news about him.
“Looks familiar but I don’t know his name.”
“Where does he look familiar from?”
He looked thoughtful for a moment.
“I think he was in the café as well.” He thought for a moment longer. “Yeah, he was, sitting across the room talking to the café manager. I didn’t speak to him.”
That would presumably have been Roberto Delucca.
“They were gabbling on about something or other in what I assume was Italian. At one point this guy” – he touched Mendoccini’s picture – “got up and left for a few minutes, and when he returned he put a bag on the table and they put something inside, but I didn’t see what it was.”
“Do you know his name?” I nodded at Mendoccini’s picture.
“This one’s Paolo,” he said, touching Poletti’s picture, “but him, I don’t know.”
“Have you seen either of them since?”
“No, we dealt mainly with Kader. That’s why those tapes you heard were largely full of his voice. He orchestrated everything.”
Kader was in deeper than we’d already suspected. He’d been referred to as an agent provocateur at Addley’s first trial, which had caused the trial to collapse and led to the Addleys’ acquittal. But if he’d supplied the explosives for the synagogue bombing, this was definitive proof of his complicity in terrorism. It would also explain how Poletti’d been able to evade arrest for the synagogue bombing despite being questioned. I’d pass this snippet on to Christine Simmons for the MI5 files. They quite likely knew this already given the nature of the operation then being mounted against Red Heaven. I wondered if they’d suspected Kader seemed to be playing a game of his own and, if so, how much leeway he had been given. Mason Randall had paid with his life for what Kader had done. For that reason alone I was glad Simmons had shot Kader.
“Do you know anything at all about this other guy?” I asked.
“No, I don’t. Other than he was in the café when I met with that writer, I can’t tell you anything about him.”
“What was he doing?”
“Just sitting across the other side of the café, talking to the manager. Actually I did see them counting money at one point, a pile of notes, but I wasn’t really taking too much notice. I was mainly talking to this writer. If I remember, he was called Richard somebody.”
This had been a more fruitful talk than I’d expected and I was feeling pleased with most of what I’d heard. “Did you, or anyone you knew, have anything to do with a business called Carloggias or Fettolio’s?”
“I didn’t. I don’t know about anyone else. Actually, there was a Fettolio’s van parked outside the place I spoke to this writer bu
t I didn’t think anything of it, y’know?”
I paused for a few moments to take stock. “Anything else?” “No, I can’t think of anything.”
I decided to test his new resolve.
“I don’t suppose you’d be prepared to say what you’ve just said in court? You know, testify for the Crown against Poletti if he ever gets brought to trial, put all this into a sworn statement?”
“Yeah, I’ll do that,” he said after a short gap.
“You’re sure?” I wanted confirmation I’d heard right.
“Yes, I’m sure. As I told you, I’ve left my past behind me and this is one way I can expunge the evil from my soul, getting people like these out of my life. I can’t tell you how sad I am I allowed myself to be deflected from the true path to the light. I got lost but I can see the way ahead clearly now.” He beamed.
He sounded like he was reading the lesson in church. I briefly wondered what would be the reaction if, in the unlikely event of Addley being allowed ordinary social intercourse with the general prison population, he lectured such people about the spiritual path to redemption, particularly if it was known what he was really in prison for. For his sake I hoped it never happened.
I nodded. I had nothing else I wanted to ask. He’d confirmed knowing Poletti and had recognised Mendoccini from a picture shown to him. I’d learned the Golders Green bomb had been planted by Poletti and Kader had supplied the resources, which implied a much deeper connection to terrorism than had been believed. I already knew Mendoccini had been in the country at that time but didn’t know if he’d assisted in any way. However, he was an associate of someone I now knew to be actively involved in terrorism. So many good memories of Michael Mendoccini were being soured.
“Well, thanks for your help.” I was about to get up and leave. “I have to say you’ve been a lot more forthright than I was expecting. You’ve cleared up a few points for me. Thanks for offering to testify if it ever comes to it.”
“I told you, man, I’m at peace now, whatever you might think. I’m comfortable in my own body and mind and, even though I’m in the isolation block and likely to be there for some time, I’m perfectly happy in my own company. Buddhists say you have to love yourself before you can truly love others,” he said calmly, “and I couldn’t do that with all these negative influences in my life. I couldn’t and didn’t love the person I used to be.”
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