Chapter Thirty-two
Francis O’Brien was heading north east along the M42. He had retraced his steps through Birmingham to join the motorway… His destination was an unknown safehouse close to North Walsham…
O’Brien had been born in England to Irish parents. Like so many before him his grandfather had been an active brigade member spanning a twenty year period from 1946 to 1965 when he was arrested outside his local newsagent one foggy November morning. He died in prison in 1974, a heart attack after a brawl over cigarette papers. O’Brien’s parents had immediately left for England to ensure their three year old son would be brought up away from such things. Raised in Colney, north of London he’d had a comfortable, stable upbringing. His parents employment had afforded him privileges many of his lilywhite comrades could only dream of, two holidays a year, usually somewhere abroad, driving lessons, a birthday gift for his seventeenth and other middle England comforts. His head had been turned in College where he was studying electronics. A man named Morris had enthralled him with stories of his grandfather and tales of freedom fighters battling for the cause. After College he had gained good employment and was now being fast-tracked for management, He was using two weeks annual leave for this escapade.
His plan was to take a circuitous route. He wanted to keep well away of the A5, the route he believed Harraghy and McCauley were driving. He decided on the M42/A42 then turn south along the A511 and into the city of Leicester, there he would join the A47. Carry on through Peterborough and at Kings Lynn join the A148 across to Cromer. It would then be a simple drive along the small back roads into North Walsham, by this time it would be dark so he was hopeful his arrival would go unnoticed…
Jackie Harper had been painstakingly thorough; rather than solely concentrate her efforts on locating the subject vehicle along the M5 corridor, she had widened her search. Leaning over a large map, she had calculated what would be a realistic average speed for the vehicle, then, she drew a circle: This would be her target search area.
She had concluded that there would be fifty-six cameras for her to examine although this was immediately reduced to a core of 15 viewing the obvious junctions any driver would use to exit or join one of the four motorways surrounding Britain’s second largest city; Jackie was in the process of backtracking camera 15 for thirty minutes for the entry slip of junction six of the M42 when she spotted the car… The time stamp was 1506. At 1510 the target vehicle was passing cameras 16, 17 and 18 at junction 7 and 7A…
“Max, I’ve got him, northbound M42… Realtime he’ll be stuck in the roadwork congestion through 8 and the new junction 9 they’re building. The problem is all of the Curdworth cameras are duff…”
“Ok, let me call it in…”
*****
“Chief I have a guy called Max on line three for you…?”
I raced to the nearest desk phone; the others weren’t far behind. “Max…! What have you got for us…?”
“Target vehicle is currently in roadworks on the northbound carriageway of the M42…”
“The construction area for the new M6 link…?” “That’s right…”
“How long will you be able to maintain surveillance…?” He answered enthusiastically…
“If he stays on the motorway, we’ll have him all the way to the M1 and beyond… there’s a good chance the network will capture him north or south if he plans to join the A1 as well…”
“Christ Max, you’re priceless…!”
“Well, I’ve never been called that before Chief…”
(He responded good humouredly.)
“We are moving units toward him. We’ll need realtime updates until we can get eyes on him…”
“That’s understood, a young lady has given me a direct number…”
“Yes… It’s dedicated so only your office will be using it. It has a speaker feature so we’ll remain in contact. End the call and ring that direct number back please…”
The call ended… I turned to Chris,
“Get in touch with Cormorant for an ETA.Let’s see how far out they are…”
“Ok… I think Charlie is confirming whether West Midlands Police 41 is still on the ground at the M5…”
Charlie nodded from across the table before hanging up,
“Ok, there are three patrol cars in the vicinity of the A45, Birmingham airport area. All three are high performance and are now in pursuit. The first Mike Papa 23, has an eta of eight minutes, CMPG estimate ten and thirteen minutes for MP 16 and MP 21…”
“Chris…?”
X-Ray Zulu 731, ETA twenty one minutes… Refuelling is being set up for them at BIA although they’ll have to do a bit of dodging to keep out of commercial flight paths, it’s Class D airspace. With Catthorpe now a known target, the RAF have offered refuelling assistance from Syerston in Newark and Wyton in Cambridgeshire as they are the closest…”
*****
Officers Frank Warwick and Paul Lewis had been informed of the fate of their colleague. Their control room or FCR Inspector had decided that a more prudent technique would be used to stop the target vehicle.
TPAC or Tactical Pursuit and Containment is Standard Operational Procedure or SOP, for UK pursuit trained officers, this would utilise the “Box and Stop” and “Rolling Roadblock” method. His major obstacle was time. He would need a further fifteen minutes to position suitable vehicles to enable the operation to hopefully succeed. Having already dealt with the immediate fallout of a British Navy Lynx helicopter opening fire on a public road, he didn’t really look forward to another similar scenario.
The M5 incident had unravelled rapidly; he wanted this to be more controlled. He had welcomed the order to rescind the Delta Protocol, greeting the news with a huge sigh of relief.
Warwick and Lewis, driving an unmarked Ford Sierra Cosworth, were easing themselves into position, this would allow them to carry out covert surveillance and relay realtime intelligence to the busy control room…
“Mike Papa 23 to Control…” “Control…”
“We are passing 7, there is evidence of traffic build up leading to 8, how do you wish us to proceed, over…?”
The FCR Inspector placed his hand on the radio operator’s shoulder;
“Mike Papa 23… Remain covert… At present we are receiving realtime image intelligence on the target vehicle passing Cam’ 20… Approach normally, over…?
“Roger control… Out…”
“Frank, can we get through some of this…? Maybe see if we can get a bit closer and positively clock the bastard…?”
“I’ll do my best. The weaving may give us away. Remember we have no idea who we’re dealing with; if it’s a kid spooked, like the M5 evidence suggests, we should be fine; if not, well, he may just have an arsenal on the passenger seat…”
Warwick continued to manoeuvre the big Ford through the three lanes. Five minutes later the Green Sierra was spotted by Lewis.
“Frank…! Outside lane about two hundred yards… Description matches the target vehicle…”
“Ok… I’ll stay here, we’re moving quicker. Let’s creep up on him nice an easy…”
“Mike Papa 23, Control… Vehicle matching target ahead… Await confirmation, over…?”
“Roger 23… Be advised, 16 and 21 are still seven minutes out, over…”
“Roger Control… Out…”
FCR Inspector Norris lifted the telephone, “Compass Section Chief…”
I hit the speaker function,
“Chief one of our pursuit cars, Mike Papa 23 is approaching a vehicle matching the target…”
“Very well Inspector… What are your recommendations…?”
“23 is covert, so the approach should be quiet initially. 16 and 21 are still five minutes behind, they are full liveried motorway patrol cars. When he spots them, who knows…? If he’s a desperate man, he may choose to plough through the roadworks, killing a few workmen in the process, we’d struggle to apprehend him then…”
I looked a
cross at Charlie and Chris,
“Inspector… Charlie Haddon here… Surely that’s worst case scenario…? From what we have been informed by Traffic Control, if he was to opt for this, he’ll more than likely end up in the long ditch which is forming the construction of the new central barrier…”
“Yes, yes that’s quite possible… I’m not sure it’s worth the risk, however…”
“Aye but we’re not sure that it isn’t…” “I see…”
It was Chris’s turn,
“Inspector Norris, at what point do the roadworks on that section finish…?”
“Passed junction 9 at a place called Dunton Wood…”
“Looking at the map, this stretch gives you a good few miles of straight carriageway to initialise a “Box and Stop” and the possibility of a rolling roadblock too…?”
“That’s correct. It may also give us an opportunity to deploy HOSTYDS if appropriate…”
“HOSTYDS, Inspector…?”
“Sorry gents… Hollow Spike Tyre Deflation System…” “I see…”
Chris clearly didn’t,
I looked at the map. I could see how he wanted to play it. It made sense. There had been enough high profile gunfights; attempting to apprehend the target in a more subdued manner and still leaving him the ability to breathe would be a bonus.
“I see your logic Inspector… What can we do to assist…?” “An eye in the sky would be beneficial…?”
“Yes indeed… I’ll speak to Staffordshire immediately…”
“Thank you Chief… When we have all the strategic elements in place, I’ll call back…”
I grabbed my cell phone and called Steve, “Chief…?”
“The FCR Inspector in Birmingham has asked for air support. Theirs is on the M5 at the minute… I was thinking of Staffs…?”
“There lies a problem, as I said, Staffs share Air Support Unit duties with West Mercia and we’ve been hammering them with the searches so much all their flight teams need downtime. I thought you had a Lynx in your backpocket anyway…?”
“We do… I’m concerned, because the target has seen it before, he may do something more stupid than he planned, especially with the image of Crowns head or lack of it, still in his mind…”
“You’re talking like he’s a kid…?”
“I think he is Steve… I think he’s one of the lilywhites.There’s no one else left…”
“Morris..?”
“Morris is gone… On that we’re positive…”
A very unconvinced SO12 Inspector replied… “Really…? How so…?”
“Not on the phone… Face to face…”
“I see… JESUS…! No…! I would ne’…” “STEVE…!”
“Yes… Received and understood Section Chief, sir…!” “Air support…?”
The line was silent as he thought,
“North Midlands Helicopter Support Unit: they should be able to help. They’re based in Ripley, so we’re looking at thirty minutes flying time probably. There’s also East Midlands based north of the A14 outside Market Harborough, with the positive INTEL on Catthorpe, they’re probably airborne now. I’ll contact both, I’ll also get a status on Police 41. I’ll ring back in five minutes…”
I walked to Robin’s office and gave him the heads up, “And what of the Lynx Iain…?”
“En route to Birmingham. They’ll top off their tanks and join the party…Inspector Norris will love that…!”
“You think he’s been getting his ear bent…?”
“I do… He’s already had one motorway he’s responsible for closed due to air-to-ground gunfire, he doesn’t want the headache of another. We are supposed to be stopping those trying to bring the country to standstill not helping them…”
“Mmm… I take it you no longer wish for TOW enabled air support…?”
“Maybe not today sir…”
“We may need it yet however, I’ll have a chat with the Home Sec’ and get him to release the pressure on Inspector Norris. His plan in principle is very good…”
*****
The officers in the police Cosworth were now three car lengths behind and to the left of the target vehicle. As slow moving traffic on the inside lane was filtering off toward the newly constructed M6 junction 4A, their lane was moving quicker than O’Brien, who was still creeping along in lane three. Officer Warwick’s plan was to position themselves close enough for a positive then shadow, nothing more. Their lane moved again...
“Paul, get ready… Here we go…”
They reached alongside then continued forward,
“Got it…! Juliet seven four nine Alpha Tango Romeo… That’s a confirm… I’ll call it in…”
As he reached for the RT, Frank Warwick placed his left hand on his colleague,
“No Pete, hang on a mo.’… He’s coming alongside…”
The Green Sierra copied the moves of the Cosworth, this game of cat and mouse was destined to continue until they were clear of the roadworks…
*****
The call came in to confirm the target vehicle a little after East Midlands Air Support confirmed their asset was heading north. Steve Case had also confirmed that indeed West Mercia’s ASU, Air One, was once again airborne and assisting in the pursuit of the final VBIED containing Harraghy. The last piece of the puzzle was McCauley. Where was he…? At no time during his conversation with Charlie had Morris alluded to his location. We were assuming he was lying in wait quietly, ready for the call to collect Harraghy from the Mercedes truck…
Here on the fourth floor all we could do is wait…
*****
O’Brien looked to his left again to admire the gleaming black performance car. Being mechanically minded, he appreciated the power and style of the Ford Cosworth. Indeed, he was no stranger to the various automotive publications on offer highlighting the allure of such marques. To him this particular car seemed slightly different which meant he looked a little closer. As his line of traffic pulled ahead, his eyes lingered on his rear view mirror to catch a glimpse of the front and forbidding grille of the vehicle… The Grill, he thought, what’s wrong with the grille…? The two horizontal vents either side of the distinctive blue Ford oval had set alarm bells off in his head: Police car, he told himself, it had to be…!
His mind raced… He was stuck, trapped he thought wildly, on the outside lane of a motorway in a huge traffic jam. He indicated left, forcing himself into the slow moving traffic, two cars ahead of the officers.
“Frank, he’s on the move mate, maybe he’s spotted us…?” “I doubt it Paul, we’ve been very careful…”
“Yes we have but if he gets into the inside lane there’s nothing to stop him racing along the hardshoulder towards junction 9… Shit…!”
Lewis reached for the RT,
“Mike Papa 23 to Mike Papa 16, over…” “16 receiving, over…”
“Yeah 16, ETA this location over…?”
“Approaching junction 8 now, ten minutes maximum, over…”
“Be advised 16 there is a possible change. There is a strong chance he’s blown us. He has suddenly changed lanes and is currently attempting another manoeuvre to distance himself, over…”
“Roger 23 will expedite…Out…”
The officer, driving Mike Papa 16 immediately turned his vehicle onto the hardshoulder. The powerful Volvo 850 T5 began to accelerate rapidly…
As O’Brien frantically attempted to again change lanes, his eyes were searching constantly, he also lowered the driver’s door window to listen… After his earlier experience he was acutely aware that he could be easily spotted and more importantly stopped from above. A van on the inside lane left room for him… Finally! He thought with relief. In one movement he swung the car to the left and pushed hard on the accelerator, speeding along the hardshoulder…
“Frank, he’s doing a runner…!”
The Ford Cosworth sprung to life, its blues and twos cutting through the quiet countryside…
“Mike Papa 23
to control… In pursuit of the target vehicle along the east bound carriageway’s emergency lane, over…”
Inspector Norris snatched at the desk RT,
“Roger 23… Air support is imminent, be advised the call sign is X- Ray 55…
*****
“Chief, Inspector Case, line 2…?”
A nod…
“What do you have Steve…?”
“O’Brien has bolted; he must have sussed the covert surveillance…”
Bearings: The Compass Trilogy Part One Page 36