Gunrunner

by Graham Ison

  ‘You can’t prove a thing,’ said Roberts, in an attempt to convince us that he was innocent of any wrongdoing, but I doubt that he even convinced himself.

  ‘What can’t we prove?’ asked Dave.

  Roberts maintained a sullen silence; probably his best option.

  ‘Right, lads,’ I began, addressing the TSG officers and my detectives. There was a sarcastic cough from one of the women PCs. ‘And ladies,’ I added hurriedly. ‘I want a thorough search of the building. I’m looking for firearms. If you find any, or anything that looks like explosives, let Sergeant Mason know. He’ll ensure that his chaps make them safe before you go any further.’

  The ten PCs, led by their sergeant, fanned out and began a systematic search of the warehouse, directed by Inspector Taylor. My team followed them.

  It was a large building and the search took nearly an hour, but the result proved to be a bonanza. The haul comprised ten Heckler and Koch carbines, twenty handguns of assorted makes and calibre, and a substantial quantity of ammunition.

  ‘What were you going to do, señor?’ asked Dave, moving closer to Roberts, ‘start another civil war in Spain?’

  ‘Don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Roberts.

  I gave Kate Ebdon the task of overseeing the removal of the weaponry to Lambeth where it could be stored securely. And, just to be on the safe side, I asked PS Mason and his CO19 team to provide an escort. I didn’t want our exhibits to be hijacked on the way. It would be extremely difficult to explain such an unfortunate occurrence to our esteemed commander.

  ‘What d’you want done with this pair, sir?’ asked Taylor, nodding towards our two prisoners.

  ‘Take them to Paddington police station, Buck,’ I said, after giving the matter a few moments thought. ‘That’ll be more secure than the local nick.’ I wasn’t too concerned that they might attempt to escape, but rather that other, as yet unknown, villains might attempt to get at them. At this stage, we didn’t know quite how big a network of villainy we were dealing with, and I imagined there to be more people involved than the two we’d captured so far.

  The two customs officers now appeared from within the warehouse.

  ‘We’ve had a look at the firearms your people found, Mr Brock,’ said Foley.

  ‘Of interest to you?’ I asked.

  Foley smiled. ‘Probably,’ he said. ‘My job now is to compile a report for our legal department. They’ll decide what action is to be taken.Eventually.’ There was an element of sarcasm in his last comment.

  THIRTEEN

  Although it seemed that we’d been at work all day, it was still only nine o’clock on that Saturday morning when my team and I arrived at Paddington nick. But detectives, constrained as they are by the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, can’t keep office hours, and I could already visualize the rest of the weekend disappearing.

  I told the custody sergeant to put Roberts in the interview room, and decided that Kate Ebdon would be best suited to assist me in interrogating him. I let her kick off.

  ‘When we searched the warehouse at twenty-seven Cantard Street earlier today,’ Kate began, ‘a quantity of firearms was found.’

  ‘Don’t know anything about them,’ said Roberts, making a statement that came as no surprise.

  ‘Who is the other man who we arrested at the same time that we nicked you?’

  ‘No idea.’ Roberts lounged in his chair, fully relaxed. ‘Never seen him before.’

  ‘What were you doing there?’

  ‘I’d gone to collect some wine for my nightclub.’

  ‘We searched the place from top to bottom, mate,’ said Kate, her Australian accent becoming a little more aggressive, ‘and there wasn’t any wine there.’

  ‘So I made a mistake.’

  ‘What d’you know about the wine business?’

  ‘I sell it in my club.’

  ‘Don’t get bloody clever with me, sport,’ said Kate. ‘Did you ever buy wine from Kerry Hammond?’

  Roberts laughed. ‘No, she bought wine from me. That’s what running a nightclub’s all about, darling.’

  Kate had had enough. Switching off the tape recorder, she stood up, placed her hands flat on the table and leaned very close to Roberts. ‘The next time you call me “darling”, Roberts, I’ll have you off that chair and kick you straight in the balls. Have you got that, mate?’

  Roberts sat up straight, and leaned back. He was obviously in no doubt that Kate meant what she said, was capable of carrying out her threat, and wouldn’t hesitate to do so. As I’ve said before, it’s extremely unwise to get on the wrong side of Kate.

  Kate sat down and turned on the tape recorder again.

  ‘Where were you on Christmas Eve, Roberts?’ I asked, deciding to take a hand in the questioning.

  ‘At the Spanish Fly.’

  ‘Your bar manager, Fred Goddard,’ I said, ‘who masquerades as a Spaniard called Fernando, told me that you weren’t there at all that evening. What’s more, you did a runner straight after I saw you at the club two days after Christmas. So where were you?’

  ‘No comment,’ said Roberts, ‘and I want a lawyer, and I want bail.’

  ‘You can have as many lawyers as you like, but you won’t be getting bail,’ I said. ‘Firstly, I’ll be charging you with unlawful possession of firearms and conspiring illegally to import firearms. There’s also a good chance that I’ll charge you with murdering Kerry Hammond on the twenty-fourth of December last.’

  ‘I had nothing to with that,’ said Roberts, his face displaying the first sign of fear based on the misapprehension that he was about to be fitted up.

  ‘You’ve already admitted to having an affair with her,’ I said.

  ‘So what?’

  ‘I suggest that she found out about your sideline of smuggling guns and threatened to inform on you if you didn’t cut her in.’ I knew that Kerry Hammond was a rich woman, but I doubted that all her money had come from the haulage business that bore her name. I was fairly certain that Kerry was, or had been, the brains behind the operation, but it was a vain hope that Roberts was about to confirm that.

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Roberts nervously, but I got the impression that I’d touched a nerve.

  ‘So, where were you on Christmas Eve, Roberts?’ asked Kate.

  ‘With a bird.’

  ‘Name?’

  ‘I’m not telling you. She’s married.’

  ‘Really? Well, my friend, you’re beginning to look quite tasty for the topping of Kerry Hammond. Unless you can come up with a name.’

  Roberts capitulated. ‘All right, she was a broad called Patricia Knight.’

  ‘Does she have an address, this Patricia Knight?’ asked Kate.

  ‘Seventeen Coxtree Close, Chelsea,’ said Roberts reluctantly. ‘But for God’s sake be discreet, otherwise her old man will kill me, and probably her too.’

  ‘I’m the soul of discretion,’ said Kate, as she scribbled the details in her pocket book. ‘And where did you spend this evening of romantic shafting, mate?’

  ‘I’ve got a bedroom at the club.’

  ‘Who else uses it?’

  ‘Only close friends, as and when,’ said Roberts miserably.

  ‘Are you telling me you run a knocking shop at your club?’ Kate was being mischievous now. There was no way we’d have the time to investigate this comparatively trivial breach of the law.

  ‘No, of course not,’ protested Roberts.

  We’d got nothing of consequence out of Roberts, which is exactly what I’d expected to get. I sent for a PC and told him to put Roberts back in his nice warm cell.

  ‘Happy New Year, Mike,’ said Kate, as we stood up to leave.

  I went looking for Dave Poole, and eventually found him in the CID office.

  ‘Anything on our other man, Dave?’ I asked.

  ‘I did a LiveScan followed by a LiveID on each of them, including Roberts, guv.’

  ‘What on earth are yo
u talking about, Dave?’ I asked, completely mystified by Dave’s excursion into the wonderful world of police technology.

  ‘D’you remember the gizmo that Linda Mitchell used to check Kerry Hammond’s prints at Heathrow?’

  ‘Yes. What about it?’

  ‘Well, you just put the suspect’s fingers on something that looks like a mobile phone and bingo! You get a result within three minutes, sir.’

  ‘Very impressive, Dave.’ It didn’t escape my notice that he was calling me ‘sir’ again. ‘So, what did you learn from this wonderful gizmo?’

  ‘His name’s Patrick Hogan. Not only has he got form, but there’s a warrant out for him. The Flying Squad want him for an armed robbery in Hillingdon last year. Apparently he’s been lying low.’

  ‘Not that low,’ commented Kate. ‘But I know that toerag. I thought I recognized him when we nicked him. I got him sent down for a five-stretch about seven years ago. I’m looking forward to having another chat with him.’

  Patrick Hogan had all the distinctive features of a typical villain: late thirties, shaven head, muscular, tattoos and the obligatory earring. And Kate’s years on the Flying Squad had taught her exactly how to deal with his type.

  ‘Still at it, then, Pat?’ Kate took a seat opposite Hogan, and smiled at him.

  Recognition dawned on Hogan’s face. ‘Hello, Miss Ebdon. We can’t keep meeting like this, you know. People’ll start to talk.’

  ‘It was your choice to be here, Pat,’ said Kate, ‘and what’s more the Flying Squad’s got a brief out for you. Post office blagging up Hillingdon way.’

  ‘That was all a mistake, miss. I dunno anything about it and I weren’t never there.’

  ‘Case of mistaken identity, was it, Pat? Well, it’s something you’ll have to take up with the Sweeney. You should be all right, though; you know how compassionate the Squad can be. They’re very considerate when it comes to rectifying genuine mistakes.’

  ‘Yeah, thanks a bundle.’ Hogan did not look happy at the prospect of another encounter with the Heavy Mob, as the Flying Squad was known to the criminal fraternity.

  ‘Anyway, to get down to today’s agenda, Pat, and all the shooters we found at Cantard Street. Your mate Roberts said he knows nothing about them. He’s put it all down to you.’

  ‘He’s done what?’ Hogan could not disguise his outrage at such a blatant betrayal.

  ‘Oh yes, he reckons he knows nothing about the hardware. He claims he was only there to pick up some wine. It’s a sort of variation on “I was only here for the beer”.’

  ‘What bloody wine? There weren’t no wine there. That Roberts is a double-dealing miserable ratbag. What’s he going on about? It’s well down to him, miss, and no mistake. You can stand on me.’

  ‘It’s not looking good, Pat,’ said Kate, shaking her head sympathetically. ‘Perhaps you ought to consider your position, as politicians say when they’re in deep shtook.’

  Hogan did indeed appear to consider his position. ‘What’s in it for me if I give you the SP, Miss Ebdon?’ he asked eventually. ‘I mean, can you make this Hillingdon blagging go away?’

  Kate laughed. ‘You know I can’t make deals, Pat,’ she said, ‘but I could have a word with the Crown Prosecution Service if you come up with the goods about the firearms.’

  ‘All right, so I was tied up in it, but Roberts is the man who does the business. He’s the Mister Big, as you might say. He’s well at it.’

  ‘What, all on his own?’

  ‘Nah, course not.’

  ‘How about giving me a few names, then?’

  ‘I hope you’re going to make this worth my while, Miss Ebdon.’ At first, Hogan seemed reluctant to furnish the identity of any of Roberts’s fellow conspirators, but then he relented. ‘There was a couple of blokes there last night. In the warehouse, I mean, but I haven’t a clue who they was. As for the shooters, as far as I know Mike pushes ’em out to a geezer by the name of Pollard. Charlie Pollard.’

  ‘Where’s this Pollard’s drum?’ asked Kate.

  ‘Down Bethnal Green way, I think. But I dunno for sure.’

  ‘What’s he look like, this Charlie Pollard?’

  ‘Dunno, miss. I never clapped me peepers on him. Roberts says it’s safer to keep things separate, like. In fact, I only ever heard Charlie’s name mentioned the once, and I don’t think I was meant to hear it, neither.’

  At least that was something, but Kate decided to leave it for the moment. Going on to a different tack, she asked, ‘What d’you know about a bird called Kerry Hammond, Pat?’

  ‘Yeah, I reckon she was tied up in it, an’ all. Leastways, Roberts let slip her name once, but I never met her neither. I think she was his fancy bit on the side.’

  ‘So, you don’t know for sure that she’s involved.’

  ‘Well, when I ’fronted Roberts about her, he done a bit of verbal tap dancing. Said something about her being a bird he bought wine from. But a nod’s as good as a wink.’ Hogan tapped the side of his nose with his forefinger. ‘Know what I mean?’

  ‘Did Roberts ever involve you with his wine business, Pat?’

  ‘No, miss. I only ever heard him mention it that once, but even then, I reckon he was spinning me a fanny.’

  ‘You knew, of course, that he owned a nightclub called the Spanish Fly in Mayfair where he was known as Miguel Rodriguez.’

  ‘I never knew about that till I heard one of your coppers mention it when we was nicked. Strikes me Roberts has got his fingers in quite a few pies.’

  Kate glanced at me. ‘Anything else, guv?’ she asked.

  ‘Not at the moment, Kate,’ I said, and turned to Hogan. ‘You’ll be charged with illegal possession of firearms, Pat. But, as DI Ebdon said, we’ll have a word with the CPS about the Hillingdon job. No promises, though.’

  ‘Cheers, Mr Brock,’ said Hogan, apparently resigned to spending a few more years as a guest in one of Her Majesty’s penal establishments.

  The custody sergeant was all for granting bail to Roberts and Hogan. But I quickly persuaded him that there was a grave danger that, if released, either one of them, or both, might interfere with witnesses. Or that someone might interfere with them fatally in case they started singing like canaries. We needed to know who else was involved. Consequently, our two prisoners were kept in custody until appearing before the magistrate on Monday morning. I instructed Kate Ebdon to take them to court and object to bail.

  ‘I checked Roberts’s form after I took his fingerprints, guv,’ said Dave, appearing as Kate and I left the interview room. ‘He’s got a previous.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Pyramid selling, and I don’t mean flogging ancient Egyptian monuments.’

  ‘I do know what pyramid selling is, Dave.’ It was a fraud as old as the hills that involved its creator persuading gullible, greedy people to invest in a wondrous scheme that promised fantastic rewards. The trouble was that, unbeknown to the punters, the ‘dividends’ were paid out of the investments of subsequent idiots. Such a scheme, by its very nature, was destined to collapse, but usually after the scheme’s architect had disappeared with the loot.

  ‘He got seven years,’ said Dave. ‘Came out two years ago and set up the Spanish Fly nightclub, probably with some of the proceeds that he’d stashed away. He was made bankrupt at the time of the trial, but the bulk of the money was never recovered.’

  ‘How the hell did he get a licence to run a club?’

  Dave said nothing, but just rubbed forefinger and thumb together. It would not be the first time that someone had been bribed to overlook certain ‘indiscretions’ on the part of an applicant for a licence.

  We got back to Curtis Green at one o’clock, and DI Len Driscoll was waiting.

  ‘How did you get on at Broders Road, Len?’ I asked.

  ‘It was just like an Aladdin’s Cave for piss artists, guv,’ said Driscoll. ‘There were cases of wine all over the place. The lads are still counting it all. I don’t know whether it’
s legit, but I’ve asked customs to have a look. If it’s bent, I’m damned if I know how they got so much into the country without being nicked.’

  ‘I’ve a feeling that it actually is legit, Len,’ I said. ‘Any firearms?’

  ‘No, nothing,’ said Driscoll. ‘How about you?’

  ‘Ten H and Ks, twenty assorted handguns and matching ammo,’ I said. ‘Not a bad morning’s work.’

  We now had another name in the frame. According to Patrick Hogan, the mysterious Charlie Pollard was the receiver of the firearms that Michael Roberts and company had conspired to smuggle into the country. All we had to do now was find Pollard. Hogan had suggested that he lived somewhere in the Bethnal Green area, but that didn’t help much. Apart from being a large area, Bethnal Green is densely populated by the unrighteous, and we were unlikely to receive any assistance from the inhabitants thereof. I was under no illusion but that many of them had criminal records and there is, of course, a strict code of honour among thieves. Until the chips are down, that is. With any luck this might be one of those occasions.

  I gave the task of finding Charlie Pollard to Colin Wilberforce in the hope that he might discover the answer on his wonderful computer. But, after fifteen minutes of intense keyboard work, he was unable to produce any match that could possibly be the Charlie Pollard we were seeking.

  I next asked Kate Ebdon to see what she could do. I’m a firm believer in old-fashioned methods, like informants, and I knew that Kate, an ex-Flying Squad officer, had snouts who were many and various. I had a few informants myself, but I hadn’t contacted them for some time, or they me; it was years since I’d left the Flying Squad, and I suspected that most of them were either dead, doing time or had disappeared to some safe Brazilian haven.

  However, despite having given Kate that job, I decided that there was something more immediately pressing for her to do.

  ‘I think the time has come to arrest Billy Sharpe, Kate. You’ve got a list of all the home addresses of Kerry Trucking’s employees, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I have, guv. Bear with me for a moment; they’re in my office.’

  ‘On your way back, Kate, ask Len Driscoll to come in.’