Fog on the Tyne

by Bernard O'Mahoney

  Fearing that other gang members might get involved and that violence could escalate, the police refused Eastland bail, and he was kept in custody until the following Monday, when he appeared in court. When Eastland had convinced the magistrates that this was an isolated incident, he was granted bail and picked up from the court by Stuart Watson. They immediately returned to the scene of the fight, as Eastland wanted to retrieve the drugs he had hidden. However, as he was doing so, the police arrived. Unbeknown to Eastland, the police had already retrieved the stash following a tip-off. However, the drugs the police had recovered were not steroids; they were in fact Ecstasy pills.

  Eastland has since claimed that Ashton set him up by switching the steroids for Ecstasy pills before telephoning the police, but no evidence exists to support his allegation. At Eastland’s trial, the jury did not accept that Ashton was responsible for planting the Ecstasy pills, and Eastland was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment for possessing drugs with intent to supply and a further six months for affray concerning the knife fight.

  Shortly before Eastland’s trial, Ashton had been sentenced to four years’ imprisonment for a commercial burglary. One day, when Watson went to visit Eastland in prison, he found Ashton glaring at him from across the prison visiting room. The man visiting Ashton also began to stare at Watson. After the pair had mouthed obscenities and threats at one another, Watson approached Ashton’s table and they began to fight. Watson, who was getting the better of his opponent, was dragged away by prison officers and held until the visiting room had been cleared.

  When Ashton was released from prison, a gunman attempted to murder Watson’s friend Terry Mitchell. Fortunately, Mitchell had dived for cover as the shotgun blast had rung out, and he escaped injury. From that day forth, Watson, Mitchell and their opponents all armed themselves whenever they ventured out. One morning, as he left his home, Mitchell was surprised to see Ashton’s friend Paul ‘Monkey’ Lyons hiding nearby in bushes. Mitchell confronted Lyons, who denied that he was up to anything before fleeing down the street. Somewhat puzzled, Mitchell walked to his garage and reversed his car out, as he had to take his daughter to school. As he turned out of his road, Mitchell saw Ashton and Robert Webber driving towards him. When they passed Mitchell, they appeared to be pretending not to have noticed him.

  After dropping his daughter off at school, Mitchell went to the gym. After two hours, he then drove home and parked his car in the garage. As he leant over to the passenger side of the vehicle in order to activate the immobiliser, Paul ‘Monkey’ Lyons opened the driver’s door and plunged a bayonet deep into his shoulder. Mitchell shouted out, ‘When I get out of this car, I am going to fucking kill you!’ but Lyons replied by stabbing him repeatedly with the bayonet. Convinced that he was going to die if he did not get out of the car, Mitchell began kicking at Lyons’ legs. He then raised his hand to try to push Lyons away from him, but the bayonet was thrust straight into his wrist and exited via his forearm.

  Bleeding profusely and in excruciating pain, Mitchell managed to exit the vehicle and grip Lyons by the throat. As the two men struggled, Mitchell was being repeatedly stabbed. One thrust of the bayonet went straight through his ear into his mouth and exited through his cheek. Unable to extract the blade, Lyons tugged left and right in an effort to free the weapon, which caused the wound in Mitchell’s face to tear and split even wider. With one last surge of energy, Mitchell shoved Lyons backwards over a wall and started beating him with his fists. Mitchell’s injuries and massive loss of blood meant that he soon tired, and Lyons was able to make good his escape.

  Mitchell chased after Lyons and saw him run to a car in which Ashton and Webber were waiting. ‘You’ve fucking killed him. You’ve killed him. You’ve killed him,’ Ashton was shouting as he bounced up and down in his seat. But his apparent joy was short-lived, because he soon learned that Mitchell had not only survived the attack but was also seeking revenge.

  Before Mitchell was able to confront his attackers, both he and Watson were arrested, charged with conspiracy to murder and remanded in custody to HMP Durham to await trial. While in prison, Watson was approached by Nigel Abadom, a major player in the Newcastle underworld. Abadom, acting as peacemaker between the warring factions, said that Ashton was prepared to get his wife to withdraw a statement that she had made and dispose of the incriminating bullet that had struck him if Mitchell and Watson would pay him £50,000. Abadom had recently been sentenced for the blackmailing of a Tyneside businessman with Stephen and Michael Sayers, and so he was considered a man to be respected amongst the criminal fraternity. Watson told Abadom that he was insulted by such a proposal and that he should never have agreed to pass such a message on. If Ashton was genuinely asking him to pay to prevent him from informing, then he needed to think again. ‘Tell him to keep his big, fat mouth shut,’ Watson added. ‘He is not out of the woods yet.’

  When the charge against Mitchell and Watson of conspiracy to murder was dropped to one of possessing firearms, Ashton agreed to hand over his Mercedes to the police. Nine months had passed since the shooting incident had occurred, but the vehicle, which had been stored in a garage, still had the bullet hole in the windscreen. Watson and Mitchell saw this move as a deliberate attempt to get them charged with a more serious offence, and so they sat down and, after much hand-wringing, agreed to do the previously unthinkable. They both made statements to the police against Ashton, Webber and Lyons. They were not offered any deal by the police for doing so, nor were they shown any leniency by the judge at their trial. Both Mitchell and Watson were sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment for firearms offences.

  In March 1998, Ashton and Webber appeared at Newcastle Crown Court to face charges of conspiracy to murder and possessing firearms with intent to endanger life. They were both sentenced to 18 years’ imprisonment for conspiracy to murder and 11 years for firearm offences. The year before, Ashton had additionally been sentenced to eight years’ imprisonment for conspiracy to supply drugs. In December 1999, Ashton was back in the dock facing charges of violent disorder and attempting to pervert the course of justice. The judge sentenced him to a further five years’ imprisonment, making a total of forty-one years to serve. Paul ‘Monkey’ Lyons received fourteen years’ imprisonment for the attempted murder of Terry Mitchell and a further four and a half years for ‘other’ offences, making a total of eighteen and a half years to serve.

  The message from Northumbria Police was loud and clear; nobody was untouchable on Tyneside, and anyone with aspirations to take over the city would find himself facing a lengthy term of imprisonment. But, as everybody knows, nobody, not even the police, can stop the hands of time, which is all villains have to serve before they are once more back on the streets to wreak mayhem and murder.

  Paddy Conroy was nearing the end of his sentence and so was beginning to take an interest in the outside world once more. During idle chat on one visit, he was allegedly told about a man from the West End of Newcastle who appeared to be getting involved with Tony Leach, John Henry Sayers’ right-hand man. Leachy, as he was known, would not normally have given such a person the time of day unless it was beneficial to him.

  Freddie Knights was a family man who had committed little more than petty crimes. His mother, Ella, owned the flower shop where Paddy had ordered the wreath for DC Perky, and it had been Freddie who delivered it. Paddy claims to have known the Knights family, but he admits that they were not close friends. Members of the Sayers gang allege that the Conroys were in fact a threat to Freddie Knights and that they had put a gun to his head following a dispute. The Conroys vehemently deny this. Paddy believed that there was no way that the Sayers firm would embrace a man like Freddie, unless, of course, the embrace was going to turn into a baited lure.

  The rumour mill in the West End of Newcastle was awash with theories. Some people were claiming that Freddie was selling cocaine on behalf of the Sayers gang, and others were alleging that he was entertaining one of their wives. Whatever Fredd
ie was up to, Leachy had taken an interest in him. Paddy rang Ella Knights from prison and pleaded with her to tell her son to have nothing to do with his new friend. ‘They are befriending him so that they can learn his habits, his day-to-day movements,’ Paddy said. ‘And when they know him inside out, Ella, they will make their move.’ Ella was naturally distressed by Paddy’s call and said that she would talk to her son. It’s not known if Ella did speak to Freddie, but if she did take Paddy’s advice then Freddie most certainly did not.

  On 5 November 1999, John Henry Sayers completed his sentence and was released from HMP Full Sutton after serving almost 11 years. He returned to Newcastle outwardly bristling with bravado, but deep down something was troubling him. John Henry claims that while he had been in prison his father, a freemason, had visited him to tell him grave news. According to John Henry, his father had been warned by a fellow freemason, who happened to be a serving police superintendent, that senior police officers in Northumbria Police wanted John Henry taken off the streets for good. As a result of this information, John Henry’s solicitor wrote to Chief Constable Crispian Strachan. In that letter he stated:

  Our client has had information that certain informants and police officers working at senior levels within Northumbria Police are conspiring against him. The conspiracy will take one of the following forms:

  (a) That he will be arrested in a motor vehicle and that cocaine, heroin or some other drug will be placed in the vehicle and he will be arrested and placed on remand immediately because of the unexpired portion of his sentence.

  (b) A criminal will approach him and lure him into a fight, and then he will be charged with Section 18, and remanded.

  (c) That there will be a report by an informant, which the police will confirm, that he is carrying a weapon in a vehicle, the armed response unit will attend and he will be executed by the police.

  You may feel that scenarios (a), (b) and (c) are far-fetched, but our client feels that he has been victimised whilst in prison by the police and that he has information which has been given to him that police officers and informants are conspiring against him. We simply have been advised by our client to place this on record so that internal investigations may take place. We can confirm that our client does not wish to speak directly to the police about this or any other matter, and therefore there is no point in sending any officer to see him. We are copying this letter to the Director of Public Prosecutions.

  John Henry claims that he was not only given the name of at least one superintendent allegedly involved in this conspiracy but that he was also given the name S. Watson as one of the alleged informants. John Henry says that he racked his brain trying to think who S. Watson might be but could think of only one, and that was Stuart Watson. While in prison, John Henry had met Paul Ashton and Robert Webber, who had informed him that Watson had given evidence against them. John Henry was also aware that his brother Stephen had been imprisoned with Viv Graham and others for assaulting Watson, and so he began to wonder if he was the S. Watson that he had been warned about.

  The solicitor’s letter was ignored by the police, but John Henry was most certainly not. From the day he was released, he was placed under almost constant covert surveillance. Officers shadowed him and his family on holiday in Spain, and he found a tracker device on his Land Rover Discovery.

  In an effort to go (almost) straight, John Henry set up a taxi firm called Newcastle Taxis. The office was in an area of the city frequented by gays and known as the Pink Triangle. Prior to John Henry’s arrival in the area, macho beer-swilling Geordies would push gays to the back of taxi queues when clubs closed, and some had even been assaulted. John Henry began issuing numbered tickets to circumvent the usual problems caused by drunks trying to queue in an orderly fashion and warned potential troublemakers to behave. Within weeks, Newcastle Taxis was employing approximately 50 drivers and business was booming.

  Northumbria Police were not happy with the fact that John Henry was involved in ferrying citizens around Newcastle, and so they opposed his application for an operator’s licence. Detective Inspector Max Black of Newcastle West CID told magistrates, ‘The running of taxis can have significant benefits. My experience is that career criminals use taxis to transport drugs, guns and prostitutes. It’s been a common practice for a number of years, and if you have taxi firms you can get away with all sorts of criminal activities. Taxis virtually never get stopped, and if they do and there are drugs in the back they say they must have been left there by a customer.’ Detective Inspector Black added that he believed Sayers was not a fit and proper person to operate or drive taxis because of his reputation for violence and the fact he was allegedly already involved in the taxi industry in Newcastle without owning a licence. John Henry’s application was refused, but he appealed the decision immediately, which allowed Newcastle Taxis to continue operating until the next hearing.

  Fearing he would lose his thriving business, John Henry signed it over to an associate named Alan Maughan, who in turn leased it to a man named Younes Mohammed. When he applied to renew the taxi operator’s licence, the council objected on the grounds that Mohammed was not a fit and proper person. They claimed he was not in control of the business but operated it on behalf of John Henry and Maughan.

  Mohammed told magistrates he owned the business and denied any business dealings with John Henry or Maughan, but he did admit that Maughan did some work as a self-employed driver and had done some computer training for the firm and that John Henry did visit the business. The court also heard from the council of their concerns that Mohammed did not appear to be in control of the business as he knew only the first names of his employees and had failed to submit 18 out of 22 monthly reports, a condition of his licence. Mohammed’s application was denied, and John Henry lost an almost legitimate business. So much for encouraging ex-offenders to rehabilitate.

  Since his release, John Henry had become acquainted with a former soldier named Alan Coe. After a successful career in the Army, Coe had worked hard in the licensing trade and won promotion to become an area manager for Scottish & Newcastle Breweries. Coe and John Henry had a mutual friend, Robert Orange, who ran a pub in Jesmond called the Brandling. It was here that John Henry would often meet Coe and question him in detail about his role in and knowledge of the pub trade. At John Henry’s suggestion, Coe resigned from his job and accepted a £15,000 loan from him to take over two pubs in Newcastle, the John Gilpin and the Hillheads, which Coe then ran in his own name.

  After these premises were established, Coe became the director of a firm called Neptune Inns, which one by one took on the tenancies of a succession of run-down pubs in ‘challenging locations’ across the north-east. John Henry kept his name away from the business, but he was always lurking in the background, taking a lion’s share of the profits and instructing Coe as to which premises to target. If an honest publican had been running these pubs, there wouldn’t have been much profit for John Henry to take. However, there was very little that was honest about Neptune Inns. The company failed to pay any of the 17.5 per cent VAT that was due, and it failed to pay business rates and council tax. It was a lucrative crime that Coe and John Henry were committing, but it was one that somebody somewhere would inevitably have to take responsibility for. John Henry thought that somebody would be Alan Coe, because it was his name alone that was associated with the business. Unfortunately for John Henry, an incident was about to occur that would expose just about everything the Sayers firm had ever been involved in.

  At 3.30 p.m. on 19 September 2000, two thieves, Paul Hunter and Terrence Mann, met Michael Dixon, a friend of the Sayers family, to go and steal a car. Less than an hour later, Hunter and Mann had stolen a silver Volkswagen Golf from Fowler Street, in South Shields. Dixon was captured on CCTV cameras shortly afterwards returning to Newcastle via the Tyne Tunnel.

  At seven that evening, two men, Eddie Stewart and Dale Miller, made their way to the Longbenton area of Newcastle in the stolen Volkswagen. S
tewart’s intention was to bang on the windows of Ella Knights’ home so as to frighten her into calling her son Freddie for assistance. Depending on whom you believe, Freddie had either upset a notorious Geordie villain by sleeping with his wife or set up a lucrative cocaine business in Longbenton that others wanted to take over. Regardless of the reason, somebody had hired a team to shoot Freddie on his mother’s doorstep. Stewart and Miller were unable to locate Ella Knights’ home that night, and so the hit was temporarily aborted.

  On 20 September 2000, Sir Bobby Robson had picked his strongest side for Newcastle United’s Worthington Cup home tie against third-division minnows Leyton Orient. Success in the competition would guarantee the club European Cup football, something their supporters, the Toon Army, had longed for. Thirty-eight-year-old Freddie Knights, an ardent Newcastle United fan, had the game, and the birthday of his fourteen-year-old son, on his mind as he and his wife, Grace, drove towards his mother’s home that night. He certainly wasn’t aware of what others had planned for him.

  At 7 p.m., driver Eddie Stewart and gunman Dale Miller had arrived at Ella Knights’ home in the Volkswagen Golf. Michael Dixon and Lee Watson had followed them in a burgundy Renault. (Watson is the man who had been arrested with Michael Sayers for the killing of Viv Graham.) For the next hour, a flurry of mobile phone calls between Dixon, Stewart and Watson were made. At 8.10 p.m., Dixon had telephoned Stewart to ensure that he and Miller were in position at Ella Knights’ home. Twelve minutes later, Freddie had telephoned a friend who was watching the Newcastle United game at St James’ Park to enquire about the score. ‘Nil–nil,’ Freddie was told, ‘but we should be slaughtering them.’ Disappointed, Freddie decided to forget about the match and concentrate on his son Alan’s birthday celebrations.