Behind the Crime

by Colin Ferguson

  He continued to sit there quietly but a large tear ran down his cheek. I told him that I would write a report telling the court how well he had been getting on.

  I did so, but the court could only see the big young man with a bad criminal record. He was sentenced to three months in prison. He moved away when he was released. His mother didn’t want him there anymore so he went to stay with friends in North London. The prison sentence confirmed him in his criminal behaviour. The friend he went to stay with saw to that. Two years later, I read about his involvement with a major crime. If only they had seen the Eddie I had seen they might have let him be.

  The Flannel

  Elroy was another victim of the confusion at the time for young black men. He too had lived with his gran in Jamaica for many years. One day she took him to look at the aeroplanes. “Would you like to fly in one?” she asked.

  Needless to say, a young boy would say yes to such an exciting adventure. When he landed, it was at Heathrow and the mother he barely knew was there to meet him. With no preparation or understanding of what had happened, Elroy was totally unable to accept what had happened. His parents were separated and he began to shuttle between them and to feel totally rejected. He had great difficulty settling at school and couldn’t grasp the difference of his easy-going small school in Jamaica with the large secondary school in Battersea.

  When he was put on probation we became a focus for his life. I could tell him what he should do and not do. I guided him through his applications for unemployment and housing when he did find somewhere to be independent. He liked coming in to talk with our secretaries because they didn’t scare him. I listened to him. Everywhere else was a threat, a danger, a place of rejection.

  His anxiety showed by heavy sweating and thus smelling rather unhygienic. Getting him through a year of probation was not too difficult because he needed so much support that our main problem was in being able to meet his needs. In the end though, he completed his time and at the same time moved into the Brixton area.

  I knew that we would hear of him again because he was so anxious and explosive when he felt insecure. He really was on the cusp of social inadequacy and mental breakdown. Sure enough, a year later, which was much longer than I had expected, he was in trouble again when his landlord evicted him and ended up in hospital as a result of Elroy’s anger.

  He was remanded to a probation hostel in the area, an event that I would not have recommended but with no accommodation it was the best the Court could do without sending him to prison.

  That may have been better for his behaviour was becoming less and less controllable. A fight broke out in the hostel and Elroy was involved. One of the staff intervened and told Elroy to get out. My worst fears came to be as Elroy reacted angrily and struck out with almost tragic consequences.

  He was remanded in custody for grievous bodily harm and sent to prison for two years. I never discovered what happened to him after that but I fear he may have become a recidivist. He would have found a place that could not reject him. His story was not isolated as so many families found that their children could not settle in this foreign land.

  When Love Is Not Enough

  Len and Ellen were also from the Jamaican community and they had been married for over fifteen years when it happened. The early years of their relationship had been good and they had three children. The whole family were churchgoers and Len, especially, saw his faith as integral to his life.

  The three girls were all that Len could hope for; they were bright, attractive, kind and loving. But when Stella (the youngest) turned ten, it was as if Ellen became a different person. She became unsettled and argumentative. Then she began to see other men and did not hide the fact from either Len or the girls.

  Len was torn between his belief in his marriage and his concern for the girls. Ellen then began to leave home for long periods making no secret of the fact she had gone to live with another man. She did not try to keep contact with Len or the girls during this time. But she also kept returning. Len with his strong belief let her return in the hope that she might change.

  This time she had been away for about three months and the family had just really settled down to a routine. It was Stella’s thirteenth birthday and she had some friends with her for a little party. Thankfully, it was nearly over when Ellen came in turning as she did so to blow a kiss to someone outside. She was unsteady on her feet and soon made everyone feel so uncomfortable that Stella asked her friends to leave.

  Len was furious, which for a normally placid man was unusual. He and Ellen were in the kitchen shouting at each other. The children heard their father shout, “If you don’t care about me you should at least think of our children.”

  They also heard her reply, “What makes you think that they are your children?”

  Len had been carving ham for the party earlier and it was on the table in front of him. He insisted on pleading guilty to murder, even though the events became a blur in his mind.

  He spent eight years in prison before release on license. His family and his friends were all waiting for him. The church that he had been so committed to had cared for his children while he was away and although they could not condone what he had done, few of them would condemn him. Len had struggled hard to retain his faith because of the great sense of guilt that he carried. He was a broken man with bad dreams.

  Len knew that God still loved him and the church showed that in the way they welcomed him back, but it would be a long time before he could forgive himself.

  Murder Will Always Be a Bad Dream

  Causing the death of another person stays with you forever. Those were the words of a life licensee that I interviewed. His offence had been committed in the late 1950s when the death penalty was still available to the court. He had been sentenced to death but that had been commuted to a life sentence shortly before his execution was due to take place.

  Charlie and one of his friends, had broken in to a shop and were stealing the goods there when the shop owner and his wife interrupted them. His friend fled the scene quickly and was never caught but the wife attacked Charlie with a large kitchen knife. In the ensuing struggle, the knife ended up in her, killing her.

  Even though Charlie had not gone with the intention of killing, the death occurred during the commission of a crime and that merited the death sentence. He had served over fifteen years before release on parole (in his case a life license). One of the conditions of this was to report to a probation officer weekly.

  He had been released to a local hostel and was actually one of a colleague’s cases but as he was on holiday Charlie had to report to me.

  He came in and sat down. I explained how my colleague was away. He was aware of this. He sat there quietly so I initiated the conversation. “How are you settling at the hostel?”

  “It’s good not to be locked up all the time.”

  “How long were you in prison?”

  “Not long enough.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “I should be dead. At least in prison I knew I was being punished, but I can’t get used to being free.”

  “Why not?”

  “I can’t sleep, she won’t let me sleep.”

  “Who is she?”

  “The woman I killed. I see her every night as soon as I shut my eyes I see what I did.”

  “What do you see?”

  “There was a large mirror behind her and I saw her sliding down my body and then lying on the floor with that terrible knife in her chest.”

  “But you didn’t go there to kill her, did you?”

  “No. But I did kill her and now she won’t leave me alone.”

  Charlie was so haunted by what he had done that six months later, he got very drunk and drowned in the river.

  Like, Man!

  It seemed to be Andy’s favourite sentence and it really became quite tedious listening to him bemoaning his lot in life, punctuated by the word ‘like’ so I decided to let him
hear himself. I recorded some of our conversation then played it back to him. The result was electrifying.

  “That’s not me!”

  “Oh yes it is,” I replied

  He sat back in his chair, speechless for a while. “That’s like – awful! What can I do?”

  These are the magic words for any probation officer. They are ready for a change, and begin to work on that change.

  Andy was in a mess. Not only did he sound like a discarded hippy but he was acting like one. He was out of work, his girlfriend had chucked him out, and wouldn’t let him see either her or their child until he showed that he was willing to make an effort to support them. He was sleeping on the floor of a friend’s room but that was not going to last. In desperation, he had stolen food from a supermarket.

  “What do you think you need to do?” I asked.

  “I don’t know like. I sound so pathetic. What can I do like?”

  “How about getting some work?”

  “I tried but what can I do like?”

  “I think you know what to do. Just go to the employment exchange and take the first job they offer. It doesn’t matter what it is. Then come back next week and tell me what you did.”

  I added, “By the way, when you go for an interview don’t keep saying ‘like’, that is one of the things that sounds pathetic and you don’t want that anymore.”

  Andy went as suggested and was given a job sorting out coat hangers out at a store in London. He was working in the warehouse. Because he had found a job he was able to get a starter payment from the Exchange and had rented a room in Battersea with it. He walked to work to save money and made his own sandwiches to avoid the cost of London shops.

  Two weeks later, he came late to see me and apologised for missing the previous week. The reason was that the warehouse boss had asked him to be his deputy (there were only three of them). The next time I saw him, his boss was off sick and he was in charge and coping with it.

  His self-confidence went up dramatically and before long he was back with his girlfriend and daughter. He was so transformed that I couldn’t understand how he could have got into such a state as before.

  When I saw him for the last time, he had been placed on a management training scheme by the store. He said he just needed someone to believe in him and thanked me for setting him in the right direction and not once did he say ‘like’.

  Responsibility

  Brian was on probation for a minor drugs offence and because the court thought he needed to have a guiding hand. He was twenty and had been in care until he was seventeen since when he had drifted.

  In the last year, he had become involved with Carol, a woman nearly ten years older who was widowed and had three young children. She was a strong-willed woman struggling to raise her children in sub-standard accommodation on the eighth floor of a block of Council flats.

  They seemed to give each other mutual support and obviously cared a great deal about each other. Brian told me that being responsible for someone made him feel good.

  It wasn’t easy especially when they woke up one night with the youngest screaming. When they put the light on they found the wall was crawling with bugs. The bed and everything in there had to be incinerated and the room vacated until it could be deloused. As a priority, it only took three months but they coped. “What else can you do?” said Carol.

  Carol was a natural carer and loved her family greatly and she had fought hard to keep them all together. I think she saw in Brian another casualty of the system and in need of a mother while she needed as much emotional support as she could get.

  Although Brian was unemployed and unskilled, he was good with the children and she was able to supplement their social security money with some casual cleaning work.

  Then their generosity backfired on them when they took one of Brian’s old friends in, while he was going through the court on drug charges. He overdosed and died during the night. To their relief, they were exonerated of any blame but it was another unwelcome hurdle in their struggle to cope.

  Towards the end of his order, Brian came in to see me unexpectedly. He wanted to tell me that he had been in the public gallery of the court when he saw the Warrant Officer pointing. For the first time in his life, he knew it couldn’t be for him.

  Just before I moved, he found his first full time job on a building site. The money was good, better than Social Security and Carol was happy to be clear of being dependent on the ‘dole’ as she called it.

  Cockroaches

  Working in South London in the ‘70s meant that I was there when the influence of the Krays and the Richardson gangs was still felt and the great train robbery had involved a lot of the local villains. Ben ran a stall in Battersea and was well into the local crime scene. The story was that he had been down to drive one of the cars in the train robbery, but a dose of flu’ had put him out of action.

  Vic had been found guilty of armed robbery so was away for a long time. I mention this because his wife was friendly with Ben and there were other links to major crime but Daphne was very much on the fringe especially since Vic had gone down.

  She was put on probation for shoplifting, her excuse being, “I needed it but social had stopped my money.” After being initially quite suspicious of me, she warmed to the fact that someone was actually there helping her, advising her on how to do things but letting her do them herself.

  She was mid-forties, very strong-willed and with a colourful vocabulary especially after she had been drinking. This had not endeared her to the local agencies, in particular the housing department with whom she had a long running feud.

  This had not been helped by Vic who was in considerable arrears when he was there and she had had to cope with this on her own.

  She was not at all well in herself having already had a breast removed because of cancer. As a result, she was unable to work but it had not prevented her from enjoying her drink.

  After the first few weeks, we began to get on well as I accepted her as she was and didn’t preach to her. The dampness of her flat did not help her illness and it was no surprise when she discovered cockroaches in her kitchen.

  When she complained to the housing officer about this, he had told her that she was imagining them and that she shouldn’t drink so much. Fortunately, we had been talking about anger management the week beforehand as otherwise he might have regretted his words sooner.

  I suggested to her that she catch one and then take it in to show him that she was not imagining them. I recall her sitting back and saying, “What a good idea.” I had not expected her to collect a whole jar full or that she would tip them on to his desk with the words, “Here’s my ‘effing’ imagination.”

  The whole office had to be fumigated but so was her flat.

  It was only a one-year order so our contact ended quite soon but I received a Christmas card from her with a little note to say she was OK for the next four years.

  Illness

  Sometimes behaviour can be caused by a chemical imbalance such as the young mother I wrote a report on. It was clear she was struggling and she was constantly tired. She had walked out of a shop without paying and they had not accepted her apology. The court recognised that she might be telling the truth and asked for a report before sentencing.

  When I called, she was in tears and very fearful of the court. She was so unlike anyone who would break the law as she was secure in her accommodation and was still seeing the baby’s father and being supported by him, though she told me he was worried by her erratic behaviour since the baby had been born.

  I used the Social Functioning Questionnaire with her and the results showed very clearly that she was a well-balanced young woman but very lacking in energy.

  Having a wife who had suffered from an iron deficiency, I suggested she go to see her doctor and get a blood test done, which she did. His prescription for iron tablets soon turned her into the person she really was and the court were able to give her an absolute discharge
as she had already paid for the shopping.

  The next case was slightly different in that the deficiency had already been identified. This time it was a woman in her thirties who was writing a book.

  She had a deadline to reach and so she could stay awake longer she had altered her prescription to get more amphetamine.

  Blood tests had proved that she was in fact suffering a potassium deficiency and that the only thing the amphetamine was doing was to increase her anxiety level to the point where she could not concentrate.

  Her medication was changed and she kept a supply of bananas handy, because of their high level of potassium, for when she was flagging. I am glad to say her book was completed by the deadline and she was much happier.

  Beryl was a mother of four boys and she had just gone through a divorce. She coped on a very shallow level and drank at lunchtime before the children returned home. The oldest boy was used to getting the tea and was in fact acting as a carer for his mother.

  It was obvious that it was not just the drinking that caused the problem as she was in fact desperately lonely and seeking inappropriate relationships. The doctors were sure that there was a medical condition but it was a long time before the diagnosis of lupus was made a condition where the virus attacks all the organs so that one by one they start to fail. She kept in contact with me when I left and her eldest son wrote to me when she died as a result of the lupus.

  Transgender

  Jim was on parole having been released from prison as a result of a burglary which he said was to raise the funds he needed for a transgender operation. He was genuinely on the waiting list and did eventually have the operation and became Julie. The main problem then was that if he committed any further crime he would still be sentenced as a man.