Once the warrant had been obtained, Dillon led a small group of officers, including Copeland and Flowers, over to Winston’s flat to conduct a flash search. With their suspect in custody, they now had ready access to his keys, so getting in was no longer a problem.
A Police Search Advisor – or POLSA – accompanied by a specially trained search team would be tasked to pull the place apart once the flat had been forensicated by Sam Calvin and his cohorts.
As the driver of the pursuit car, Steve Bull had been written off to liaise with Traffic over the worryingly long list of vicinity only police accidents – or POLACCS, as they were known – that had occurred during the chase. Witness statements would eventually have to be taken from everyone affected by Winston’s driving, but that could wait until after the Traffic bods had finished dealing with the Road Traffic Act side of the investigation.
The shootout had quickly become a major item across all the networks and, as the SIO, Tyler’s first priority had been to ensure that the Yard’s top brass were fully briefed and ready to deal with the impending shit storm. His first call had been to DCS Holland, who had gone nuclear when he discovered just how badly things had deteriorated after Tyler decided to follow Winston away from the flat, rather than just housing him for C11 to take on the following morning. Within seconds of saying goodbye to the DCS, the phone rang, and he was forced to go through the whole painful process again, this time with the area Commander, who had been even harder to placate. They say bad things happen in threes; sure enough, the phone had barely landed in its cradle when it started ringing again. It was the AC’s Staff Officer, who had the raging hump because he hadn’t been able to get through to Tyler earlier.
As if fielding the barrage of angry calls hadn’t been hard enough in itself, the Yard’s Central Press Office was being inundated with media enquiries, and an irate press officer, unable to reach him on the phone, had been paging him constantly. The first message had been firm but polite. The second had been more robust. By the time the fifth message arrived, a senior press officer had become involved, and he or she was demanding that Tyler drop whatever he was doing and call the press office at once. The messages had reached double figures now, and the latest one to come through, from a media and communications manager, who was presumably even more senior in rank, had warned him that if he wanted to keep his rank – and his testicles – he should make immediate contact. The pager’s incessant vibrating was driving him mad. Wondering if this was what it felt to have a stalker, he had finally switched the annoying thing off.
“So, how did the flash search go?” Jack asked, hoping Dillon had some good news for him.
He didn’t.
Under Copeland’s guidance they had carried out as thorough a search as they could without jeopardising the scene from a forensic perspective, but they hadn’t found anything to connect Winston to the murder. On a positive note, they had recovered a significant quantity of white powder, which they believed to be uncut cocaine. They had also seized ten rounds of .38 calibre ammunition, a bunch of stolen credit cards and driving licences, and several blank British passports. Under normal circumstances, a seizure like that would have been great news. Today, it felt like a very poor consolation prize.
“What’s the score here?” Dillon asked.
Jack rolled his eyes, a look of exasperation crossing his face.
“I see. Like that, was it?” Dillon asked, sympathetically.
“Yep.” Tyler took a deep breath before continuing. “I must’ve been given a dressing down by the entire chain of command for northeast London.”
Dillon grimaced. “Really? That’s quite impressive, even for you.”
Tyler leaned an elbow on the edge of his desk and wearily buried his chin in the palm of his hand. “A new record, if I’m not mistaken.” He looked hungover, which was pretty much on a par with how he felt. “Oh yeah, I almost forgot, the Chief Inspector at Information Room phoned me. He wanted to know what I was going to do about a certain DI who developed an acute case of selective deafness when ordered to disengage from a vehicle pursuit.” His tone was one of mild rebuke, and he raised an eyebrow accusingly.
“What did you say?” Dillon asked, neutrally.
Jack allowed himself a mirthless smile. “I told him I was having trouble with my phone and couldn’t hear him. He hung up on me after that.”
Dillon grinned. “So, what now?” he asked, trying to stifle a yawn. He felt fatigued to the point where he could no longer think straight, and he began rubbing his eyes, which were dry and sore. They immediately felt worse, as though he’d massaged grit into them.
“We’ve done all we can, for now,” Jack told them. “As soon as you’re finished downstairs, go home and get some sleep. I’ll wait here to see Mr Holland, and then I’ll do the same. The DNA results from the flesh under Tracey’s nails won’t be in till late today at the earliest. I’ll ask Chris Deakin to call me at home if he hears anything.”
“What time do you want everyone back in?” Dillon asked.
“Winston’s going to be hospitalised for a good few days, which takes some of the pressure off us. The team has already been on the go for twenty-four hours solid, and if they don’t get some sleep soon, they’ll drop. Make sure they finish their statements, tidy up anything that’s urgent and get away as quickly as they can. I don’t want them back in today.”
“What about the flat? Won’t we need to supply an exhibits officer for that?”
Jack shook his head. “He
