“Did she say anything about the calls between her mobile and the 777 number?” Jack asked. “Or did the situation deteriorate too quickly for that?”
“She had the gall to tell me she hadn’t received any calls from that number and that she didn’t know anyone called Claude Winston. She even offered up her phone so I could scroll through the address book and the incoming and outgoing call logs. Of course, the sly old hag had already deleted her call history by then.”
“Well, the call data says otherwise,” Reg Parker said. “Pity you didn’t seize her phone, then we could have tried to recover the erased data.”
Murray reached behind him and produced a clear evidence bag containing a Nokia handset. “Ta-da!” he said triumphantly.
“I bet that went down well,” Reg said, grinning.
“Well, to be honest, I think she had pretty much decided that she didn’t like me by that stage,” Murray admitted, grinning to himself.
“Okay,” Jack said. “I think it might be worth us getting a statement from Sonia at some point. If she commits the lies that she told Kevin to paper, we may want to consider bringing charges of perverting the course of justice against her when the dust settles.”
Murray didn’t look too keen on the idea. “I’ll happily try,” he said, “but I don’t think she’ll be willing to speak to me again.” He had only just about got out of the house without being assaulted the last time.
“I don’t think the boss was planning to send you, Kevin,” Susie explained.
Murray looked relieved.
“Indeed not,” Jack confirmed, inwardly shuddering at the thought. “I have no doubt that Sonia Wilcox knows exactly who’s using the 777 phone and now, thanks to young Prudence, we do too. She told us that since we banged Claude Winston up last November, Angela’s been working his for nephew, Deontay Garston. We believe he’s the bogus doctor, which also makes him the man with the 777 phone. Wendy, how you getting on with your research on Garston?”
Wendy Blake cleared her throat. Although she was a well-liked and respected member of the team, she suffered from stage fright and always got nervous when she had to speak during office meetings.
“I started work on him first thing this morning sir,” she said quietly.
“Speak up,” Murray griped. “Some of us don’t have super hearing.”
Wendy blushed. “Sorry,” she said, making an effort to project her voice. “There’s surprisingly little in the system about him. PNC-wise, there’s some petty form as a juvenile, just TDA, possession of cannabis, that kind of thing. Nothing for violence or weapons. There’s hardly anything about him on CRIMINT either, which does seem at odds with him taking over Winston’s drug and pimp business.”
“Do we have a current address for him?” Dillon asked.
“Sort of,” Wendy replied. “He was stopped in a BMW a few weeks ago in Barking. I did a check on the car he was driving. It’s registered to him at an address in Bow several years ago, but there’s no way of knowing if that address is current.”
“Is he shown on the voter’s register as living there?” Susie asked.
Wendy shook her head. “No, there’s an Asian family shown on voter’s.”
“Okay,” Jack said. “Let’s get a drive-by done at the address to see if the car’s there. Without more to link him to it, we’re going to really struggle to get a warrant at this stage. Wendy, can you get the car circulated on the PNC. If seen, it’s to be stopped. If either Garston or Angela are in it, they are to be arrested. Put a firearms marker on the PNC that the car is not to be approached without Trojan assistance. I don’t want some local lid getting killed trying to make a name for themselves by nicking the bloke who shot PC Morrison.”
“I’ll get straight on it.”
A horrible thought occurred to Jack. “Dean, can I confirm that Winston, Garston, and Marley are actually circulated as wanted on the PNC?” he asked.
Dean’s scowl translated to: ‘Oh puh-lease!’ and the stern-faced researcher raised an admonishing eyebrow as it if say, ‘Do I really even have to answer that question?’
Jack took the hint. “I’ll take that as a yes,” he said, grinning. “While we’re dealing with Intel matters, are either of you any further forward identifying this Rodent character?” he asked.
“Sorry boss,” Wendy said. “I can’t find anything on him.”
Jack grunted his disappointment.
Darren Blyth raised a hand. “Sorry if it’s jumping the gun,” he said, “but after our chat last night –”
You mean after the bollocking I gave you, Jack thought.
“– I started going through some of the footage from the cameras surrounding the wasteland where the HEMS bird went down. I’ve managed to find what I believe is the red Rover fleeing the area, and I think I’ve actually got the car’s index.”
Jack had mixed views about this revelation. On the one hand, he was very pleased that Darren had responded to his criticism positively, and he was delighted that the man had found what could be a very important lead. On the other hand, he was angry that Blyth had waited until this morning’s meeting to tell him, instead of letting him know right away, which is what his own officers would have done. He could only put it down to the difference between the ways that he and Andy ran their respective teams and conditioned their staff to think.
Andy was a plodder; he was happy to move forward slowly and methodically, dealing with one strand of an investigation at a time, knowing that he would get the right result in the end. In contrast, Jack was totally driven; he wanted everything done yesterday, and he expected his people to aggressively chase all lines of enquiry from the second the job broke right up to the moment that the suspect was charged. Considering that the two men were such polar opposites, not just in their working methods but in their appearances and backgrounds, it sometimes surprised
