Authors: Rebecca Bradley
9
After
the team had identified all the child sex offenders with hands on
convictions living in a half mile radius of the dump site we had split
into teams of two and headed out. Ross and I were just off Mansfield
road. The outside of the address we stood in front of looked sad,
uncared for. The curtains were drawn, the garden unkempt. A green
wheelie-bin was dumped in front of the gate. I couldn't tell whether it
was to protect the resident of the address from visitors or the rest of
the street from him. I elbowed my way past it, not wanting to use my
hands on the rubbish filled container. Ross wrinkled up his nose as he
followed. I rapped on the top section of the door, the cold glass harsh
against my bare knuckles.
“Think he's in, boss?” Ross asked.
“We'll
soon see,” I answered in response to a stupid question. Wishing that I
had brought a pair of gloves to the office, I rubbed my hands together.
“Who is it?” A shout from behind the door.
“Police,
Mr Adams. Open the door please.” I shouted back. I knew he wouldn't
want us on his doorstep for long, drawing attention from his
neighbours. He'd asked the question though, so I was more than happy to
answer him.
A
key turned in the lock and a chain was dragged across its bracket
before the door opened. Mr Adams stood in front of us in distressed and
grubby grey jogging bottoms and a similar coloured tee-shirt, frayed
around the sleeves and hemline. Dark stains spread out from the cuffs,
neck and armpits. I made a conscious effort not to turn my nose away in
disgust as the odour of stale beer and cigarettes wafted from him.
He narrowed his eyes “What do you want? I don't have a visit organised with you.”
I
stepped forward, forcing him to take a step back into the hallway. “We
need to ask you some routine questions Mr Adams. I'm sure you want to
help us with our enquiries and get us on our way as quickly as
possible.”
He
looked from me to the six foot frame of Ross and back again. “You'd
better be quick or I'm going to put in a complaint of harassment.” He
backed further away from the doorway. A move I took as an invitation in
and I stepped over the rather dirty threshold. Nick Adams stopped
moving once we were inside and the door to his neighbours’ view was
closed. “What do you want?” I got the feeling he didn't want us further
into his home and I didn't have valid grounds at this point to push him
for entry. I opted for politeness and with great restraint I asked the
questions we needed answering. As I spoke the left side of Adams top
lip quivered. His mouth parted and the quivering lip turned upwards in
a sneer, wet pink flesh lifting outwards. Cigarette odour leaked
through his now open mouth from the depth of his body. I watched as he
lifted his hand to his mouth, ran his tongue across a finger, waited a
beat then placed it under his nose and breathed in. Ross stepped
forward, his shoulders back, bringing his height into full effect. The
sneer lingered.
“Mr Adams?”
Nick
Adams' explanation of where he was the previous night held. It might
not have been comfortable, but he was in the pub with people he could
loosely call friends. People I would call fellow sex offenders. Certain
public houses were known haunts for them. Places they felt safe. The
restrictions on registered sex offenders may be in place to protect
children but they didn't prevent them fraternising with fellow
offenders. Offenders who built their lives around trying to fit in, to
appear invisible. People knowing what they had done always made their
lives difficult. Fit in or stay hidden were their only real
options. This stuck in my throat like a piece of barbed wire. Sex
offenders gathering, exchanging notes and suggestions, and leering at
any unsuspecting young girls who didn't realise the place they had
entered was such a hell hole. I didn't subscribe to the suggestion they
could be rehabilitated. A bit like boxing going underground if the
sport was stopped for health reasons only more necessary for those
taking part. They could no more stop their sexual interest in children
than I could stop breathing. Maybe some managed to curb their actions,
but I wasn't sold on that either.
Ross
growled out his thanks for Adams' time, we left and moved on to the
next on our list, a large five bedroom family home that belonged to a
wealthy offender.
10
The
contrast between Adams and Derek Habden was stark. He had a wife and a
large, well kept house in Sherwood. Where Adams had been dirty and
seedy, Habden oozed class and cleanliness, though no amount of
cleanliness would get Habden anywhere close to Godliness with the
offences he had racked up. His PNC record showed several offences for
sexual assaults on teenagers, but a clever and expensive barrister had
managed to convince a jury his client was not the type of man who
needed to turn unwanted attention on to a teenager new to adulthood. It
was, he claimed, the females who had made up the allegations after his
client, a community man, respected amongst his peers and friends, had
rejected their advances, advances made in an effort to progress their
own social standing. The jury bought this. Habden was great at
projecting the good honest man. Why indeed, would he want females
barely out of childhood? Unfortunately for Habden he was caught again
and the last time was an offence he couldn't get out of. The girl was
fourteen. His defence claimed Habden could not have known she was
fourteen because her dress sense and make-up indicated otherwise, her
behaviour, provocative. His previous bad character was brought in to
play and Habden was found guilty, given a suspended sentence, placed on
the sex offenders register and ordered to complete a sex offender's
programme.
The
conversation was a lot more difficult than the one we'd had with Adams.
He was arrogant. Ross bristled every time Habden opened his mouth.
“You
understand I do not have to answer your questions, don't you
inspector?” he asked, making the very word, inspector, seem dirty. I
felt the movement in Ross as his shoulders went back yet again.
“I appreciate your time Mr Habden.”
“I was at home with my wife, as I am every evening.”
I
looked across to Lorraine Habden; her black hair hung down the sides of
her narrow face, making her appear thinner, almost skeletal. She
managed to look down her nose at us and nod her concession at the same
time. A small woman who had stood by her husband during some pretty
damning evidence and who felt vindicated by a not guilty verdict from a
jury. It didn't explain her demeanour in the face of a guilty verdict a
year later. I presumed she still bought his lies, that, or she was
afraid to go it alone without the upstanding man by her side.
“Derek
has been at home since five-fifteen yesterday. I don't know why you
feel the need to persecute my husband. It was all a misunderstanding.”
“You're sure he was here all evening?” Ross prompted her to respond to the same question again.
“As
she has already stated constable, we were together the entire time. She
is not a stupid woman and was very capable of understanding the
question the first time you asked it. Unless you intend to arrest
Lorraine or I, I do believe you were leaving,” Habden interjected.
Lorraine, looked from us, to him and down to the floor.
“Thank
you for your time.” I nodded my assent to Ross and turned to leave. “I
hope we don't need to attend again, Mrs Habden.” I looked her in the
eyes. I could see her hope waning. There is only so much a wife can
take. I handed her my business card. I held my surprise as she took the
card from me. I'd left her with more to think about.
11
She
heard him before she saw him. A door somewhere past the room she was in
creaked on its hinges. A sound that represented terror. She held her
breath and attempted to stay quiet, be as small as she could, hoping to
be invisible. She shuffled on her knees, backwards across the sticky
plastic until her bare feet hit wire bars. They weren't very wide and
one of the bars went between her toes. Her hand went to her mouth to
stifle the sound as she cried out. He didn't like her to make a noise.
It made him upset. She moved her hand down to her toes and rubbed
between them. Any relief from the pain, however small, helped. She
looked down at her feet as she rubbed, still trying to force herself
further back, even smaller. They were stained: the yellow of urine, of
vivid red and purple bruises, and plain old brown shades of dirt. The
small lamp plugged in on the floor in the corner offered the
opportunity to see herself and her surroundings clearer. They were
imprinted in her head now. Every inch of the room etched into her
mind’s eye. She knew where the cat came in to pee, in the corner under
the old style school desk. The girl knew where the time-worn Shackleton
chair sat with its well sunken seat, all faded flowers and leaves, the
wooden legs scratched, possibly by the visiting cat.
She
jumped at the sound of the metal bolt as it was dragged across the
barrel. Rust and age grated together in a squealing whine. Wrapping her
arms around her body, knees up to her chest, she pushed back into the
corner, eyes cast down.
“Hello my little angel, how are you today?”
She didn't move.
“You must be hungry. I brought tomato soup, not too hot; I wouldn't want you to be ungrateful. Would you like it?”
She
was hungry. She didn't want to speak with him, but she was so, so
hungry and she could smell the food. The need for survival was strong.
She lifted her head but fear grasped hard as he peered through the bars
at her. Her head dropped. Eyes back to down to the floor.
“You need to keep your strength up, you've got to eat.”
She nodded but didn't look up.
Slender
fingers with filed nails fiddled with the padlock on the cage door;
within a moment the plastic soup bowl and disposable spoon were set
down inside.
“Eat it up, we can't have you fainting on us.”
She
didn't move and she wouldn't move until he had left. Aftershave added
to the myriad of vile smells already in the enclosed space.
“OK, I know you'll eat it. Enjoy. I'll collect it later.” A smile flickered across his narrow lips.
As
soon as he had left the room she allowed a real breath. It hurt, her
chest hurt, breathing felt like a massive undertaking. She wondered if
bones were broken. They felt broken. She felt broken.
She
tried not to eat all the food she was given. She never knew what was in
it. Not all the time. But she was hungry today and she shovelled the
stale, mouldy chunks of bread and lukewarm soup into her mouth. When
she'd finished she pushed the bowl back to the cage door and shuffled
back to her corner. Her eyes began to feel heavy. The edges of her
vision were hazy. She knew what was happening, she couldn't stop it. It
gave relief from the pain if nothing else. She put her head on the
floor, with her hands underneath to protect it, closed her eyes and
gave in.
12
I
pulled the 308 into the small parking space that Central police station
provided. The car park was a place we shared with the fire service in
the next building and was cramped, to say the least, having space for
about twenty vehicles in total. The temperature gauge in the car read
five degrees. It hadn't warmed much. My jaw tightened, forcing tension
further up my head. I pushed the door open as far as it would go
without risk of scratching paintwork from the adjacent vehicle,
breathed in and squeezed myself out. Ross grunted as he attempted to do
the same on the other side and muttered a curse as he managed to
extricate himself and slam the door closed. We crossed the small patch
of concrete and entered the dilapidated station through the rear door,
climbing the stairs to the major incident room. I left Ross in charge
of making the drinks and checked my emails. There was one from Evie.
Going on the description I'd given her, she hadn't found a match
between local missing children and the child in the mortuary. She said
she would look at the recorded missing kids for the rest of the county
next.
In
the incident room we debriefed the interviews we'd conducted with the
sex offenders over the round of insipid drinks made by Ross. Our third
interviewee had a cast iron alibi as he had been locked up in the cells
overnight for a drunk and disorderly, and the fourth had notified us
about a week’s holiday he planned and a follow up phone call to the
B&B lady confirmed he had gone.
“I
didn't like Habden at all,” Ross offered the group while he stuffed a
ham salad on brown into his mouth. Mayonnaise dolloped out onto his
chin.
I sighed. “If it went on whom we liked Ross, the cells would be full of sleaze bags.”
He
let out a grunt and wiped his chin with the back of his hand. I could
see he wasn't happy with the situation and the type of people we had to
deal with in the process of this enquiry. He needed to get his head
around it though. It was necessary to get into these people, this
world, if we were to find out what had happened to our girl and, more
importantly, who she was.
Aaron
waved his pocket book at me. “We didn't fare much better. One of them,
Darren Scott doesn't have anyone to verify he was at home all night
wanking into his tissues, but there's nothing to say he wasn't either.
The other three have weak alibis we would need to look into further. It
feels like a complete waste of an afternoon.” Sally sat and nodded her
agreement as she picked bits of salad out of the smaller cob in her
hand. Her face wrinkled in disgust at the tomato as it dropped onto the
paper bag it had been held in.
“And
Martin,” I asked Martin Thacker, the longest serving DC on my team.
“How did yours go?” He leaned back in his chair, his shirt buttons
straining across his paunch, his arms crossed behind his head.
“Yeah,
pretty much the same as you. They were either “in all night alone” with
a “girlfriend” or in the boozer. There's room to get them firmed up,
but I didn't get the feeling any of them were too worried about being
tied to a body. They may have been a bit twitchy about being linked
with a child generally, but not with a dead one. There's stuff to check
anyway.”
“Okay,
so we have a few lines of enquiry to follow up, but no one gets the
feeling we need to push harder on anyone, am I correct?”
Nods
of agreement went around the room. It baulked them to say they didn't
think these guys had done anything, but they didn't think the offenders
we had spoken with had killed the girl found in the alleyway. Even if
they did have a gut feeling one of them was involved, we needed more
than instinct, we needed evidence. I was disappointed because we didn't
have an identity for our girl and we were no closer to identifying an
offender either.
“Right,”
I rose, “so the plan of attack now is to put in the leg work and
corroborate those alibis one way or another.” As I walked away I could
hear the team muttering as soon as they thought I was out of earshot;
how they weren't happy about having to deal with child sex offenders
and how they were already feeling a layer of grime around them just
from talking with them.
My
office wasn’t so much of an office as a goldfish bowl within a corner
of the incident room. Shabby horizontal blinds, lined with years of
settled dust, hung on the inside of the glass to provide privacy should
it be required. I leaned back into my chair and looked out.
Uniform
cops were milling in and out as they completed the tasks of collecting
CCTV in the area of the dump site and house to house enquires that had
been requested of them. All information coming in to the room would be
checked and input onto HOLMES – Home Office Large Major Enquiry System
- which would keep track of all nominals, phone numbers, vehicles and a
multitude of other items brought up throughout the investigation and
link them to each other, as and when necessary. It would also print out
actions for officers to conduct following the input of data by an
allocated receiver for the system. Its ability to cross reference the
intelligence made it an invaluable piece of kit in an enquiry this
size, but I was always a believer in human instinct as well and
instinct was the tool I favoured. Because of this, I sometimes butted
heads with more senior officers, who thought HOLMES was the singular
way to work. All too often I had seen people’s instincts turn out right
and I wasn't willing to quite let go of the old fashioned “nose” for a
collar. The phone on my desk rang as I watched my team out beyond
the glass partitions.
“Hannah, it's Catherine.” Detective Superintendent Walker announced herself.
“Ma'am.” I tapped the jotter pad with my pen out of an automatic frustration and a need to do something with my hands.
“How is the investigation progressing?”
I
attempted not to sigh into the handset. “The post-mortem has been
conducted. There was a lot of evidence of trauma over an extended
period of time. She was bound at her hands and feet and also had
something placed around her throat. Cause of death looks to be
asphyxiation. We haven't got an ID, but I've got Evie working on it.
She's already checked out divisional missing children but didn't find
any matches so she's now widening the search criteria.” The lack of ID
wouldn't please her.
“Any
idea on how long it will take to get an identification, Hannah? The
press office is on my back and the command team are paying attention to
this one.”
The
politics of the job were something I hated with a passion. I joined to
catch the bad guys but the further I progressed through the promotion
boards, the more politics were involved and the less policing took
place. I wouldn't go for promotion again. I wanted to police, keep my
feet on the ground, investigate and get a good honest collar. “No
Ma'am, I'm afraid not. We're working the case and looking at all
angles. The girl isn't known to us as her fingerprints haven't brought
an ID, so it's a matter of waiting for some forensic results to come in
and the system searches to be completed.” Doodled triangles appeared on
the jotter paper in front of my keyboard.
I looked up as Ross stuck his head around the door frame.
“Keep me updated please, Hannah.”
“Yes Ma'am.”
I had barely got the handset back on its cradle when Ross spoke. “We've got a possible ID. In Norwich.”