The Wrong Man: The Shooting of Steven Waldorf and The Hunt for David Martin (17 page)

U
p to and including the early 1970s, there were corrupt practices in the Metropolitan Police. Corruption was not endemic in the ranks of the CID but there existed a small cadre of deeply crooked CID officers and their activities badly needed to be addressed, dealt with and eradicated. No honest cop was in any doubt about that. Unfortunately, the person deputed to deal with this dissolute behaviour was the new commissioner, Sir Robert Mark GBE, QPM. Not only did he possess a vitriolic hatred of the CID, he was also utterly determined to break their power. To this end, he formed the police complaints department, which was then known as A10. A senior uniform officer was in charge and the investigating officers were drawn from the uniform and CID branches.

Mark may have disliked introducing those despised CID officers into his anti-corruption unit but the fact remained that they were necessary, because few of their uniform counterparts possessed any investigatory skills or the ability to compose a coherent report to the Director of Public Prosecutions. In order to bring to book the deeply corrupt officers who were the subject of investigation, some of the A10 officers used bullying tactics on junior officers whom they believed were in possession of knowledge which could be used as evidence against the crooked cops, although, of course, this might not necessarily have been the case.

Naturally, there were decent, hard-working officers at A10 who were determined to achieve success in the fight against corruption without resorting to these types of tactics, but there was an aura of fear enveloping the Metropolitan Police. Officers were being returned to uniform on the flimsiest of evidence and sometimes their careers were ruined on the basis of rumours alone. Incredibly, these despotic actions became a two-way street; if a detective was thought to be behaving not in a dishonest but in a recalcitrant or bolshie manner, he could be threatened with a posting to A10. The threat was usually quite sufficient to make the most contumacious offender toe the line.

In consequence, the whole of A10, good cops as well as bad ones, were lumped together and cordially disliked. No-one trusted them. The good guys out on the streets – and this was the vast majority of the Metropolitan Police's 3,200 detectives – wanted the bad ones turfed out (and the sooner the better) but because of the mistrust that had arisen no one wanted to volunteer information of wrongdoing to A10. No, the unit which was going to ‘clear up the Met' had more than a whiff of McCarthyism about it.

Ten years passed and the complaints department was now known as CIB2. The bullying, blustering officers of yesteryear had more or less vanished and the whole department was now known to have adopted a stronger, more professional approach. There was of course no question of corrupt behaviour in the Waldorf case; however, because the whole affair seriously threatened the public's credibility of the police, CIB2 was quite rightly called in at the earliest opportunity.

At 1.25 on the morning of Saturday 15 January, the still-shocked Peter Finch was interviewed by Detective Chief Superintendent Neil Dickens from CIB2. Dickens was then 42 and during his twenty-six years' service with Hertfordshire Constabulary he had been commended on thirteen occasions for his work in catching criminals while serving in uniform, in the CID and also the Regional Crime Squad. Now, in a sideways move to the Metropolitan Police, he would spend a twelve months' attachment with CIB2.

The notes were recorded contemporaneously by Detective Sergeant William Hose and Finch was asked, by Dickens, referring to Martin, ‘What type of man is he?'

‘I think he is a very dangerous man with no regard to the law or authority,' replied Finch, adding ‘and at the time of his arrest he said that he could have taken a number of officers with him. I would say that he would not hesitate to use violence, i.e. firearms, to make good his escape.'

To make the point quite clear, Dickens said, ‘Did he make the comments personally to you, or is it something you have heard?'

Finch replied, ‘Referring to my pocketbook, he said upon arrest whilst I was struggling with him, he said to me, ‘‘I'll have you, I'll blow you away,'' so I know from first-hand experience that he wouldn't hesitate to shoot a police officer.'

He was asked to detail his duties of the previous day, and he did so, and stated that the reason why he had drawn his gun was because he was wearing a large blue anorak over his holster and that he might well have experienced difficulty – as indeed he would – in drawing his weapon if he was confronted by Martin. ‘Why,' he was asked, ‘did you consider it necessary to draw your weapon?'

‘I knew that if the man was Martin that he might well have a gun in his hand,' replied Finch, adding decisively, ‘and he would shoot me first before I had time to draw my weapon.'

Although Finch's actions in Pembroke Road have already been mentioned in the narrative of this book, it is important to see precisely what he had to say to his questioner:

I had my gun in my right hand, close to my leg. As I approached the Volkswagen van which was in the nearside lane, I saw the yellow Marina van of Central 415 and the passenger shouted to me, ‘It's the yellow Mini in front of the van.' They were about two cars behind the van in the same line of traffic. I then slowed down my pace and approached the Mini from the rear nearside. I could see that the driver was a male and there was another male in the front passenger seat. I walked up to the front passenger's door and I looked at him and I was convinced it was Martin. I was slightly behind him. I saw his nose which was rather large. I then backed off to the Mini's rear nearside and as I did so, the driver turned round and looked at me and said something. I got myself into the drawn weapons position and I crouched very low. I did call out ‘Armed Police' but could not say anything further because I saw the man who I thought was Martin turn to the rear seat and I thought he was going to reach for a gun and I feared for my life. As he did so, I fired a paired shot and these went into the rear nearside tyre.

‘Did you see a gun?' asked Dickens, ‘or anything that resembled a gun in the car?'

‘No, I did not,' replied Finch. ‘It was just his sudden movement which I saw. I then raised myself from a low position and moved towards his passenger window. He was shouting something and still moving, so I fired two paired shots towards his left arm at close range.'

Dickens later asked: ‘You described how this man moved and shouted. Did you get the opportunity of a good look at him?'

‘Yes, when I was at the passenger window,' replied Finch. ‘I saw him in profile, although the street wasn't that well lit and I was still convinced that he was Martin.'

At the end of the seventy-five-minute interview, Finch was cautioned, that is, that he need not say anything more unless he wished to do so and that whatever he said would be taken down in writing and might be given in evidence, and he declined to do so.

The next interview, again conducted by Dickens, was at 9.32 that evening, in the presence of Finch's solicitor, Ian Walker of Russell, Jones & Walker, the solicitors invariably instructed by the Police Federation to act for accused officers. The notes were contemporaneously recorded by Detective Sergeant Gus MacKenzie and this time Finch was cautioned from the outset.

He was led through the police regulations about when it was proper to draw a gun from one's holster and then Finch was asked if, when he went out on foot, it was ‘solely for the purpose of making a positive identification?' The question was slightly ambiguous because at the briefing it had been stated that if Martin had become aware of a police presence, he might well have to be arrested on the street, hence five officers being armed. But Finch's answer was equally obscure, because he replied, ‘I wouldn't say that it was solely for that purpose because it had been discussed on a number of occasions that if we were on the street, we would take him,' which was not necessarily the case.

‘How many other officers were sent out on foot?' asked Dickens.

‘As I was the closest unit, other than the surveillance team and the fact that Detective Sergeant Hockaday whom I was with did not know him, when I heard the call it was agreed between us that I would go on foot,' replied Finch. ‘I did not hear anyone else say they would be going on foot to give assistance.'

Dickens suggested once again that the object was merely to give Finch the chance of having a look in the car and Finch replied, ‘That may have been the object, but when I saw who I thought was Martin, I decided I could cope.'

Referring back to Finch's explanation as to when it was proper to draw a gun from its holster, if it was intended to use it, Dickens asked, ‘Had you made such an intention?'

‘I had decided that if the need arose, yes, I would use my firearm,' answered Finch.

He told the interviewing officer that he had shouted a warning and because of the passenger's actions he thought he was going for a weapon: he believed that seeing him in the ‘drawn weapons' position, would make them stop what they were doing and surrender. ‘They had little time to surrender,' commented Dickens but as Finch replied, ‘Yes, I agree, but I thought my life was in danger.'

Finch went on to explain that as he went round to the driver's door of the Mini, he could see Waldorf moving, half out of the car; he could see Deane was carrying out a ‘reload' and would therefore be incapable of bringing his gun into use again; he (Finch) was out of ammunition and because he felt the man still represented a danger, he struck him several times on the head with his revolver. He then reloaded his weapon and covered the man while he was handcuffed. It was only when he looked at the man full in the face that he realised that man was not David Martin.

Dickens suggested that Finch had lost control of himself at that time, discharging his firearm at an innocent man whose identity he had mistaken and had followed it up by setting about him bodily with his gun, but Finch replied, ‘I do not think I had lost control of myself. I knew what I was doing all the time,' and shortly afterwards the interview concluded after forty-nine minutes.

Following Finch's preliminary interview, Jardine was interviewed by Detective Chief Inspector Brian Siddle of CIB2 and Detective Sergeant Thomas Yates contemporaneously recorded the questions and answers, which commenced at 3.22 a.m.

During the questioning, Jardine said that he had seen Finch pass him on foot in Pembroke Road, gun drawn, and then, ‘I think I was distracted momentarily, either by the radio or moving the car or something but when I looked at him again, he was pointing his gun at the Mini and shots were being fired.' Jardine told Siddle that he assumed that a positive identification had been made, that the man inside the Mini had a gun and from the number of shots which had been fired, that the passenger was firing back. Describing how Deane had got out of the car and had gone to the Mini's nearside, Jardine stated he had also run towards the Mini, drawing his revolver as he did so. ‘DC Finch was to the offside of the Mini and to the offside of the man who was sprawled half in and half out,' he told Siddle.

‘What happened then?' he was asked and Jardine replied, ‘I assumed the man had been shot but he was still moving. Because of the briefing and because of what I knew of the man, I still considered him to be very dangerous and I fired two shots towards his head. He was still moving after that, so I fired a further shot towards his head. I didn't see if any of these shots hit him, but his movements certainly became a lot slower.'

The interview concluded at 4.10 a.m. but twenty minutes later, Jardine was again interviewed, this time by Detective Chief Superintendent Dickens who had just read the notes of his interview. A few more questions were asked, mainly with regards to what he may have said to the occupants of the car and his reasoning behind shooting Waldorf; he was then cautioned and the interview concluded.

Later the same day, at 6.55 p.m., Dickens interviewed Jardine again and, in keeping with Finch's later interview, Jardine was cautioned from the outset. He was not legally represented but he had the services of a Police Federation representative, Police Constable 501 ‘TD' Reginald Jenkins, who thirteen years previously while serving as a C11 motorcyclist had been awarded a British Empire Medal for gallantry during a shootout with bank robbers in South London.

It was an exceptionally short interview, because Jardine told Dickens, ‘ … as you are aware, I was interviewed until about 5 a.m. this morning, after which I was officially cautioned. I do not wish to obstruct this inquiry in any way but in view of the serious nature of the incident and the fact that I was strongly advised by senior officers to obtain legal advice, which I have not yet had the opportunity to do, I must with great regret decline to answer any further questions until I have legal representation. I would like to add that I have a complete answer for any action I took, which I will give at a later date.'