The Fit Up Read online

  Copyright © 2021 A.P. Rogers

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, eventsand incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Matador

  9 Priory Business Park,

  Wistow Road, Kibworth Beauchamp,

  Leicestershire. LE8 0RX

  Tel: 0116 279 2299

  Email: [email protected]

  Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador

  Twitter: @matadorbooks

  ISBN 978 1800466 821

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

  To Eric

  You never doubted my honesty and integrity.

  I’m eternally grateful for your calm help and guidance over the years in seeing the bigger picture.

  Thank you Dad.

  Contents

  1 Commitment

  2 Dangerous liaisons

  3 Suspicious minds

  4 Complacency

  5 Caught and convicted

  6 Knock Knock – Who’s There?

  7 Best Evidence

  8 Second Nature

  9 A Shot In The Dark

  10 Game, set and match!

  11 Skin the cat

  12 The warm-up act

  13 Petty criminal

  14 Hot chilli dip

  15 Trial run

  16 Opening salvos

  17 The failed stunt

  18 Just desserts

  19 Double vision

  20 A rash decision!

  21 Plan B

  22 Further enquiries

  23 Set the trap

  24 Bad to worse

  25 Allegations, allegations

  PREFACE

  The Boomtown Rats didn’t like Mondays, but it didn’t stop Bob demanding you give him your fucking money for his Ethiopian appeal. Sting wanted his MTV while Mark Knopfler looked at those yo-yos. The days of flares, turn-ups, wide lapels, kipper ties and so on are gone, replaced by ‘New Romantic’ styles. For the man about town, sharp suits were the order of the day, parallel trousers, thin lapels, narrow ties and smooth leather Italian-looking shoes, plain and pointed, with a low heel.

  Whilst programmes such as The Sweeney and The Professionals had come to an end, others from American shores did their best to fill the void. Michael Mann’s Miami Vice or later editions of Starsky and Hutch provided an alternative portrayal of the boys in blue. It’s against this backdrop the book recounts the story of the youngest newly promoted Detective Inspector in the country. He finds himself catapulted into a position of responsibility not only for coming to terms with the hangover of police corruption so prevalent in the sixties and seventies, but also seeking to provide pragmatic solutions to rising crime rates, greeted with a casual indifference by some of his junior officers, and his conscientiousness that higher arrest rates would keep the bosses happy, even if his officers might fall off the wagon at times!

  1

  Commitment

  Can I trust you? I said, can… I… trust… you? Because if I can’t then our conversation is over, finished, never raised again. Now, can I trust you?

  Good.

  It follows of course that you need to trust me too. I give you my unconditional loyalty, you have that. But more importantly I need to know that whatever you see, whatever you hear, and crucially, whatever you are involved in, I need to know that you have unconditional loyalty to me and dedication to the success of the team.

  But if you ever give me cause for concern, then, well let’s just leave it at that.

  He sat staring at his office door on the other side of his desk. The two commendations, one for bravery, rescuing a mentally ill man from suicide by leaping off a two-hundred-foot pylon, the other for professionalism in a complex theft enquiry, took pride of place on the wall to his right together with his certificate for Freedom of the City of London. The black frames seemed to give them a sense of gravitas commensurate with their importance to him. Two other gold frames contained his qualifications from Hendon as a Detective Officer and a Scenes of Crime Officer. He allowed himself a wry smile as he thought how he had made it into this chair as the youngest Detective Inspector, aged just twenty-nine, in the country.

  The early sun burned through the two Georgian windows behind him, and he could tell it was going to be another hot day in late May. But the light beige loose-fitting suit wouldn’t be too hot to hold the impending interview, he thought, as he got up to look in his cracked Arsenal mirror hanging beside his closed office door. He adjusted his thin pale blue tie, undoing the top button of his white linen shirt. These were the days of Miami Vice on the television, slip-on shoes and no, definitely no socks. He even appeared at Crown Court and gave his evidence not wearing any socks, completing the Don Johnson look, for a bet. Well, he thought, why not? No different to the other games played in not-guilty fights, like getting a particular word or phrase into evidence. Makes it more entertaining than the usual, being told by defence counsel that you’re a liar or corrupt.

  He mused, how lucky he was that he hadn’t had to go back to uniform to gain promotion, because very few had jumped straight from DS to DI. He was looking at a new recruit for his Central London Pickpocket Squad operating on ‘L’ Division, part of the Transport Police Division.

  I’m interviewing Alan Fish, a young lad recommended by my team as worth giving a go on the squad. Let’s see how he answers my questions. If he gets the message, he’s in. But if not, I’ll kick him into the long grass. Mark my words, this kind of work is sink or swim, and I’m a good swimmer. Let’s see if he is too.

  “So why do you want to join us?” said DI Bob Trebor, taking a mouthful from his green mug proudly displaying a leaping Jaguar. As was his custom he had with him a junior officer to assist in the interview process. He sat at one end of Bob’s desk providing a kind of bridge between the interviewer and interviewee. On this occasion it was Paul Hazel, the officer who had recommended Fish. Opposite Bob sat a young fresh-faced youth somewhere in his early twenties. He knew of Bob’s reputation. He sat nervously concocting his answer as he felt the blood drain from his face, his skin colour changed to that of a cheap white envelope. Fish had obviously pushed the boat out, clean-shaven with long but tidy hair swept back to a mullet hanging over his shoulders like Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust. By contrast his suit was a quite conservative two-piece dark grey number with a white shirt, reminiscent in Bob’s mind of those Jehovah’s Witnesses that knock on your door trying to convert you with their latest promotional pamphlets.

  With some five years as a uniform PC, Alan Fish was of the opinion that he had more to offer the job. He had a reputation among his peers of being a good thief-taker and investigator, although Bob said he hadn’t heard of him.

  Didn’t know him? Actually that’s not true. But I have to maintain this charade of indepen
dent view when looking for my new staff. Only an idiot wouldn’t do his homework, and believe me, I’m no idiot. Failing to plan is planning to fail. And if I want the best squad with the best results I need to know the form of each of them. This one came to the division under what we call ‘a cloud’. He was captured shagging a plonk, aka a WPC, in the back of a Panda car. Well, someone had to go.

  The ‘Pickpocket’ or ‘Dip’ Squad are ‘the Moles’, not out of any John le Carré novel, but because in the main, they worked on the Underground of London. They had an enviable reputation among those officers who wanted to work hard and play hard. It only numbered some dozen or so officers consisting of Bob in charge, two Detective Sergeants, the remainder being Detective Constables and a couple of aids to CID. It sometimes inflated in complement when the need arose, say something like Notting Hill Carnival or of course the lead-up to Christmas, or when the South American ‘dips’ from Chile or Colombia erupt on the landscape of London like an unpleasant rash! Many strived to get on the team. It was a closed shop to those who viewed it selfishly as a good career move; selection for interview with Bob came, many thought, in an unconventional manner. His rationale was that a happy team was a productive and successful team. In other words if each member of the team was content and comfortable working with any other member, a great camaraderie and bond would lead to more success. But you had to be a good thief-taker in the first place. A kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. So to achieve his desire Bob would impress on those working for him that it was they who had the say as to which applicants joined the team. They put forward the nominations as and when vacancies occurred and Bob would interview, but with the proposer present. It worked. It made the squad seem like an exclusive club which many wanted to join. It also produced a degree of envy and vindictive rumour from those who either didn’t make the grade or had realised they were inadequate. Jealousy, as Bob observed, is such a wasted emotion!

  So where had Fish come from to be caught in the nets of the Dip Squad? It seems he had a past that was, shall we say, a little murky, but by the same token, intriguing. The first four years of his illustrious career had been in north London, or to be more precise, Nam. No not Vietnam. To the uninitiated this meant Tottenham, shortened. During that time he had served his probation, passed his probationary period, got confirmed as a PC, got himself married, and everyone thought, settled. Apart from one dark-haired voluptuous woman police officer, aka WPC, the daughter of a local councillor who took exception to one of the job’s rising stars tubbing his daughter. What Fish didn’t know was that she had confessed all to Daddy and pledged her undying love for him. Whereas Fish just thought it was regular exercise! Big mistake, because Daddy, who was in the same Masonic Lodge as Tottenham’s Chief Superintendent, collared him at the ‘Festive Board’, the dinner after the lodge meeting, and was reassured that a trap would be sprung to capture the young lovers.

  The Royal, to the uninitiated, is a huge Mecca ballroom, which could hold something in the region of 1,500 revellers enjoying either live bands or a disco. Regulars at the venue had been the Dave Clark Five until, as folklore has it, their enthusiastic rendition of ‘Bits and Pieces’ saw them being banned for stamping their way through the stage and landing in the basement. The ceiling was festooned with thousands of fairy lights and the obligatory giant mirror ball. All round the dance floor, which one had to step down onto, were cheap-looking gold-painted chairs with red velvet cushions, strategically positioned around mock marble tables. To complete the pseudo affluence of the place were about a dozen or so full-sized plastic palm trees scattered around the edge of the dance floor. What an exotic image! Then, as if to make life convenient for the boys in blue, the building was right opposite Tottenham nick. Only some fifty yards from arrest outside to the charge room inside.

  “Fish, you’re on foot patrol tonight, be outside the Royal at 1am with PC Roberts when they chuck out to prevent public disorder as the ‘little treasures’ go home,” said Sergeant Howard.

  “Yes, skipper,” he responded.

  He thought to himself what splendid irony this was, to be moving on the young bucks as they hung around the exit, just as he had been moved on in earlier years after a night of dancing along with his skinhead mates. Ah, the days of Ben Sherman shirts, Levi ‘Sta-Prest’ trousers, red braces, and brogues.

  “Then team up with WPC Hampton,” – the voluptuous beauty – “after your grub at 3am in Panda One.”

  Play time, he thought, as he confirmed the instruction with his sergeant. She looked across at her lover, and shyly winked at him, without notice of the others on the relief.

  “Right then, time is ten to ten, quick cuppa then out you go into the night,” said Sergeant Howard as he dismissed the eleven officers of the night duty shift for Tottenham sub-division.

  PC Roberts, or Harry, is what in the trade would be called an ‘old sweat’. He had about twenty years’ service, he’d worked in the West End, he’d done various attachments to vice and crime squads, was well-rounded, and had, some say, a jaundiced attitude to life, particularly those members of the public who had incurred his wrath. He was about forty-five years old, married, two kids in their teens, and lived in a rural area north of Tottenham called ‘Coppers Canyon’ because so many had found they liked a bit of country life, otherwise known as Cheshunt. Harry was just under six foot with ginger curly hair and a ruddy complexion to his face which gave him an appearance of being constantly angry or out of breath when in reality he had a very relaxed and happy disposition. He was a good journeyman copper, who had no interest in promotion, was robust in his attitude towards young officers senior in rank to him, called a spade a spade, not a shovel.

  You get the picture.

  At 11.15pm, Roberts, in Panda Two, took a call on the radio to a disturbance at The Royal. He confirmed his attendance as he turned into Chestnut Road to do one circuit of Tottenham’s one-way system. Alan amused himself blowing rings into the chilly night air as he walked east along Broad Lanes, having heard Harry’s confirmation. In a matter of seconds Harry pulled up alongside him.

  “Come on, get in, sounds like there might be a body for you on this one at the Royal.”

  Fish, ever keen to learn and gain experience from a seasoned and respected copper like Harry, happily jumped into the passenger seat. They parked in the service road and sauntered in, passing through the brass-handled doors, acknowledging the bouncers as they were escorted to the manager’s office on the first floor. Harry led the charge and pushed open the door, which had been ajar, and saw the manager sat behind a mock Georgian desk, of the kind you see in that famous black and white photograph of JFK, with his kid playing underneath. Only this time there was no kid – just, to Harry’s mind, a curious bloke dressed head to foot in women’s clothing, complete with blonde wig, and wearing black tights under a short tartan mini skirt, sat uncomfortably opposite him. Was this some kind of reverential homage to The Bay City Rollers who had recently reformed, probably because they’d run out of money, and were due to play The Royal the following week? In any event he’s not right, thought Roberts as he looked to the manager for some insight into why he had been called.

  Apparently, the transvestite, something of a public rarity, had been cruising around the population of the dance floor looking for a one-night stand, after failing in pulling a punter in the High Road. He had been spotted by one of the floor walker bouncers who, not knowing whether they should thump him or eject him, went for the safe option of taking him to the manager’s office. That way they didn’t have to make a decision. The manager briefly went over why a man dressed in women’s clothing wasn’t acceptable in his dance hall. Fish agreed in his mind but couldn’t figure out what kind of offence he’d committed.

  With a reassuring air, Harry said, “You’re nicked, come with me.” Without a sound they left the dance hall to a chorus of wolf whistles from the bouncers. He put him in the back of the Panda car for a short ride, round
the block, back to the nick, while Al, figuring their latest acquisition wasn’t going to cut up rough, wandered across to the nick to await their arrival.

  “Sit there,” said Harry as he entered the charge room, indicating to his prisoner to occupy the long bench against the wall. Roberts had a brief word with Sergeant Howard, the prisoner was put in cell number three, and having agreed it would be a good arrest for Alan to be involved in, Harry went off to find Fish.

  Harry entered the reserve room and said, “Well, Al, there you are, he’s banged up, we’ve just to sort out the script. Do you know what you’ve got?”

  Ordinarily, Judges’ Rules allows for officers to confer together and commit to evidence their joint recollection of events and what has been said. But in this situation the ‘script’ means the officers get together to agree what the evidence is going to be. When, for Harry, the arrested person deserves it, then that’s fair enough. In the case of this one, being a social worker, for him, meant he did deserve it. As far as Harry was concerned, you can’t have men who are obviously in a position of trust, working with kids, walking around in women’s clothing. His view was that he was a liability, and he couldn’t have a liability. So sod him, he deserves what he gets.

  “You’ll be witness to me, cos it has to be an officer in uniform to see the offence and it’s got to be corroborated.”

  “Yeah,” said Al, mentally licking his lips with interested excitement. “What’s it about then?”

  Harry filled him in.

  “Can you believe it, I’ve found out he’s a social worker dealing with kids in care. So basically in law he’s importuning for an immoral purpose. Heard of it?”

  Al shook his head, so Roberts then outlined the plot.