Substantial Threat (33 page)

One of Lancashire Constabulary's objectives for the year was to make roads safer. This meant that there were often traffic patrols operating radar speed traps on roads where speeding had been the cause of accidents, or where it caused a danger to the public. Parts of the A59 north of Ormskirk are such a problem, particularly on the north side of a small town called Burscough. Here the A59 is often subject to traffic-officer attention, especially in the 30 mph limit as the road winds out of the north end of town. On that day, two traffic cops had set up a speed trap, one on the radar, one stopping the offenders, and were keeping themselves very busy with cars coming into Buscough from the direction of Preston. Easy pickings and great fun.

Travelling south down the A59 that morning was a PC from Ormskirk who had been to headquarters clothing stores for some new uniform. He had been on duty since seven and was returning to Ormskirk, ready for a very big, fat-boy's breakfast. He knew that the traffic cops had set up a radar north of Burscough and he slowed right down as he sailed into the 30 mph zone, fully aware that the gutter rats would have no qualms in booking him, even though he was on duty and driving a police van. No love lost there.

This combination of police on the A59 at that time of day was not particularly unusual. As the officer drove past the tripod-mounted radar at 29 mph, he waved at the traffic cop, then hid his one-fingered salute. Up ahead he could see the motorcycle cop standing next to his machine, wearing his hi-viz jacket, ready to pull in wrongdoers. He accelerated a little.

All these officers received Henry Christie's coolly transmitted circulation at exactly the same time, and their reactions were similar because they realized that this motorbike could well be en route to them and, as motorcycles tend to go like the proverbial shit off a shovel, it might be there within seconds.

Miller clung to Crazy as he took the machine underneath them up to speeds which were, like his nickname, crazy. The road surface was generally smooth and excellent. If no other traffic had been about, it would have been a fantastic ride as the bike swept round long corners and flew down straights. Unfortunately, other traffic did impede progress a little, but not too much. Crazy was good. He looked well ahead, made sound decisions, veered round and in between vehicles and made superb time.

They were on the southern outskirts of Burscough within minutes. Crazy throttled back a little and disregarded the red of the traffic lights just outside the town, weaving dangerously between crossing traffic and hitting the hump-back bridge just before the small town centre at 90 mph.

The bike left the road at the crest of the hill, thumped down on its rear wheel, swerved madly, but Crazy held it upright and braked down to about 50 mph for the town centre, then, once he had negotiated the pelican crossing and the mini-roundabout without knocking anyone over, he opened the throttle again up the hill over the railway line.

Miller could not help but laugh. The wind in his face and hair, the roller-coaster ride he was having was fantastic. The feeling was unbelievable, that combination of speed, danger and blood-letting.

Then he heard Crazy scream an obscenity.

The A59 is not a wide road as it snakes out of Burscough, so it was very easy to place the police van and the traffic cop's plain car at an angle and effectively block the road completely. There were no footpaths on either side, with nowhere for vehicles to go, unless they chose to go off-road into the recently ploughed fields on either side.

The motorcycle cop stood astride his powerful BMW. The other two officers stood in the road, stopping traffic and working their way on foot down the short line of stationary cars and puzzled drivers, towards Burscough, anticipating the arrival of the pursued bike.

It came speeding into view.

Henry was speaking calmly into the radio, telling the three cops up ahead to take extreme care and not to put their lives or others' lives in jeopardy. The men on the bike were dangerous in the extreme.

They acknowledged his warning.

Crazy braked hard and almost launched himself and Miller over the handlebars as the speed of the bike reduced from eighty to zero within a fraction of a second. He stopped about fifty metres away from the two cops on foot, who started to approach hesitantly.

Miller had his pistol in his waistband. He produced it and rested it on Crazy's shoulder to take aim at the officers. They dived for cover behind a car and the police motorcyclist cowered down, hoping his machine would offer protection. Miller did not fire. He patted Crazy on the back and indicated for him to about-face.

Crazy revved the engine, released the clutch, spun the bike on the spot and headed back towards Burscough.

Behind him the two officers on foot raised their heads slowly from their cover and spoke on their radios. The one on the motorcycle set off in pursuit.

‘Coming this way,' the ARV constable said to Henry. He racked his MP5 so it was ready. He was a happy man. He had been trained for this sort of thing and was looking forward to putting it into practice.

Henry reached the set of lights that Crazy had ignored. Three cars had been involved in a minor bump, blocking part of the road. Henry could not see any injuries, so he sneaked past and speeded up towards the town, wondering if he was actually going to come face to face with the motorcycle.

He hoped so. He had already decided that, given half a chance, he was going to ram the bastard off the road and fuck the consequences.

‘Which way?' Crazy shouted over his shoulder, the wind taking his voice away with it.

‘Back into town,' Miller screamed into his ear. ‘Left at the roundabout towards the motorway down the back roads.'

Crazy acknowledged these directions with a thumbs up.

He was approaching the railway bridge at 70 mph.

Henry reached the mini-roundabout as the motorbike came into view on the crest of the railway bridge just ahead of him. He screeched to a halt. The bike kept coming.

‘You might want to close your eyes, cos I'm going to ram him and I don't want any witnesses,' Henry said to the armed constable.

‘You have my permission to go for it, sir.'

Henry pressed the accelerator, brought up the clutch with a dithering foot, and held on to the handbrake as he built up the revs. He thought how much he had actually come to like the Vectra. It had been a good workhorse. Now it was going to go to the knacker's yard.

Crazy saw the Vectra. So did Miller. They recognized it as the one Henry Christie was driving. Both knew he would go for them because he had to. Otherwise he was going to lose them.

Crazy powered the bike down the short hill, went wide across to the wrong side of the road to get into the best position to cut left at the roundabout. He leaned over at such a sharp angle that his knee was almost touching the road surface, and only the edges of his tyres were in contact with the tarmac. The bike twitched. Crazy corrected it expertly, then its back end twitched again; he corrected it instantaneously.

He saw the Vectra leap forwards.

In his mind Henry had prepared himself for the ram. He was going to go for it. He brought the clutch up, dropped the handbrake, virtually stood on the accelerator.

And probably for the first time since he was seventeen, he stalled a car.

The Vectra lurched as though it was going to be sick, then died.

Crazy was ready for the impact, but it did not come. He laughed out loud when he saw what had happened, then screwed back the throttle to take him out of the corner, across the edge of the roundabout. His rear end twitched, but this time he could not control it. As his rear tyre touched a minute patch of diesel spilt on the road, the wheel whipped away. Crazy fought for control. He could not pull it back and the bike went down in a shower of sparks and slid at a speed of about 60 mph across the road and under the front end of the Vectra.

Henry saw the bike go. He gripped his steering wheel, ducked his head uselessly, lifted his knees up and braced himself for the impact. It all happened within a milli-second, yet he saw it all in wonderful, coloured, sharp detail. The sparks were spectacular, like a Roman candle burning. The rear passenger took off in flight from the pillion and zoomed like a missile out of Henry's view. The rider held on tight to his machine, fighting desperately with it all the way until the moment of impact when it collided with the front of the Vectra with a crash so loud and distorted that Henry would never forget it.

The bonnet crumpled up like a blanket and the front of the car lifted as though on a jack.

Then it was over.

‘You okay?' he asked the ARV officer.

‘Never better.'

Henry got out on shaky legs and looked at the motorbike and rider, both trapped tightly underneath his car. The rider was still moving, but Henry saw that his left leg was sticking out at a hideous angle below the knee and shards of bone had pierced his leather trousers. Then the rider was still.

‘Boss!' the armed officer called to Henry.

Henry looked across the twisted bonnet of his car. The pillion passenger had rolled across the pavement and slammed up against a wall. He was now, miraculously, on his feet, staggering, gun in his right hand, towards the ARV officer who had his MP5 in a firing position. The passenger was covered in blood. His left arm hung loosely at his side and his face seemed horribly deformed. He was trying to raise the pistol and fire it.

The armed officer was getting very tense, very close to shooting this man down. Henry could see the tension in the constable's shoulders.

‘Armed police,' he shouted. ‘Drop your weapon, drop it now!'

The man still came towards him.

‘Armed police,' he said again. ‘Drop your weapon or I will fire.'

With what looked to be an amazing feat of strength, the injured man raised his gun, but as he did so he lost his balance, toppled over backwards and discharged the gun once into the air.

I
t was a very tired, harassed and angry Henry Christie who, at 6 a.m. two days later, took part in the briefing of a full firearms team and a full squad of hefty support unit officers at Fleetwood police station.

Prior to this Henry had faced many hours of relentless scrutiny following his, allegedly, very ill-judged decision to move a witness who was under a substantial threat without putting in place a pre-planned firearms operation. It had been a harrowing time for him as his decision-making was continually criticized as being poor and also because he received no support whatever from Bernie Fleming. Henry would not have minded so much, but he was, misguidedly it transpired, trying to protect Fleming from the fall-out. But Fleming seemed to have developed a case of memory loss and, oddly, could not recall receiving any phone call from Henry prior to the incident taking place.

All anyone could see was the result. The so-called protected witness was currently still in intensive care and unlikely to pull through; an injured ARV officer who would be okay was already talking about suing the force; and there were two dead offenders. Added to that DS Rik Dean off sick with stress, also planning to sue the county.

Only one good thing had happened to Henry over the preceding forty-eight hours. He had received the results of the DNA test taken from Marty Cragg's dead body which matched the DNA from one of the semen traces found inside the body of the dead prostitute. Henry pulled together a few disparate pieces of information such as Marty's involvement with bringing asylum-seekers into the country, some for the purposes of prostitution; Marty's association with Jack Burrows, which gave him access to the dead girl's grubby flat; his penchant for beating up women, his sperm inside her, of course, and the fact that Marty had a scald mark on his arm, which Henry had noticed while inspecting his body before sliding it into the mortuary fridge. At the time Henry had not thought anything about the scald, but it tied in with the scald mark on the girl's body nicely. Henry believed he probably had enough there to get a conviction if Marty had still been alive. When he got the chance, he would put pen to paper and write off the murder.

It still troubled him deeply that the girl, Julie from Albania, remained unidentified.

He felt a journey to Albania coming on. He knew the police out there were keen to work alongside other European forces, and maybe he could use them to help find her family. If, indeed, she did come from Albania.

So that was the only good thing.

And now he was going for Ray Cragg, although he did not know how much good would come from sweating him in interview. Ray was a seasoned criminal and would say nothing and probably get away with everything, particularly if Jack Burrows died, which was a distinct possibility. An interview was about all Henry had. Ray was so forensically aware it was frightening. If only he had made a mistake somewhere along the line.

Henry looked at the assembled faces of the firearms and support-unit teams. He thought they looked pretty mean and would not like them coming through his door at any time of day.

Next to him was Jane Roscoe who was co-running the operation. She had taken the bulk of the briefing with Henry chipping in where appropriate. He had watched her talk and had been impressed.

The briefing was over at 6.30 a.m. Everyone was then given the chance to have a quick brew before turning out to be ready and in position to hit Ray Cragg's house at seven on the dot. Henry knew Ray was in because he'd had a surveillance team tracking his movements for the last thirty-six hours.

Henry and Roscoe had a cup of tea each, but said little to each other. He finished first and with relief said, ‘Time to go.'

They left the back door of the station together and were approached by a man bearing a large bouquet of flowers. Henry held back the urge to say, ‘For me?'

The man went up to Jane.

‘Tom!' she said, taken aback. ‘What are you doing here?'

‘I needed to see you, needed to sort things out with you.'