Lying Ways, page 12
Tom was taken aback, not only by the familiar and casual way the governor approached the question, but also by Liam’s clear collusion. It would appear that this was how they spoke to one another.
‘I’m not sure what to think of them if I’m honest, sir. I would have thought that my personal opinion of prisoners is irrelevant and unhelpful,’ Tom said.
The governor nodded. ‘Right you are. Sensible chap. We do tend to get a little institutionalised in here. Day one for you, Tom. We’ve probably been inside these walls too long, which is why it’s good to have a fresh pair of eyes. They’re all scum in the end.’
There was a brief silence that Tom thought he should fill, but he didn’t know what to say. He looked at Liam, who sat back in his chair with his legs crossed and arms behind his head. He was very comfortable around the governor.
‘Have you both worked together for a long time?’ Tom asked.
‘Too long!’ Liam said, and the governor laughed. Again, the lack of appropriate professional boundaries took Tom by surprise. In the army, overfamiliarity preceded presumption and led to disrespect. Rank was a necessary check on the structure of everything they did. If there were chinks in the hierarchy inside Highton, Tom wondered what else was sloppy about how things were run there. ‘Was Mr Burton in good spirits? His horse came in yesterday. That means I owe him fifty quid. Can you believe it?’ The governor slapped the desk in front of him and his tea cup rattled.
‘Jesus, do you ever learn?’ said Liam.
Tom looked between them. Triggers were beginning to light up in his head. He heard Johnny’s words.
‘Don’t worry, Tom, you’ll get used to it,’ the governor said, bringing him back to the moment. ‘Think of it like keeping prisoners of war in check, there are always those who you need to keep onside. Rickie Burton is our Saddam Hussein. He keeps order in a small country. In return we allow him certain privileges.’
‘What kind of privileges, sir?’ Tom asked tentatively.
Liam laughed and the governor smiled.
‘All men need certain things to thrive, Tom. They need to feel as though their place in the world is important, valued and useful. You’ll get to know Rickie in your own time. Don’t let his size put you off, he’s actually a very decent chap. He’s resourceful and clever, and I like that. He plays a game, and it’s my game. In return I generously allow him to continue the pursuits that make him feel as though he is all of those things I just mentioned. Now, to me, he’s none of them, but he thinks he is, and that’s why it works.’
‘What if you give up your place in the world because you committed a crime?’ Tom asked.
‘Precisely!’ the governor said. ‘We get sent all the ones who can’t play on the outside, so they come and play in here, and it’s our job to make sure they stick to the rules.’
‘The rules?’
‘My rules. Liam will fill you in, there’s no rush. This ship keeps afloat because there is compromise on my terms. Sometimes, it’s impossible to stick to certain protocols laid down by politicians in London, who have no idea how things work. Sometimes, you have to come up with better solutions. All I’m saying is that to get the best out of the cons, you need to make them think you’re being fair. But that comes at a price.’
‘They pay for privilege?’ Tom asked. The question was out of his mouth before he could help himself. What worried him most about his outburst, though, wasn’t so much what he’d just heard, it was that they’d somehow thought it timely to tell him on the first day of his job. Was this some kind of crazy recruitment ritual? His question wasn’t answered.
Chapter 20
Kelly left her car and walked over to Craig. It had been a while since they’d met face to face and they shook hands warmly. Craig was one of those people who never looked stressed. There were men she came across in the force who wore their work on their faces, but that didn’t apply to Craig. To look at him he could have been a banker, or a grocery store owner. You never knew what he was thinking – unless you knew him as well as Kelly did.
Kelly wore a trouser suit and low heels. Normally, she’d be more casual in the office, but a prison visit necessitated something more formal. She’d spoken to the prison police liaison officer over the phone and tried to sweet-talk him. She knew they had no jurisdiction whatsoever on the governor’s turf. This was his prison, and she needed his permission to conduct interviews and searches. Legally, she wasn’t allowed to enter a cell, but that’s what she wanted to do, because that was the only thing that would allow her to rule in or out whether a serving con had had anything to do with the murder of Jack Bell and Dean Kirby. A cell search was a delicate affair, she knew that, but that’s where cons kept their contraband, such as USBs and mobile phones.
‘You’re looking tanned,’ she said to Craig. ‘Been somewhere nice?’
‘Italy,’ Craig replied. He wore a grey suit and adjusted his neck badge on the end of his lanyard. A gust of wind took her hair across her face and she straightened it. Her heels clicked on the tarmac and they walked towards the prison gate.
‘Whereabouts? I’ve always wanted to go,’ Kelly asked.
‘Tuscany. We stayed on an old farm and drove into Florence, Siena and Pisa. It was pretty impressive, though very hot,’ he said.
‘With the boys?’ she asked.
‘Only the younger two.’
Craig was divorced and gave the impression to anyone who asked that he wasn’t interested in a relationship. He was an attractive man and kind. He cared. In that sense he was old-fashioned. A couple of years ago, before Johnny, he’d have been the type of man she’d have liked to get to know, which was funny, because her taste in men had changed so much since moving back from London. There, she’d been attracted to thrusting workaholics who worked murder squads for sixty hours a week. It was a million miles away from Johnny, who was a proper grown-up. Like Craig.
They chatted about the case.
‘I went to see Jack Bell’s daughter who lives in Ulverston,’ he said. Kelly waited. They were nearly at the outer security door. The guard opened his hatch, ready to check their ID.
‘She was unmoved by her father’s death. It was quite depressing really. She didn’t say much about what soured their relationship, apart from they were sick and tired of bailing him out when he had no money. She got her sister on the phone when I was there, the one who lives in Workington. So that’ll save you a job. She said, “Dad’s dead,” in the coldest voice and put me on speaker. It was odd.’
‘Families,’ Kelly said. ‘Did they know anything about him prior to his death? Did he contact them when he was released?’
‘No. They’d had no contact for the best part of two decades.’
‘That’s devastating. Do you think we need to find out more? What about the niece? Did she elaborate on their relationship? If he was such a pain in the arse, why did she bother with him?’
‘Every family has its own unique and special relationships, don’t you find?’ he asked. It was true, they were all dysfunctional in some way.
‘Didn’t she have plans to see him upon his release?’ Kelly asked. If they were so close, then one would expect her to be excited for the date at least.
‘Yes she did, this week.’
The guard took their names and found them on the list of visitors expected for the day. He passed them their visitor badges, which they clipped to their police tags, and he pressed a button to open the outer metal door. They pushed it and went inside, where they had to walk through a body scanner and hand over their belongings, except their lanyards. They were greeted by another guard who said he was to escort them straight to the governor’s office; the governor was expecting them. The place smelled of cigarette smoke and the sweet aroma of weed. Kelly raised her eyebrows at Craig.
‘Jesus, I hope they don’t test my clothes when we get back to the office.’ She winked. Random drugs tests were common in the police force, just like they were in the army.
‘It’s completely out of control,’ Craig said. ‘We had a case in Barrow recently, and when the guy was found guilty and sent down, he joked that he’d be better off inside because he could get drugs more readily than he could on the outside. I don’t know what they’re supposed to do. It gets smuggled in inside bodies, clothes, presents, babies and God knows what,’ he said.
‘Maybe it’s something we don’t bring up with Governor Taylor?’ she said.
‘I know you’d love to,’ he said.
She smiled. He was right. She could hardly help herself poking her nose inside anything that raised her hackles. Her problem wasn’t that drugs were common inside prison, but that no one seemed to care.
Prisons depressed her. It wasn’t too difficult to see why; after all, they were full of violent, frustrated criminals. However, it was also the way they were run that got Kelly’s back up. The police caught the criminals and spent thousands of hours putting together a case. Then the lawyers swooped like vultures, agreeing secret deals in wine bars, dismissing half their work. Then the judges waved their gavels from their lofty thrones and dished out sentences that were laughed at and ridiculed by anyone who knew anything about rehabilitation or effective incarceration. The governor, the man she was about to meet, was the next link in the chain: it was up to him how the prisoner lived from day to day. Most of them did their best, and then gave up. Prisoners being dependent on drugs, as well as suffering from untreated mental health issues, was wrong, plain and simple. The whole penal system was fucked. The notion that prisoners somehow had a chance of staying clean was a joke. Gangs ruled inside these walls, just like they did on the outside. What Kelly wanted to know was: which ones were Jack Bell and Dean Kirby affiliated with inside? Any questions she had about her two victims depended upon who they associated with on the inside, and Jeanie Clark had already given her an idea.
They were escorted through a series of doors and corridors, all caged in reinforced steel, and clunky when opened. Each bang of metal on metal jarred Kelly. The prison officers they saw were polite and respectful. They went up some stairs and were asked to wait in an area with a few chairs laid out. The place was generally dismal.
From a distance, they heard the occasional shouting and banging coming from the wings. The governor’s office was self-contained inside the prison building. The wings were housed in a separate structure, joined by a series of walkways. There was something sinister about being so close to so many serious criminals; it chilled Kelly’s soul. The last time she’d been inside such a place was Broadmoor, when she’d visited the Teacher, one of the most appalling criminals in recent history. Some people, like the Teacher, took well to incarceration, they were born for it. It was as if they worked all their lives to get there, to a place of safety and nurture, where they had no responsibility whatsoever, apart from to follow rules. Something clearly happened, Kelly knew, to human beings in their development, which divided the species into two streams. One half ended up in places like this, or Broadmoor for the true nutters. Kelly had never believed that the Teacher was crazy, but apparently the jury at the trial thought differently. It meant that rather than face the brutality of a place like this, the Teacher got special treatment at a glorified hospital. But there wasn’t much Kelly could do about that – her job was to catch bastards, not judge them. That was the job of those in the white wigs.
They didn’t sit down in the small waiting area. Kelly was too fidgety and Craig too curious. He read the flyers and pamphlets on smoking, sexual harassment in the workplace and venereal disease, which were pinned to a noticeboard outside the governor’s office. They looked as though they’d been there ten years. The door opened and a man held out his hand. He went to Craig first. In Kelly’s experience most men did the same, overlooking the outstretched hand of a woman in order to shake one belonging to another male.
‘Brian Taylor,’ he boomed.
Dick swinger, thought Kelly.
‘Detective Inspector Craig Lockwood. This is Detective Inspector Kelly Porter, she’s the senior investigating officer running the case,’ Craig said. Brian Taylor turned to her, almost apologetic, but not quite, and held out his hand.
‘Detective,’ he said. She felt a sense of unease as his eyes wandered down to her blouse and back to her eyes. He was a middle-aged man who looked like a prime heart attack candidate, and he smelled of alcohol. His pot-belly made his shirt sit awkwardly, and he had dark circles under his eyes. But he attempted a warm, if wary, smile.
‘Please come in. Can I get you a drink? Hot or cold?’ he asked. Craig said he’d love a coffee and Kelly asked for water. They sat down in the chairs offered and Brian Taylor went behind his desk. There was a large window behind him and Kelly could hear the bounce of a ball, and shouting. It must be the exercise yard below.
‘So, what a damn way to go, eh? We were sorry to hear the news. Both Bell and Kirby were good inmates. They were exemplary in fact. They shouldn’t have really been here, a Cat B or C would have done them fine.’
‘That’s good to know,’ Kelly said. ‘So they didn’t cause any trouble? They kept themselves out of fights and rivalries?’
‘I wouldn’t go that far. All our inmates have run-ins, but as far as general behaviour, yes. They were liked by the staff too.’
‘Yes, we noted the close relationship between Jack Bell and your officer Jeanie Clark. Is that usual?’
‘It’s only a problem if it’s inappropriate,’ Brian said. Kelly noticed that he seemed uncomfortable at the notion.
‘And it wasn’t?’ Kelly asked.
Brian looked at Craig, who said nothing.
‘No, of course not. Jeanie is known for looking after her lads. I mean, she talks to them, mothers them a bit, you know? They like her. She makes things run smoothly, she’s a calming influence on the inmates,’ Brian said. ‘In here, this is their home, and at the end of the day, my officers want no trouble, and to go home to their families unhurt.’
‘Right,’ Kelly said. ‘But is it normal for her to meet them on the outside after release?’
Brian looked puzzled. ‘Are you telling me that she met Jack Bell and Dean Kirby after their release?’
‘I’m telling you that she had arranged to meet Jack Bell and that it was she who reported him missing, which is how we identified him and connected him to Dean Kirby, and Highton,’ Kelly said. She flicked through her notepad. ‘Jeanie told us that Dean and Jack were on the same wing, A wing. We’d like to speak to some of the men on that wing please. We have plenty of time so can fit in around their working day.’ Kelly asked.
She waited. She found Brian Taylor too buoyant and chummy. A man in his position should be a little distracted, stressed, a tad gloomy even. Two of his ex-inmates had been brutally murdered, and one of his officers had planned to see one of them out of hours. Add to that all the pressures of running a Category A prison, and she couldn’t help but reach the conclusion that he was either not suitable for the job, or hiding something. Or both.
He picked up the phone and dialled an extension number. ‘Liam, I’ve got local police detectives here, they’re investigating Bell and Kirby’s deaths. They want to conduct some interviews with A wing inmates.’ He paused. ‘Today.’ Another pause. ‘Can you arrange it?’ He hung up.
‘That was the custodial manager of A wing, where Jack and Dean were held until they were released,’ Brian said. ‘I’ll warn you, my prisoners don’t take well to surprise police visits, so get what you need and don’t stir up a hornet’s nest,’ he said.
‘I appreciate the delicacy of the situation, and I’m very grateful for your permission. I came myself because the nature of the crimes is of the gravest level,’ Kelly said. ‘I’ll go easy. I don’t want to be responsible for any trouble after we’ve left.’
Brian nodded. ‘How did it happen?’ he asked.
Kelly saw a flicker of humanity and realised that Brian Taylor had probably seen some of the nastiest wounds inflicted on human bodies. Like the police, she knew that prison officers cauterised their emotions over such things.
‘We’re piecing it together. You’ll appreciate that I can’t share details at the moment,’ she said. Brian looked at Craig again and it needled her. ‘Is there an old-timer on A wing who runs things?’ she asked. Brian looked at her. She waited. Still Craig said nothing.
‘Jack Bell would have been that man,’ Brian said finally.
‘Really?’ Kelly said. ‘That’s not the impression I got from Jeanie Clark,’ she said.
‘Oh?’ Brian asked. ‘I’m assuming, of course, that the popular ones have more privileges and the senior ones are respected. You’ll have to speak to the custodial manager about that.’
Kelly figured that assumption was the last thing a governor of a Category A prison would rely upon, but let it pass.
‘Right. And how about communication between prisoners and the outside? I’m figuring the trade in mobile phone hardware is as buoyant as ever,’ she said.
‘The discovery of contraband is dealt with sternly, detective. No one wants two weeks in the block,’ he said. The block was another name for solitary confinement, and it was a living hell. Being locked up in a dark cell in the bowels of the prison for twenty-four hours a day, with no fresh air or exercise, and maybe a radio for company for good behaviour, if you had batteries, was pure torture.
‘When was the last search carried out for mobile phones?’ she asked.
‘I’ll have to consult with my custodial managers, but I can assure you that cell searches are a regular and normal occurrence here at Highton.’
‘Glad to hear it. And what sort of contraband do you usually find? How much does a mobile phone sell for in here, for example?’ she asked.
‘There’s no trade allowed inside the prison, that’s strictly against the rules,’ he said. She could see that he was becoming flushed under his collar.
‘Of course it is,’ she said. ‘Perhaps you could take advice from your police liaison officer as to whether a cell search, in the light of the current turn of events, would be something you’d consider.’
‘I’m not sure what to think of them if I’m honest, sir. I would have thought that my personal opinion of prisoners is irrelevant and unhelpful,’ Tom said.
The governor nodded. ‘Right you are. Sensible chap. We do tend to get a little institutionalised in here. Day one for you, Tom. We’ve probably been inside these walls too long, which is why it’s good to have a fresh pair of eyes. They’re all scum in the end.’
There was a brief silence that Tom thought he should fill, but he didn’t know what to say. He looked at Liam, who sat back in his chair with his legs crossed and arms behind his head. He was very comfortable around the governor.
‘Have you both worked together for a long time?’ Tom asked.
‘Too long!’ Liam said, and the governor laughed. Again, the lack of appropriate professional boundaries took Tom by surprise. In the army, overfamiliarity preceded presumption and led to disrespect. Rank was a necessary check on the structure of everything they did. If there were chinks in the hierarchy inside Highton, Tom wondered what else was sloppy about how things were run there. ‘Was Mr Burton in good spirits? His horse came in yesterday. That means I owe him fifty quid. Can you believe it?’ The governor slapped the desk in front of him and his tea cup rattled.
‘Jesus, do you ever learn?’ said Liam.
Tom looked between them. Triggers were beginning to light up in his head. He heard Johnny’s words.
‘Don’t worry, Tom, you’ll get used to it,’ the governor said, bringing him back to the moment. ‘Think of it like keeping prisoners of war in check, there are always those who you need to keep onside. Rickie Burton is our Saddam Hussein. He keeps order in a small country. In return we allow him certain privileges.’
‘What kind of privileges, sir?’ Tom asked tentatively.
Liam laughed and the governor smiled.
‘All men need certain things to thrive, Tom. They need to feel as though their place in the world is important, valued and useful. You’ll get to know Rickie in your own time. Don’t let his size put you off, he’s actually a very decent chap. He’s resourceful and clever, and I like that. He plays a game, and it’s my game. In return I generously allow him to continue the pursuits that make him feel as though he is all of those things I just mentioned. Now, to me, he’s none of them, but he thinks he is, and that’s why it works.’
‘What if you give up your place in the world because you committed a crime?’ Tom asked.
‘Precisely!’ the governor said. ‘We get sent all the ones who can’t play on the outside, so they come and play in here, and it’s our job to make sure they stick to the rules.’
‘The rules?’
‘My rules. Liam will fill you in, there’s no rush. This ship keeps afloat because there is compromise on my terms. Sometimes, it’s impossible to stick to certain protocols laid down by politicians in London, who have no idea how things work. Sometimes, you have to come up with better solutions. All I’m saying is that to get the best out of the cons, you need to make them think you’re being fair. But that comes at a price.’
‘They pay for privilege?’ Tom asked. The question was out of his mouth before he could help himself. What worried him most about his outburst, though, wasn’t so much what he’d just heard, it was that they’d somehow thought it timely to tell him on the first day of his job. Was this some kind of crazy recruitment ritual? His question wasn’t answered.
Chapter 20
Kelly left her car and walked over to Craig. It had been a while since they’d met face to face and they shook hands warmly. Craig was one of those people who never looked stressed. There were men she came across in the force who wore their work on their faces, but that didn’t apply to Craig. To look at him he could have been a banker, or a grocery store owner. You never knew what he was thinking – unless you knew him as well as Kelly did.
Kelly wore a trouser suit and low heels. Normally, she’d be more casual in the office, but a prison visit necessitated something more formal. She’d spoken to the prison police liaison officer over the phone and tried to sweet-talk him. She knew they had no jurisdiction whatsoever on the governor’s turf. This was his prison, and she needed his permission to conduct interviews and searches. Legally, she wasn’t allowed to enter a cell, but that’s what she wanted to do, because that was the only thing that would allow her to rule in or out whether a serving con had had anything to do with the murder of Jack Bell and Dean Kirby. A cell search was a delicate affair, she knew that, but that’s where cons kept their contraband, such as USBs and mobile phones.
‘You’re looking tanned,’ she said to Craig. ‘Been somewhere nice?’
‘Italy,’ Craig replied. He wore a grey suit and adjusted his neck badge on the end of his lanyard. A gust of wind took her hair across her face and she straightened it. Her heels clicked on the tarmac and they walked towards the prison gate.
‘Whereabouts? I’ve always wanted to go,’ Kelly asked.
‘Tuscany. We stayed on an old farm and drove into Florence, Siena and Pisa. It was pretty impressive, though very hot,’ he said.
‘With the boys?’ she asked.
‘Only the younger two.’
Craig was divorced and gave the impression to anyone who asked that he wasn’t interested in a relationship. He was an attractive man and kind. He cared. In that sense he was old-fashioned. A couple of years ago, before Johnny, he’d have been the type of man she’d have liked to get to know, which was funny, because her taste in men had changed so much since moving back from London. There, she’d been attracted to thrusting workaholics who worked murder squads for sixty hours a week. It was a million miles away from Johnny, who was a proper grown-up. Like Craig.
They chatted about the case.
‘I went to see Jack Bell’s daughter who lives in Ulverston,’ he said. Kelly waited. They were nearly at the outer security door. The guard opened his hatch, ready to check their ID.
‘She was unmoved by her father’s death. It was quite depressing really. She didn’t say much about what soured their relationship, apart from they were sick and tired of bailing him out when he had no money. She got her sister on the phone when I was there, the one who lives in Workington. So that’ll save you a job. She said, “Dad’s dead,” in the coldest voice and put me on speaker. It was odd.’
‘Families,’ Kelly said. ‘Did they know anything about him prior to his death? Did he contact them when he was released?’
‘No. They’d had no contact for the best part of two decades.’
‘That’s devastating. Do you think we need to find out more? What about the niece? Did she elaborate on their relationship? If he was such a pain in the arse, why did she bother with him?’
‘Every family has its own unique and special relationships, don’t you find?’ he asked. It was true, they were all dysfunctional in some way.
‘Didn’t she have plans to see him upon his release?’ Kelly asked. If they were so close, then one would expect her to be excited for the date at least.
‘Yes she did, this week.’
The guard took their names and found them on the list of visitors expected for the day. He passed them their visitor badges, which they clipped to their police tags, and he pressed a button to open the outer metal door. They pushed it and went inside, where they had to walk through a body scanner and hand over their belongings, except their lanyards. They were greeted by another guard who said he was to escort them straight to the governor’s office; the governor was expecting them. The place smelled of cigarette smoke and the sweet aroma of weed. Kelly raised her eyebrows at Craig.
‘Jesus, I hope they don’t test my clothes when we get back to the office.’ She winked. Random drugs tests were common in the police force, just like they were in the army.
‘It’s completely out of control,’ Craig said. ‘We had a case in Barrow recently, and when the guy was found guilty and sent down, he joked that he’d be better off inside because he could get drugs more readily than he could on the outside. I don’t know what they’re supposed to do. It gets smuggled in inside bodies, clothes, presents, babies and God knows what,’ he said.
‘Maybe it’s something we don’t bring up with Governor Taylor?’ she said.
‘I know you’d love to,’ he said.
She smiled. He was right. She could hardly help herself poking her nose inside anything that raised her hackles. Her problem wasn’t that drugs were common inside prison, but that no one seemed to care.
Prisons depressed her. It wasn’t too difficult to see why; after all, they were full of violent, frustrated criminals. However, it was also the way they were run that got Kelly’s back up. The police caught the criminals and spent thousands of hours putting together a case. Then the lawyers swooped like vultures, agreeing secret deals in wine bars, dismissing half their work. Then the judges waved their gavels from their lofty thrones and dished out sentences that were laughed at and ridiculed by anyone who knew anything about rehabilitation or effective incarceration. The governor, the man she was about to meet, was the next link in the chain: it was up to him how the prisoner lived from day to day. Most of them did their best, and then gave up. Prisoners being dependent on drugs, as well as suffering from untreated mental health issues, was wrong, plain and simple. The whole penal system was fucked. The notion that prisoners somehow had a chance of staying clean was a joke. Gangs ruled inside these walls, just like they did on the outside. What Kelly wanted to know was: which ones were Jack Bell and Dean Kirby affiliated with inside? Any questions she had about her two victims depended upon who they associated with on the inside, and Jeanie Clark had already given her an idea.
They were escorted through a series of doors and corridors, all caged in reinforced steel, and clunky when opened. Each bang of metal on metal jarred Kelly. The prison officers they saw were polite and respectful. They went up some stairs and were asked to wait in an area with a few chairs laid out. The place was generally dismal.
From a distance, they heard the occasional shouting and banging coming from the wings. The governor’s office was self-contained inside the prison building. The wings were housed in a separate structure, joined by a series of walkways. There was something sinister about being so close to so many serious criminals; it chilled Kelly’s soul. The last time she’d been inside such a place was Broadmoor, when she’d visited the Teacher, one of the most appalling criminals in recent history. Some people, like the Teacher, took well to incarceration, they were born for it. It was as if they worked all their lives to get there, to a place of safety and nurture, where they had no responsibility whatsoever, apart from to follow rules. Something clearly happened, Kelly knew, to human beings in their development, which divided the species into two streams. One half ended up in places like this, or Broadmoor for the true nutters. Kelly had never believed that the Teacher was crazy, but apparently the jury at the trial thought differently. It meant that rather than face the brutality of a place like this, the Teacher got special treatment at a glorified hospital. But there wasn’t much Kelly could do about that – her job was to catch bastards, not judge them. That was the job of those in the white wigs.
They didn’t sit down in the small waiting area. Kelly was too fidgety and Craig too curious. He read the flyers and pamphlets on smoking, sexual harassment in the workplace and venereal disease, which were pinned to a noticeboard outside the governor’s office. They looked as though they’d been there ten years. The door opened and a man held out his hand. He went to Craig first. In Kelly’s experience most men did the same, overlooking the outstretched hand of a woman in order to shake one belonging to another male.
‘Brian Taylor,’ he boomed.
Dick swinger, thought Kelly.
‘Detective Inspector Craig Lockwood. This is Detective Inspector Kelly Porter, she’s the senior investigating officer running the case,’ Craig said. Brian Taylor turned to her, almost apologetic, but not quite, and held out his hand.
‘Detective,’ he said. She felt a sense of unease as his eyes wandered down to her blouse and back to her eyes. He was a middle-aged man who looked like a prime heart attack candidate, and he smelled of alcohol. His pot-belly made his shirt sit awkwardly, and he had dark circles under his eyes. But he attempted a warm, if wary, smile.
‘Please come in. Can I get you a drink? Hot or cold?’ he asked. Craig said he’d love a coffee and Kelly asked for water. They sat down in the chairs offered and Brian Taylor went behind his desk. There was a large window behind him and Kelly could hear the bounce of a ball, and shouting. It must be the exercise yard below.
‘So, what a damn way to go, eh? We were sorry to hear the news. Both Bell and Kirby were good inmates. They were exemplary in fact. They shouldn’t have really been here, a Cat B or C would have done them fine.’
‘That’s good to know,’ Kelly said. ‘So they didn’t cause any trouble? They kept themselves out of fights and rivalries?’
‘I wouldn’t go that far. All our inmates have run-ins, but as far as general behaviour, yes. They were liked by the staff too.’
‘Yes, we noted the close relationship between Jack Bell and your officer Jeanie Clark. Is that usual?’
‘It’s only a problem if it’s inappropriate,’ Brian said. Kelly noticed that he seemed uncomfortable at the notion.
‘And it wasn’t?’ Kelly asked.
Brian looked at Craig, who said nothing.
‘No, of course not. Jeanie is known for looking after her lads. I mean, she talks to them, mothers them a bit, you know? They like her. She makes things run smoothly, she’s a calming influence on the inmates,’ Brian said. ‘In here, this is their home, and at the end of the day, my officers want no trouble, and to go home to their families unhurt.’
‘Right,’ Kelly said. ‘But is it normal for her to meet them on the outside after release?’
Brian looked puzzled. ‘Are you telling me that she met Jack Bell and Dean Kirby after their release?’
‘I’m telling you that she had arranged to meet Jack Bell and that it was she who reported him missing, which is how we identified him and connected him to Dean Kirby, and Highton,’ Kelly said. She flicked through her notepad. ‘Jeanie told us that Dean and Jack were on the same wing, A wing. We’d like to speak to some of the men on that wing please. We have plenty of time so can fit in around their working day.’ Kelly asked.
She waited. She found Brian Taylor too buoyant and chummy. A man in his position should be a little distracted, stressed, a tad gloomy even. Two of his ex-inmates had been brutally murdered, and one of his officers had planned to see one of them out of hours. Add to that all the pressures of running a Category A prison, and she couldn’t help but reach the conclusion that he was either not suitable for the job, or hiding something. Or both.
He picked up the phone and dialled an extension number. ‘Liam, I’ve got local police detectives here, they’re investigating Bell and Kirby’s deaths. They want to conduct some interviews with A wing inmates.’ He paused. ‘Today.’ Another pause. ‘Can you arrange it?’ He hung up.
‘That was the custodial manager of A wing, where Jack and Dean were held until they were released,’ Brian said. ‘I’ll warn you, my prisoners don’t take well to surprise police visits, so get what you need and don’t stir up a hornet’s nest,’ he said.
‘I appreciate the delicacy of the situation, and I’m very grateful for your permission. I came myself because the nature of the crimes is of the gravest level,’ Kelly said. ‘I’ll go easy. I don’t want to be responsible for any trouble after we’ve left.’
Brian nodded. ‘How did it happen?’ he asked.
Kelly saw a flicker of humanity and realised that Brian Taylor had probably seen some of the nastiest wounds inflicted on human bodies. Like the police, she knew that prison officers cauterised their emotions over such things.
‘We’re piecing it together. You’ll appreciate that I can’t share details at the moment,’ she said. Brian looked at Craig again and it needled her. ‘Is there an old-timer on A wing who runs things?’ she asked. Brian looked at her. She waited. Still Craig said nothing.
‘Jack Bell would have been that man,’ Brian said finally.
‘Really?’ Kelly said. ‘That’s not the impression I got from Jeanie Clark,’ she said.
‘Oh?’ Brian asked. ‘I’m assuming, of course, that the popular ones have more privileges and the senior ones are respected. You’ll have to speak to the custodial manager about that.’
Kelly figured that assumption was the last thing a governor of a Category A prison would rely upon, but let it pass.
‘Right. And how about communication between prisoners and the outside? I’m figuring the trade in mobile phone hardware is as buoyant as ever,’ she said.
‘The discovery of contraband is dealt with sternly, detective. No one wants two weeks in the block,’ he said. The block was another name for solitary confinement, and it was a living hell. Being locked up in a dark cell in the bowels of the prison for twenty-four hours a day, with no fresh air or exercise, and maybe a radio for company for good behaviour, if you had batteries, was pure torture.
‘When was the last search carried out for mobile phones?’ she asked.
‘I’ll have to consult with my custodial managers, but I can assure you that cell searches are a regular and normal occurrence here at Highton.’
‘Glad to hear it. And what sort of contraband do you usually find? How much does a mobile phone sell for in here, for example?’ she asked.
‘There’s no trade allowed inside the prison, that’s strictly against the rules,’ he said. She could see that he was becoming flushed under his collar.
‘Of course it is,’ she said. ‘Perhaps you could take advice from your police liaison officer as to whether a cell search, in the light of the current turn of events, would be something you’d consider.’
