The Sweet Smell of Rain Page 4

CHAPTER FOUR

  The relationship between prisoner and Police Officer is not quite as adversarial as the uninitiated may imagine.

  This may be because, they, and they alone, share the rarefied atmosphere of ‘reality’, or to put it rather more bluntly, a ’la David Cameron and George Osborne that they are ‘In it together’. In fact, Cameron and Osborne felt so deeply ‘In it together’ that they ‘borrowed’ the phrase from Sir Winston Churchill. However, they were clearly not ‘In it together’ enough with the great man to attribute the line to him even though he first coined it on 8th May 1952, almost twenty years to the day before Osborne entered this world.

  Naturally, the interviewer and interviewee have entirely different agendas but it is only when there is a true meeting of their minds that genuine progress can be made. And the one essential catalyst that is known to accelerate the building of these intellectual ‘bridges’ is… tobacco.

  It was the one ‘gateway’ drug that Jim approved of. He had never smoked a cigarette in his life, but regularly bought a pack of twenty with his daily newspaper, and like all non-smokers he always forgot to buy matches or a lighter. Over the years, cigarettes had opened more doors for Hodder than any number of crow bars, battering or hydraulic rams, and on this occasion, he hoped that, once again, he could pull a rabbit out of the hat, and before long have Dean Parks singing like a bird and smoking like a beagle.

  And so it was whilst standing in the internal exercise yard of the police station that the embryonic beginning of what the Detective hoped to be a fruitful relationship was born. Simple acts of kindness, a rare act of humanity to a person used to being put upon by the system are one of the few legal pleasures in his life.

  Hodder mused how this was probably the first time in a very long time that Parks had actually smoked ‘real tobacco’ and not some cheap imitation or ‘snide’ copy. It was at times like this that he wondered if the approved pedlars of death i.e. the major tobacco companies felt superior to their counterfeit counterparts in that ‘At least we tell you what is going to kill you…we have researched it properly…buy our product…you can rely on us to kill you by a variety of means whilst collecting duty for the government of the day’.

  Leaning against a wall, hands in pocket and his right leg on a deflated football which had been in the yard for as long as he could remember Jim said ‘ We have three days before you go back to court…we really should talk I can help you despite what you might think.

  ‘Mr. Randall-Ord said that you should not talk to me without him’.

  Kicking the ball across the narrow yard, it barely made it to the other wall as Jim said, ‘It’s okay for him to say that, he is not looking at a lengthy stretch’. He went on ‘I bet that he would not swap his converted barn for your cell…sometimes mate, just sometimes, these posh guys, they do not understand…Your future does not bother him one bit…it bothers me tho’.

  ‘Why should it bother you’?

  ‘The system is going to shaft you. It needs no help from me, but I can help you through the system but I need something in return’.

  ‘What would that be then’?

  Jim slipped a packet of sweets from his pocket, popped one into his mouth and offered the packet to Parks…’No thanks…I don’t eat sweets’ he replied as he kicked the ball back towards Hodder. ‘You can get me a paper though, the one in the cell is ancient. I’m sick of reading last year’s news’.

  ‘That should not be a problem. Now, assuming that you have not assassinated any presidents or popes or committed ‘nunnocide’ recently, we can sort things out’.

  ‘And why would you do that’?

  Feeling confident, for the first time in a long time Hodder continued, ‘You see, I like a quiet life. I don’t expect you to fully understand this right now, but, I am a victim of the system too. In order for the system to exist it has to be fed. Unfortunately, for both of us it is my job to feed the system. The good news is that the system does not mind who is put through the ‘mincing machine’ as long as someone is. So, what I am saying to you is give me something for the system and I will make sure that the system gives you something in return’.

  ‘What do you have in mind’?

  Sensing a flicker of understanding Hodder said ‘Do you like your friends’?

  ‘Of course I do. What sort of question is that’?

  ‘Do you like your family’?

  ‘Well, apart from the time my cousin shagged our lass. Yeah. But I sorted that fucker out’

  ‘Do you like your enemies’?

  ‘Yeah. Top of me fucking Christmas card list! What do you think’?

  ‘Who do you hate most in the world’?

  ‘Kurt Shapp….he screwed my mother’s house last Christmas, and stole all the grand bairns presents. I never get sick of punching his fucking face in’.

  ‘Who do you hate second most’?

  ‘David Palma, he must be a grass, that’s why he keeps getting bail’.

  ‘Give him to me. I don’t want to deprive you of the pleasure of regular liaisons with Mr Shapp’.

  ‘My solicitor says that I should not trust you’.

  Hodder drew closer to Parks wincing at the smell of stale tobacco and an even staler body….’And you can trust your solicitor, can you?...you need to learn a lot about the system…look at your previous convictions and the amount of time you have spent inside…looks like he really plays a blinder for you in court doesn’t it’? And with that Jim said cheerily ‘Okay, tea break over, gonna call your brief soon so we can all waste our time going through another ‘no reply’ interview. Then I’ll go and have a beer, before coming back here and call your brief again for another interview just in time to spoil his lobster bisque. Then I call my colleagues from Sunderland who want to talk to you about another offence and so it goes on and on’.

  ‘You are wasting your time there…they tried to do me for the Sunderland one ages ago…got no evidence’.

  ‘No’, said Jim ‘What you mean is that they do not have any DNA…’But I have…’

  With that Dean Parks was taken back to his cell and was left to stew on a slow regular heat.

  Before leaving the cell block Hodder returned to the exercise yard and taking a clear plastic evidence bag from his inside jacket pocket he picked up four discarded cigarette butts from the floor. He figured that they may ‘come in handy’. By the time Hodder got back to the CID office, he once again turned off the covert recording device, which was proving to be a pretty useful addition to his armoury.

  By now, the damage to the unmarked car had assumed even greater significance, and a number of uniformed nightshift staff had been woken from their sleep and grilled over the telephone. The mystery was no closer to being solved and all that had happened was that an even greater chasm (than usual) had grown between uniform and CID. It was far too late to be struck by a crisis of conscience and come clean regarding the damage. Besides, Hodder had bigger fish to fry and sacrificial lamb was most definitely off the menu as was, still, apparently, Kit Kat.

  In the corner of the office a serious discussion was taking place over whether a combination or key lock should be fitted to the CID fridge in order to stem the ‘crime wave’ within the office. The United Nations have addressed the Middle East crisis with less gravitas. The general consensus was that a key lock would be better, but then ‘Gee-Gee’ had to go and spoil it all by talking about nominated key holders. He was then promptly ‘volunteered’ by one of the lads.

  It was even suggested that he could place his name on the key holder system on the force computer, so he could attend to the fridge should it ever be the scene of another serious crime. Hodder could not resist ‘chipping in’ and helpfully suggested that he was confident that ‘Gee-Gee’ would not mind being called out at 3.00am if someone wanted a twix or a sherbet dib dab as a matter of urgency. He had to fight an intrusive image as he visualised ‘Gee-Gee’ turning out in the small hours wearing an embroidered silk dressing gown, carpet slippers,
a ‘Marquis of Bath’ fez and cigarette holder in hand.

  A telephone rang in the office, and as usual it was greeted by frenetic false activity. Hitherto inert persons grabbed whatever piece of paper that may be at hand, studying it earnestly as if it were proof of extra-terrestrial life or the latest guide to internationally renowned North Korean comedians. In short, the phones were generally ignored. ‘After all, suggested Gee Gee’ helpfully, Isn’t that why God invented temps’?

  Washed over by a tsunami of indifference, Hodder answered the phone and spoke to the irritatingly jovial Custody Officer who told him that Parks wanted to speak to him. Jim said ‘What time is his brief coming’?

  ‘Doesn’t want his brief…he wants you’.

  Jesse Owens, Valerie Bortzov, Michael Johnson, Usain Bolt. Eat your hearts out. They would have all been trailing behind in the wake of Hodder, fighting it out for silver and bronze as he ‘ate up’ the yardage from the CID office to the custody suite in what was sure to be a world record time.

  The ever obliging Custody Officer gave Hodder access to Parks on the strict instructions that he should not give him any drugs or alcohol. Violence was not mentioned so, therefore, apparently acceptable. Taking him from his cell as quietly as possible…there really was no need to alert the other prisoners, and provoke the ‘cell chatter’ that continued around the clock.

  Once in the exercise yard Jim produced a cigarette and a borrowed lighter and said in mock ‘Adams Family’ voice ‘You Rang’.

  ‘Did you mean what you said’?

  ‘Which particular part…I said quite a bit to you’?

  ‘Can you get me out’?

  ‘I can get you out for a few hours today. But, you have to do it my way…can’t stop you having to go back to court, but I can ease the way for you. Your brief cannot do that. He is not inside the system…he just feeds off it’?

  ‘What do you want’?

  ‘I want David Palma first’

  ‘Then what’?

  ‘I want you’?

  ‘Not that way inclined mate… Me rapist remember’!

  ‘Not that way you fuck wit! You have to come clean with me so that together we can sort you out…stop you getting arrested time and time again. As you know the more that you are arrested the more likely that you are going to face a whole new set of charges…and in this game charges equals jail time. Let’s call it damage limitation’.

  ‘How do I know that I can trust you’?

  ‘The facts are you don’t…but do you see any better offers on the table right now…I could give your brief a call but the truth is mate…he does not care about you. You are just a meal ticket. Are you aboard or not’? (Hodder made a mental note to complete his expenses form for the last evening’s entertainment!)

  ‘He is supposed to be on my side’.

  Hodder moved in a bit closer…’Has the penny not dropped Dean?…he is on HIS side…as long as you sign the legal aid forms he does not give a flying fuck about you. It is in his interest to keep you remanded in custody on a not guilty plea…he makes a fortune, disputing strong prosecution evidence, gathering futile defence evidence and you pay the price with your time…You just keep the wheels of the legal profession and his Audi turning. He will happily throw you to the dogs and blissfully represent the owners if the same fucking dogs savage you’!

  The Detective let the silence grow…he knew this was good… It was one of the few things he remembered from his interview techniques course…‘It’s called managing the silence’, he would often say to his wife when she was berating him for coming home reeking of alcohol when the truth of the matter was that he was simply incapable of coherent speech

  Returning to the Custody Officer Jim said that his prisoner wanted to officially speak to him and that it would be very helpful if the fact could be noted on the custody record together with a signature from Parks indicating that he would he delighted to have this discussion without the benefit of legal representation.

  Duly obliged, Hodder and his prisoner sat in the ‘linen cupboard’ with ceramic mugs of just coffee where the reprehensible actions of David Palma were outlined. Jim learnt that said ‘Mr Palma’ was presently the proud custodian of a consignment of some two hundred smart phones that had mysteriously appeared in his lock up barn at Friardene Farm having previously, and very mysteriously, disappeared from a container that was parked upon the Tyne Tunnel Trading Estate two days ago.

  BINGO….Phase one was now complete.

  When they had finished talking…Hodder made sure that Parks had drawn a diagram of the precise location of the barn complete with Park’s fingerprints and scribbled instructions….well, you can never have enough evidence can you?

  Parks said ‘You said you could get me out for a bit. Can I go and see wor lass’.

  Jim said ‘Yeah, of course you can. As you know we operate an ‘open door policy’ here. Can you be back by 7.00 o’clock otherwise the Custody Officer will go nuts if you are late for dinner… It’s Chicken Chasseur tonight, and as you know… he is a stickler for punctuality’….

  ‘You don’t quite understand the way it works Dean. I have to take you out and it is at this point that you volunteer information to me about offences for which you have not been arrested or charged and at your request we go out and you show me what you have done. The good news is that because we are not on tape, nothing will be recorded that will cause you too much bother. Now, if you are a good boy, we can swing by your place, say ‘hello’ to your lass, but, seriously, there will be no time for a quick shag or anything, shagging after all, has got you in enough trouble already’.

  Parks said ‘I should get my brief, when we go out…just to be sure’.

  Conveniently forgetting to tell the prisoner that his solicitor would advise him not to leave the discomfort of his cell, Hodder said ‘By all means give him a call, but I think that you will find that he is not covered by the terms of your legal aid certificate to accompany you out of the police station’.

  With a shrug which strongly suggested that he was going to accept the inevitable, Parks said ‘Didn’t know that’. ‘Neither did I’ thought Jim…’but it was worth the punt’.

 

  For the next twenty minutes or so Hodder and Parks spoke about his recent activities there were a number of good quality burglaries, naturally, Parks steered clear of any intrusions into students, or their accommodation, but Hodder was not too concerned because he still had the Sunderland offence up his sleeve.

  Parks was then returned to his cell whilst Jim made a number of necessary office based enquiries to establish:

  Was there any record of the offences that Parks had just mentioned?

  Were they still ‘undetected’? It was not unknown for crimes to be ‘detected’ in ‘error’…or so the official report would state should the ‘wheel come off’.

  More importantly, was Parks at liberty at the times of the offences and therefore capable of committing them.

  Had the theft of the smart phones been reported? Yes it had. Had it been detected? No. it had not. Hodder’s sleeve was feeling somewhat congested…because this information was going to have to remain up there along with ‘Fr-Ord-gate’ and ‘Car-gate’.

  So far, so good. All Jim had to do now was to wait for Jeff Baxter to get back from court. He trusted Baxter implicitly, and they had a deep understanding of what each was required to do when they were out of the ‘nick’ with a prisoner.

  Naturally, Hodder would tell Baxter everything about his ‘cell conversation’ with the brief, apart from his error in registering Randall-Ord as an informant. For his part, Baxter would play ‘the dumb driver’ feigning disinterest, but listening intently, only occasionally throwing in the odd ‘prompt’ from the front of the car…only marginally assisted by the pile of undetected crime reports upon the adjacent passenger seat.

  When Baxter returned from court he was in truth exhausted, having just been ‘filleted’ by an aggressive young barrister. He
was less than enthusiastic about taking Parks out but, he did see it as recognition of the level of trust and confidence that Hodder had in him. In truth, he had learnt a lot from Jim, enjoyed his company, and was secretly flattered that the man who was effectively his boss showed so much faith in him.

  And so it was, that armed with a clip board, a pile of undetected crime reports and a paper continuation of the custody record that they left the police station. The purpose of the continuation sheet was to enable a contemporaneous record to be made of the journey, together with any ‘comments’ that the prisoner may elect to proffer whilst they out of the station.

  Baxter brought an as yet, undamaged car into the secure cage at the rear of the police station, and with handcuffs on one wrist, Hodder led Parks to the rear of an unmarked Vauxhall Astra. Jim ‘cuffed’ him to the interior door handle and settled down in the rear beside him. Hodder was nothing if not at traditionalist and he used the old fashioned ‘chain link’ cuffs. He did this largely because he was resistant to change and additionally, from a practical point of view, they fitted snugly into a small leather pouch upon his belt.

  Hodder soon came to the conclusion that sitting in the rear of the car with Parks had been a very unwise move. Jim should have insisted that Parks had had a shower before they left the nick. In the heat of the day Parks was percolating along just nicely, and before they were finished Hodder was confident that they would all smell the same…utterly rancid.

  As they left the police station and passed the court building, Hodder told Parks to pull his ‘hoody’ up and to get his head down. Hodder did not want him to be recognised by a bunch of ‘knuckle trailers’ who were standing outside the building, chain smoking, spitting and obviously celebrating that one of their number had just been granted bail or even better had been acquitted.

  Jeff Baxter had learnt well from the older man, and in keeping with an age old custom, he sounded the horn of the CID car and waved at the group outside the court. Without even looking, one of their number instinctively waved back at the vehicle. Oh how he regretted it! It was too late, a broad grin spread across Baxter’s face as he watched the melee in the rear view mirror. His mates were laying into the ‘waver’…’No wonder the bastard got bail…he’s a grass…he’s waving at the fucking CID’.

  All was fair in war. Besides, you got to get your laughs anywhere you can. Jeff directed the vehicle to areas where he knew that a high proportion of students lived. These areas were traditionally areas of high crime, and true to his ‘dishonest’ word Parks started pointing out a number of dwellings that he said that he had broken into. Neither officer pressed him for too much information, they could cover any confessions made during an additional tape recorded interview later. Furthermore, they certainly did not stray into the area of any undetected sexual assaults for fear of Parks ‘closing down’.

  After an hour or so, the smell was getting all too much, and it felt to Hodder that the usefulness of the exercise, unlike the smell inside the car was beginning to evaporate. Consequently, Baxter pointed the car back towards the office. However, whilst passing a street of large semi-deserted Victorian terraced houses which were earmarked for demolition, Parks said ‘Go down the back lane…I will show you where there is a shotgun’.

  Now, Hodder liked nothing more than unexpected bonuses and the real truth of the matter was that he was a bit of a glory hunter. He was not really concerned about the prisoner’s welfare, he was more concerned about his own. Experience had taught Hodder that it was easier to write off undetected crimes by way of having them ‘taken into consideration’ at court rather than to do a separate prosecution file for each detection.

  It was an economy of effort that had stood him in good stead over the years. Good for force detection figures and good for the environment. Just how many trees had Hodder saved over the past two decades? He was confident that the command block would have approved. It was after all, their system. He even felt sure that his actions would meet with the approval of Friends of the Earth too!

  As they negotiated their way down the narrow back lane and around the burnt out shell of a Transit van, Parks told Baxter to stop the car beside a solid wooden gate set into the eight foot high wall. ‘If you go into the yard there is a shotgun just inside the back door of the house’.

  ‘How do you know that’ asked Hodder….’I put it there’ said Parks

  Getting out of the car Hodder tried the back gate. It was closed, so he scaled the wall and stood on the roof of a brick outhouse, presumably an outside toilet, and he looked at the rear of the house. He saw that it was vacant but insecure. He shouted down to Parks ‘Where is it then’?

  ‘Told you. Just inside the back door. Go and have a look…it was there a couple of days ago’.

  Sensing a chance to distinguish himself, Hodder jumped down into the yard and made his way towards the open back door. He was already formulating a plan. If, indeed, as Parks had said, there was a weapon on the premises he would have to call out an ‘Authorised Firearms Officer’ to make the weapon safe and oversee its recovery. A.F.O.’s were by nature, according to the gospel by ‘St Jim Hodder’, trigger happy, gung-ho frustrated SAS men and women, short on patience and overly aggressive, but he had to concede that they did have their uses.

  Jim had one theory when it came to firearms, and A.F.O.’s in particular, ‘You should never give a firearm to anyone who has expressed an interest in having one’. As he walked across the yard towards the open back door, broken glass crunched under his feet and a ginger cat hissed loudly as it ran from the interior. Once over the threshold, Jim smelt the all too familiar odour of human excrement…what was it about people with loose bowels and empty buildings? He looked around the musty interior, being careful where he placed his feet and in the half light, he pulled a small ‘maglite’ from his jacket pocket.

  It barely flickered, and he reproached himself for not replacing the batteries earlier…just then his right foot stepped into the source of the disgusting smell. Flies buzzed around his head as he inspected his footwear. Why does this always happen when you were wearing new shoes? After impatiently looking around the kitchen and living room, he went back outside and climbed back onto the outhouse roof. Speaking to Parks through the open car window he said ‘Nothing there…if it was there it has gone’.

  Parks said ‘Look I will show you…it was definitely there’.

  Hodder told Baxter to get Parks out of the car. It was clear by the look on Baxter’s face that in his opinion, that this did not rank amongst the wisest of Hodder’s suggestions. Baxter liked Hodder, but not right now.

  Hodder said that he would slip the other end of the handcuff on his own wrist so that Parks was not able to run, all he had to do was to help him onto the wall where Hodder would secure the prisoner to himself.

  This did not even sound good in theory, but Baxter did not want to show open dissent to his senior colleague, especially in the presence of the prisoner, so, very reluctantly he released Parks from the door handle. Baxter then got him out of the car and made Parks reach up with his handcuffed wrist as Hodder pulled him up onto the top of the wall before steadying himself on the slightly sloping outhouse roof.

  As Hodder held Parks by the arm to steady him he told him to slip the handcuff on his (Hodder’s) wrist. Suddenly Parks pushed at Hodder who stumbled backwards almost falling off the outhouse roof over the wall and onto the roof of the police car below.

  Hodder frantically grabbed at thin air with great windmill movements of his arms, and miraculously found himself hanging onto the back of Parks’ hooded jacket. He pulled at it in an effort to prevent himself falling further backwards. As he did so, the material began to tear and Parks began to lose his own footing as if he, too, was going to fall onto the vehicle. Finding a burst of strength from somewhere, Parks dug his heels into the concrete roof of the outhouse and forced his upper body away from Hodder and springing forward he jumped from the roof and into the yard.

  The mom
entum of this was enough to pull Hodder forward and off the roof and once again into the glass strewn yard. Hodder landed on all fours cutting his palms as his arms absorbed all of his weight.

  Keeping his eyes on the disappearing Parks, Hodder watched as the prisoner flew through the open door of the property his feet clattering loudly on the bare floorboards. A partially completed thought flashed through Hodder’s mind…’Hope the bastard slips on that shit just inside the door’…he didn’t.

  Hodder ran through the kitchen reaching to his belt clip for his radio…what a time to realise that he had left it in the police car. He quickly looked into the living room there was no sign of Parks. It was now time for a fully formed thought to pass through his mind…’ I am fucked…I have lost a prisoner…How am I going to get out of this…more importantly…How can I protect Baxter…he was just doing what I told him to do’.

  Thinking that he had been in more than enough shit for one day, Hodder sprinted from the living room and back into the yard. He shouted over the wall, telling Baxter to get the car around to the front of the property. He also suggested, but not entirely calmly, that Baxter should call for assistance on his radio.

  Once back inside the property, Hodder heard footfalls stomping noisily upstairs and clattering across the naked floorboards above, the sound was deafening, and echoed around the upstairs bedrooms. Parks was obviously checking all of the rooms and looking for a way out of the building. Then he found it.

  Hodder heard an almighty crash from above as an armchair landed in the front street outside. The chair had obviously been launched out of the window. Hodder instinctively sped into the living room and looking through the bay window and into the street outside he saw Parks ‘flying’ past the window from above, landing heavily in the middle of the road amidst much broken glass. He clumsily got to his feet before turning to his left and smiling broadly at Hodder he sprinted from view.

  Baxter was not yet in the street, so Hodder made his way to the front door where he opened it from the inside.

  The fucking door was boarded up from the outside. No amount of kicking would force the plywood board loose. Why was it thought Hodder that criminals did not seem to encounter such obstacles whilst going about their unlawful business? There was only one way out and that was through the kitchen and back out over the wall again.

  Finding an untapped source of energy, Hodder vaulted onto the outhouse roof and down from the wall, before sprinting around the block to the front of the property. When he got there Baxter was getting out of the car which was parked a couple of houses down from the house with a shattered first floor window.

  Wheezing and panting heavily, Hodder shuddered to a halt where he saw that a crowd of a dozen or so locals had gathered from inside one or two of the still occupied houses.

  Oh how they laughed. And laughed and laughed.

  Just at this point, a number of police sirens could be heard in the distance. Hodder, told Baxter to ignore his radio and not to update the control room…Jim knew that his head was going to roll but he was in no mood for a public execution.

  When the uniformed officers arrived Hodder told them that they were in pursuit of someone they wanted to arrest and that he thought that he was inside one of the houses nearby. The truth was that Parks could have been anywhere. He had had plenty of time to get out of the street before either Hodder or Baxter had arrived at the front of the property. This, for Hodder, was all about saving face, and showing that he had done enough to cover his back. More importantly, he needed to save Baxter’s skin because he was clearly not at fault for this debacle.

  The indifference from the uniformed officers was obvious. Some of their number had just been ‘fitted up’ for damage to a CID car. No one was going to bust a gut to get Hodder out of the hole he was digging for himself.

  In an attempt to show some form of authority, Hodder approached one of the ‘spectators’ and announced that he suspected that Parks was hiding inside his house. The man who was holding a Liquorice Allsorts mug sipped confidently as he said ‘You’re not coming in here without a warrant’.

  Sensing his confidence draining quicker than the contents of the mug Jim said ‘I am in pursuit of someone unlawfully at large. I am going to search your house’.

  ‘No you are fucking not’ and with that an almighty brawl erupted during which woman and children hurled abuse and anything else close at hand at the officers. Three of their number, were arrested for minor public order offences.

  For his troubles Hodder got a badly bruised ego. To make matters worse, the Liquorice Allsorts mug found its way through the windscreen of the CID car. The windscreen and the mug immediately shattered into countless small pieces, but not nearly as many pieces as Hodder’s ego. As a face saving exercise the man who threw the mug was immediately arrested for criminal damage.

  Worse still however, was the major loss of credibility in front of the already less than enamoured uniform staff. At least, if there any form of justice…none of them would be blamed for the latest damage to the latest damaged CID car.

  By the time the prisoners had been removed from the scene and the house searched Parks was well away, probably enjoying a quiet pint and a not so quiet laugh at the expense of the police and Hodder in particular.

  Back at the office and fielding calls from the control room, who were demanding an update Hodder waited to see the D.I. and as he did so the following words meandered through his consciousness. ‘There is no situation that a Police Officer cannot make worse’.