Terrorist Task Force/ Liverpool
Grace Farrington hung up the telephone and clapped her hands together. The final pieces of the jigsaw were still missing but she had made progress. Faz had just spoken to Graham Libby at the coroner`s office and he had confirmed her suspicions. She looked across the street from her office window and saw the huge Liverbird statues perched high on top of the Liver Buildings. The giant birds were the symbol of the Port of Liverpool and were a welcoming landmark for mariners arriving home from the sea. Urban legend states that the giant bird statues will remain perched, protecting the city, until a virgin walks beneath them. Grace thought that they would remain there for some time yet. She picked up her file and headed to the progress meeting.
Grace walked into the room where the rest of the team were gathered waiting for her. She placed a disc into the digital screen and it lit up. An aerial picture of the River Dee appeared on the screen.
“Forensics has finished compiling the information that they have so far. This is the where the boat was moored,” Faz said pointing to a charred section of the riverbank. “Three hundred yards down river is a tidal weir. The weir traps anything of substantial size, which has enabled us to recover boat debris and bodies that would otherwise have been washed away.”
Grace changed the digital image from the river to the picture of a severed limb. The arm, which was severed at the elbow, still, had the hand attached to it. Attached to the wrist by a black strap was a digital camera covered in pondweed.
“The arm belonged to a mature student called Peter Mcraenor. He was a member of the Metropolitan Police Force for ten years until he took study leave to complete a degree course at Chester University. His camera was water resistant so the integrity of the pictures was maintained,” Faz handed out copies of the digital stills that were recovered prior to the explosion. The images showed students boarding the vessel, and half a dozen group pictures of smiling happy young people enjoying the party atmosphere. In the background was a crowd of guests waiting to board the boat.
“Watch the area to the rear of the crowd, specifically the two security guards to the right hand side,” Faz focused the image to enhance a small section of the larger picture. A black limousine appeared on one of the stills, and the two security men seemed to move toward the passenger as she joined the queue.
“This is where it gets interesting. Peter Mcraenor must have seen something that made him become suspicious. It could be his police training, we will never know, however he switches to video mode here,” Faz started the video sequence. The two security men were stood over the female passenger that had alighted from the limousine. An ambulance arrived and two shaven headed paramedics placed the prone woman into the rear of the vehicle. As they picked the girl from the floor Peter Mcraenor had focused in on the paramedic’s wrist, it revealed the bottom half of a Swastika tattoo. As the vehicle left the two security men could be seen in the background walking quickly away from the scene then the screen went black.
Grace looked at the confused faces that stared at her and she smiled. Her eyes sparkled mischievously as she started to explain her theory.
“We have checked with all the function`s organisers and there was no security company engaged to work at the party. These two men are not genuine security guards, however their uniform patches match those worn by a company called Brigade Security,” Faz pointed to the company logo that she had acquired.
“Brigade Security are the business wing of the 18th Brigade,” Tank interrupted, “they are a serious organised crime family with an extreme right wing political agenda. They run the door security and drugs trafficking across Liverpool and Manchester.”
“Correct. That also fits in with the Nazi tattoo on the paramedic`s wrist. There was no emergency medical team deployed to the River Dee area that day, before the bomb exploded. The ambulance is a fake just like the security guards. All of the men involved resemble 18th Brigade members. We are scanning their profiles through police files to see if we can get concrete identification,” Faz cleared the image and Jeanie Kellesh appeared on the digital screen.
“Jeannie Kellesh is the daughter of the next Saudi Interior Minister and a relation of the Arabian Royal Family. She was two years into her degree course and was always shadowed by Saudi Secret Service, which we believe brought her into conflict with her family and bodyguards. The security men had dropped her off at the boat and then retired to a car park in close vicinity to the dock. It was literally minutes between her arriving and being kidnapped. The good news is that everyone thought she had died in the explosion, obviously she didn’t,” Faz shrugged her shoulders to gauge the reaction from her fellow agents.
“If we are to believe that a bunch of Neanderthals like the 18th Brigade have masterminded the kidnapping of a Saudi Princess then we must also assume that they have had help,” Tank said, “they don’t have the technology to build and detonate a bomb as sophisticated as this one.”
“They certainly didn’t have before this incident however, drug squad detectives that I have spoken to are convinced that the 18th Brigade is selling drugs brought in by Eastern European crime families,” Faz continued, “the Russian Mafia are predominantly of Jewish extraction but the Chechens are Islamic. We know that both these crime syndicates use ex-military and Special Forces personnel that have this type of explosive capability. The van that was burnt out in the car park was stolen a month earlier from the Bradford area which has a large Muslim community. Uniformed division interviewed the owner of the vehicle, who is a Pakistani man called Imran Patel, briefly and released him. It has since come to light that Imran Patel was, unbeknown to uniform, on an MI5 watch list. He was frequenting several extremist mosques and placed on a casual observation list twelve months ago. We have two agents on the way to his house to pick him up and bring him in. There could be an Islamic link to the explosion on the boat if the Chechens were involved.”
“It`s possible. The 18th Brigade is a bunch of fascist bigots but they are also mercenaries so they would get involved in anything for the right price. Why blow up a boat in a violent gesture of Islamic Jihad and then kidnap a Muslim Princess? It doesn’t make sense,” Tank said, “it`s more likely that the bomb was a massive diversion to make everyone think that Kellesh was dead.”
“Have we identified the body that was recovered from the burnt out van yet?” Chen asked. He took of his suit jacket, as he felt uncomfortable. This meeting was going to be longer than he anticipated. There did not appear to be any clear suspect.
“No, we haven`t been able to recover enough usable DNA from the cinders but Graham Libby did find synthetic fibres welded to the skull of the victim,” Faz answered, “It seems that someone wanted us to think that the victim had black hair.”
“Why would anyone want us to think that? I am not following your drift,” said the Major confused.
“The forensic lab is certain that the charred remains from the van was wearing a black synthetic wig when it was set alight. They are also sure that the subject was alive when the fire was set. There is extensive damage to the lungs and stomach indicating that accelerant was poured down their throat. The only reason I can think of to put a wig on a dead body is if you were trying to hinder identification,” Faz said, “especially if the victim had no hair of their own.”
Grace Farrington walked over to where Tank was sitting and she rubbed his shaved head with both her hands.
“You could put a wig onto a corpse and set fire to it if you did not want anyone to think that the body belonged to a skinhead,” Tank said rubbing his bald head to demonstrate his point, “let`s prepare a raid on the 18th Brigade headquarters. We need to bring them in and question them immediately to find out if they are working with the Russians or the Chechens.”