The Blooding (30 page)

She gave the impatient detectives a glance or two but wasn't about to give up the phone. They jumped back in the CID car and kept going.

When they got to the office at 9:00 P
. M
. there were messages all over the door. One said, "Don't go home!" Another said, "Got a job on!" A third said, "Don't go home. Got a job on!"

When Pearce got to his desk he found a huge one saying, "DON'T GO
HOME!"

Phil Beeken had taken a telephone message that afternoon from a bobby whose father owned a pub near the Queens Road outlet shop of Hampshires Bakery. Beeky relayed the information from that telephone call directly to Insp. Mick Thomas and they pulled an old house-to-house pro forma from the Lynda Mann inquiry. They compared the signature of the resident of a semi-detached house in Littlethorpe with the pro forma from his blooding in January. The two signatures of Colin Pitchfork didn'
t m
atch.

Mick Thomas and Phil Beeken tried to keep each other from gettin
g t
oo excited. After all, signatures can change over a period of three years
,
particularly with young people. But Pitchfork wasn't a kid. Then the
y l
ooked at each other and decided, The hell with it! They were over the moon and rising!

Mick Mason was telephoned at home and given the job of immediately contacting the others from the bakery who'd been present in the Clarendon Pub when Ian Kelly blurted an admission during an unguarded moment. Thomas and Beeken went to the manager's house and took her written statement.

She began by saying, "This is probably a waste of your time, but my conscience forced me to ring the police." She kept apologizing until they reassured her.

By the time Mick Thomas and Phil Beeken hooked up with Derek Pearce and Gwynne Chambers later that evening they were practically hyperventilating.

Mick Thomas said to Pearce, "Roger and Tracy are still in Yorkshire trying to bloody some bloke! You and Gwynne were in London! Everybody else had gone home! I was going crazy with no one to tell!"

One of them noticed something very peculiar. The conversation in the Clarendon Pub, that unguarded moment, had occurred exactly one year after the day that Dawn Ashworth's body lay undetected in a field by Ten Pound Lane. It seemed to be an omen.

They unanimously elected to go immediately to a pub, and they did. While drinking his second pint Pearce said that going to bed was out of the question. He wanted morning to come without having to sleep through the interim. Mick Thomas suggested that they'd better not get drunk because of the importance of the following day. But they didn't have to worry--the booze couldn't compete with the adrenaline rush.

Each man later reported that he spent a near-sleepless night. Each later reported that he felt he was facing the most important day in his police career.

As far as Pearce was concerned: "It was the most important day of our lives."

Ian Kelly had not been having an easy time at the bakery since he'd given blood for Colin Pitchfork. It seemed as though too many things were going wrong, and Colin Pitchfork was always around to "help" him. Once when they were making buns, Ian burned them. Colin observed the error and told Ian not to worry, he'd take care of it. Ian later heard that Colin "took care of it" by informing the foreman.

There was a more serious incident when Ian was making buns with another baker. A huge steel machine cover was propped against a wall. Ian pushed a baking trolley past it and was absolutely sure he had sufficient clearance, but somehow the heavy metal cover fell over and crashed into his partner's legs.

The man bellowed and swore and accused Ian of crippling him. It turned into such a row that the gaffer came out and shouted, "Stop behaving like kids, the two of you!"

The injured baker was so outraged he told the boss to stuff it. The baker quit his job that day, saying that Ian Kelly was the one who should've been sacked.

Ian went back to work, absolutely baffled as to how the machine cover could've fallen. Until he later learned that Colin Pitchfork had been standing nearby when it happened. It was beginning to look like somebody wanted him out of Hampshires Bakery.

On the morning of Saturday, September 19th, it was decided that Pearce and Chambers would arrest Ian Kelly. And they might arrest the young baker who'd been offered PS200 by Colin Pitchfork, depending on his answers. Mick Thomas and Mick Mason were to call on that young man. Even though they were off duty, DC Brian Fentum and Phil Beeken insisted on being there. Nothing could've kept them away.

Ian Kelly opened his door that morning to a pair of visitors he knew weren't selling magazines. Derek Pearce showed his warrant card and said, "We're from the murder enquiry incident room at Narborough, investigating the murders of Lynda Mann and Dawn Ashworth. Have you given a blood sample regarding those enquiries?"

"No, not me!" Ian said.

"I don't believe you," Pearce said. "I have reason to believe you've given a blood sample."

"No, I haven't!" Ian said.

"We've talked to other people at the bakery," Pearce said. "I believ
e y
ou have"

"Yes, you're right," Ian said. "I did it for another lad at work." "Who's that?" Gwynne Chambers asked.

"Colin Pitchfork," Ian Kelly answered.

Pearce said, "I'm arresting you for conspiracy to pervert the course of justice and we're taking you to Wigston Police Station."

"Yes," said Ian Kelly. "I'll just put me shoes on."

They took Ian Kelly to the station, which was already humming, and put him into an interview room where his statement was recorded.

Pearce said, "I must tell you, you do not have to say anything unless you wish to do so, but anything you say may be given in evidence. Do you understand that?"

Ian began by saying, "Yes, well, the gentleman in question, Colin Pitchfork, he come up to me and asked if I'd do him a favor. I didn't know it were for them murders. I didn't know what it were really for cause he didn't explain what it were for. He just had to give a thingybob cause he got a letter from the police station."

Then Ian related the story that Colin Pitchfork had told him about giving a sample for the other bloke, and Ian told about the photo strip and altering the passport. But he stuck to his claim that he didn't know that the blooding was for anything as serious as murder.

Derek Pearce didn't look quite as dangerous as a Shi'ite with an AK-47 when he said, "Yeah, you're Mister Muggins. And you've just gone along and given the sample. And he got what he wanted: full protection. You've delayed us eight months?'

Ian started to understand what was facing him. He said, "Well, when I went to his house, more or less . . . well, the day before, he told me it were a murder enquiry. But I didn't know which murder it was at the time!"

And he admitted to having been given a little schooling on the dates of birth of the children and other personal information. He said, "I knew it were for a murder but I didn't know whose it were for, cause at the time when I walked in I were that sick. I'd got a temperature. I was feeling really low. I mean, when I began writing his signature I got shaking like a leaf!"

Supt. Tony Painter was called in that afternoon and found Derek Pearce bobbing and bouncing like a dinghy in a storm.

"Let's go nick him!" Pearce said to their commander.

"No, take it all down on paper," Painter said. "And then go get him." Pearce said, "We want him now!"

"I'm the boss and I say paper first," Painter said.

"Quite right," Pearce said. "Paper first."

So they had to wait another two hours until all statements were transcribed and put in some semblance of order. By the time six of them got to the house in Haybarn Close, the blue Fiat was gone. There was nobody at the Pitchfork home. One stayed; the rest returned to the station, trying to be philosophical. After all, they'd waited four years.

Chapter
26.

Blind Terror

The most important feature of the psychopath is his monumental irresponsibility. He knows what the ethical rules are, at least he can repeat them, parrotlike, but they are void of meaning to him. . . .

No one wears the mask of normality in so convincing a fashion. He is strikingly cool and sure of himself in situations where others would tremble with sweat and fear. . . . He retains a superhuman composure.

--PAUL J. STERN, The Abnormal Person and His Worl
d s
urveillance and arrest of a major felony suspect is done differently in Britain than in the United States. In Britain a suspect under observation is often allowed to enter his house so that he can't run away. In a gun-crazy country like the U
. S
. the last thing the police want to do is let any suspect enter his house, where he may have enough firepower to take the Persian Gulf.

Late that afternoon the murder squad allowed the blue Fiat to pass into Haybarn Close and proceed to the end of the cul-de-sac. They waited until Colin Pitchfork parked the car, until the entire family was safely inside the house.

Derek Pearce, who said he lived to cover back doors, ran around to the rear with Gwynne Chambers. The two Micks, Thomas and Mason
,
went to the front. Phil Beeken and Brian Fentum backed up the two Micks. At 5:45 P
. M
. Mick Thomas knocked.

Carole Pitchfork later said, "At first I thought they were insurance men. I thought perhaps it was about the car accident on Narborough Road. They came in and said they were police officers and asked to speak to Colin in private."

Mick Thomas and Mick Mason walked Colin Pitchfork into the kitchen while the others stayed in the living room. Phil Beeken later said, "I saw him and thought, Yeah, it's him! He looks the way our man ought to look! It's him!"

Mick Thomas said to Colin Pitchfork, "From enquiries we've made we believe you're responsible for the murder of Dawn Ashworth on the thirty-first of July, 1986. We believe another man gave a blood sample for you. I'm arresting you on suspicion of that murder. I must inform you that you don't have to say anything, but anything you say may be taken down and given in evidence. Do you understand?"

Colin Pitchfork very calmly said, "First give me a few minutes to speak to my wife."

Mick Thomas had a feeling from the look of resignation on Colin Pitchfork's face, and so did Mick Mason, who suddenly asked, "Why Dawn Ashworth?"

Colin Pitchfork replied, "Opportunity. She was there and I was there."

Mick Thomas then asked, "What do you want to speak to your wife about?"

"It's going to be a long time till I see them again. You've got to let me say goodbye."

Just then Colin Pitchfork's four-year-old son cried, "Daddy, the telly won't work!"

Mick Thomas nodded an okay and Colin Pitchfork walked into the living room to adjust the tuning. Mick Mason grabbed all of the kitchen knives off the counter, just in case, and opened the back door. When the pub singer got outside, he did a little saber dance with those knives, and Derek Pearce knew it was over.

A few minutes later, Pearce and Mick Thomas were in the little kitchen with Colin Pitchfork, while a very frightened Carole Pitchfork was asked to take the kids upstairs.

Colin Pitchfork asked, "Why's there a need for the other officers to be going round my house?"

"There's a number of things we need to search for," Mick Thomas told him.

"Like what?"

"The passport that was used."

"It's not here," Colin said. "Honestly. It's at work. Let me speak to my wife."

Mick Thomas said, "You can speak to your wife, but only in my presence." Then he called for Carole Pitchfork and she came down and entered the kitchen.

She looked from one to the other. She looked at him, leaning against the kitchen cupboard.

He moved forward and tried to put his arms around her, but she pulled away.

"They've come to arrest me," he said.

"What foe" she asked.

"For them murders."

"But you went for the blood test!" she cried. "And you got a letter saying it was negative!"

"I didn't go," he said. "Ian went."

"Did you do it?" Carole Pitchfork asked him then.

He didn't answer.

"Did you do it?" she asked again.

Still he didn't reply.

"Did you?" she asked.

"Yes," he answered.

And she flew at him. Neither detective was ready for her to launch an attack. They jumped in between. Mick Thomas grabbed Carole and bundled her out the door, but not before she directed a punch and kick at Colin Pitchfork. She missed her husband but managed to punch Derek Pearce in the mouth and kick him in the groin.

On the way to the station, in the back of the CID car, Colin Pitchfor
k s
aid to Mick Thomas and Mick Mason, "I must let a few people kno
w w
hat's happened to me before they read it in the papers. Then I'll tell yo
u e
verything." He paused and said, "But I want to do it my own way.