The Disappeared (15 page)

'Is
the truth more that you didn't want to know?'

'Perhaps
. . .'

'Because
you knew that groups, such as Hizb ut-Tahrir, had no qualms about prising
members away from their families?'

'Yes
... I had heard that.'

Jenny
made a note that from January to June 2002 Mrs Jamal knew full well that her
son was radicalized and had buried her head in the sand. Her own painful
experience had taught her how easily a mother could deceive herself.

In
terms of evidence, Mrs Jamal had little more to offer, but Jenny nevertheless
took her through the events of the weeks following Nazim and Rafi's
disappearance. She described her sketchy meetings with DC Sarah Owens, the
family liaison officer appointed by the Bristol and Avon police, and her
interviews with David Skene and Ashok Singh, the MI5 officers who met her three
times before the investigation was effectively brought to a halt in December.
Mrs Jamal insisted that the last formal contact she had with the police or with
the Security Services was the letter from DC Owens dated 19 December 2002,
which contained the nonsensical sentence: 'In the absence of any firm evidence
concerning the whereabouts of your son or Mr Hassan, it has been decided that
the investigation will be suspended until such time as further evidence becomes
available.' A detective whose name she couldn't remember had told her several
days before that the Security Services had received intelligence suggesting the
two young men may have gone abroad, but no one, she claimed, had ever come up
with one solid fact to back this up. In the months and years that followed she
wrote countless letters to the police and MI5 both personally and through a
number of lawyers, but received nothing in return except barely polite
acknowledgements, and often there was no response at all.

She
had been met with a wall of silence and indifference.

Before
handing her over to the waiting lawyers, Jenny leafed through the photocopied
documents Mrs Jamal had given her and pulled out a statement made by Detective
Sergeant Angus Watkins on 3 July 2003. She passed it to Alison to read aloud to
the jury. Watkins stated that he had examined the door frames of both Nazim and
Rafi's rooms in Manor Hall and found identical quarter-inch wide depressions
in both, consistent with the use of a blunt object to force entry. He also
noted that laptops and mobile phones belonging to both students were missing
from their rooms, but there was no sign of their other possessions having been
disturbed. Valuable objects such as an MP3 player were still in evidence.

'Was
this suggestion of forced entry to both rooms ever followed up to your
knowledge?' Jenny asked Mrs Jamal.

'I
don't know. I didn't even get this statement until my solicitor wrote to them
the following year.'

'Did
you go to your son's room yourself?'

'Yes,
I did.'

'What
impression did you form?'

'All
his clothes were still there, and his suitcase. His koran - the one his father
and I gave him when he won his scholarship - was still on the shelf. His prayer
mat was on the floor. All that we could see that was missing were his phone and
computer.'

'What
about Mr Hassan's room?'

'I
spoke to his mother briefly. It was the same. No computer. Everything else was
as he would have left it.'

'Was
there no burglary investigation? Didn't your solicitor take this up with the
police, ask if they searched for fingerprints or DNA samples?'

'My
solicitor . . .' She shook her head in exasperation. 'He was working on the
case when he was arrested and went to prison. He claims he was innocent. . .'

'Arrested
for what?'

'Something
to do with evidence in another case.' She shook her head. 'I don't know what to
believe about him.'

'What
was his name?'

'Mr
McAvoy,' she said, as if she could never forget. 'Mr Alec McAvoy.'

From
the corner of her eye, Jenny saw Alison look up with a frown of recognition.
And then she remembered. McAvoy: the legal executive she'd met at the morgue,
whose card she still had in her purse. She turned to Alison, 'Gould you request
that Mr McAvoy attend, please, Usher? This afternoon if possible.' She would
like to hear his side of the story before she called the police witnesses. It
was becoming apparent that their investigation had been pursued with far less
than the usual rigour and she would expect a full and comprehensive
explanation.

Fraser
Havilland, counsel for the chief of police, had only a few low-key questions
for Mrs Jamal. Did the police respond swiftly when she raised the alarm? Would
she accept that they had taken appropriate steps to trace her son? Could she
agree that if her son really had left the country, perhaps on false documents,
that there was little more the police could have done? He didn't get the
answers he would have liked, but neither did Mrs Jamal react angrily or
emotionally as Jenny had feared she might. When Havilland asked, quite reasonably,
what was her chief complaint against his client's force, she replied that she
didn't believe it was the police who were to blame. They were being told what
to do by a higher authority, she said. They were merely obeying orders. Why
else would they have given up so easily?

Martha
Denton, counsel for the Security Services, whom it was now clear were the focus
of Mrs Jamal's suspicion, shared none of her colleague's deference. Her first
question, more of a statement, was a well-aimed arrow designed to do harm:
'You've been disingenuous, haven't you, Mrs Jamal? You knew your son had become
a radical Islamist and you are using these proceedings as an attempt to assuage
the guilt you feel at not having taken action to stop him being sucked in as
far as he was.'

'I
don't understand. Why should I feel guilty? It was your people who stopped the
police from finding out what had happened to him.'

'And
where did you get that idea?'

'The
detective who told me about the intelligence, he almost said as much.'

'The
one whose name you can't remember?'

'He
was about forty years old. Slim.'

'I
see.' Denton struck a sarcastic tone: 'And did he explain to you why the
Security Services might be so keen not to find two radical Islamists who were
known to have been associating with members of Hizb ut-Tahrir, an organization
which, although not officially supportive of terrorism, harbours known
sympathizers within its ranks?'

Thirty
pairs of unforgiving eyes fixed on Martha Denton.

She
remained unmoved. 'Did he explain that, Mrs Jamal?'

'No.'

'This
is an invention of yours, isn't it? You are desperate to blame someone for the
fact you haven't discovered the fate of your son and you have chosen to fixate
on my clients.'

Jenny
cut in to issue a reproach. 'We may have a jury but this is not a criminal
court, Miss Denton. It is a civilized inquiry and will be conducted in that
manner. Please moderate your tone.'

Martha
Denton raised her eyebrows at her instructing solicitor and continued with mock
politeness. 'Mrs Jamal, did your son ever talk to you about his new-found
religious conviction?'

'No,
he didn't.'

'Did
you know that he was meeting regularly with members of Hizb ut-Tahrir, an
organization whose aim is to help bring about an international Islamic state?'

'That's
what you say. I have no idea.'

'But
you did suspect something like that was going on?'

Jenny
said, 'What exactly is the point of your question, Miss Denton?'

Martha
Denton sighed impatiently. 'What I am attempting to extract from the witness,
ma'am, is exactly what she did know about her son's involvement with radicals
and extremists.'

Mrs
Jamal erupted. 'My son would never do a bad thing. Never. Anyone who said he
would is a liar.' Her words echoed around the silent hall.

'His
father took rather a different attitude, didn't he?' Martha Denton said. 'He
resigned himself to the most obvious explanation for your son's disappearance
very quickly, didn't he? That's why he isn't here. For him there is no question
to be answered.'

'I
can't speak for that man. He hasn't even lifted the phone to me in six years.
How should I know what he thinks?'

'And
Rafi Hassan's family, too?'

'They're
frightened. They're all frightened of your people. I'm the only one who won't
be intimidated. I've seen them outside my home, following me in the street—'

'Thank
you, Mrs Jamal,' Martha Denton said with an amused expression and sat down.

Mrs
Jamal scowled at her, all her efforts to appear reasonable unravelling with
her final outburst. Several of the jurors exchanged dubious glances. Jenny doodled
a row of question marks on her pad. Try as she might, she couldn't take Mrs
Jamal at her word.

Yusuf
Khan got to his feet with a placatory smile. 'Mrs

Jamal,
you said that your son would never have done a bad thing. Do you honestly
believe that?'

'He
would never have hurt another human being. I swear on my life.'

'Do
you believe he went abroad to join a jihadist organization?'

'If
he did, it was not of his free will. That was not his way.'

'You
told this to the police and Security Services at the time, I presume, but what
- they wouldn't believe you?'

She
shook her head. 'They believe only what suits them.'

Khan
said, 'Did they give you the impression that they believed your son was an
extremist, a young man seduced into sympathy with violence against the West?'

'They
didn't have to. It was written in their faces - even the Indian one, Singh.'

Jenny
glanced at Alun Rhys. He caught her eye, his expression saying:
just wait
.

'And
did they even appear to entertain the possibility that your son or Mr Hassan
might have been the victims of a crime, even though there were signs of forced
entry on both their doors?'

'No.
Never.'

Khan
turned to the jury. 'Were you made to feel, Mrs Jamal, that your son was one of
the enemy within?'

Jenny
threw him a warning look. She wasn't going to tolerate grandstanding.

To
her credit, Mrs Jamal didn't give him the soundbite he was hoping for. 'I was
made to feel that nobody cared. But I prayed to God every day, and I still
believe there can be justice.'

Khan
snapped back: 'You don't think this inquest has been permitted merely to seal
your son's reputation as a traitor and a jihadi?'

'Mr
Khan,' Jenny said, 'I'll warn you once and not again - this is an inquest, not
an opportunity for you to score political points. Next time, you're out.'

The
murmur of dissent rose like a wave. Accusing glares turned on her.

Khan
said, 'You're quite right, ma'am. Perish the thought that an inquest should
ever be used to play politics.'

And
as he smiled someone sniggered, then another joined him. A moment later the
hall was filled with the sound of mocking laughter. Thrown, Jenny hesitated
long enough to lose all face. She felt her cheeks redden and her heart crash
against her ribs.

The
halved beta blocker Jenny had gulped down on leaving the courtroom had barely
got to work when Alison tapped on the door and let herself in before she could
answer.

'Mr
Rhys would like to talk to you.'

'Tell
him he can send me a note.'

'He
was insistent.'

'I
don't talk to interested parties during the inquest. He should know that.'

Alison
gave a dubious nod, turned halfway to the door, then looked back.

'What?'
Jenny said, impatiently.

'I
think you should clear the gallery, Mrs Cooper. They're not interested. It's
just a mob with a few ringleaders. They're already out at the front talking to
news cameras.'

'How
could I claim to be holding an open and fair inquiry if I shut out the public?'

'Do
you think those people care? Nothing will change what they think.'

'And
what's that?'

'Their
solicitor as good as said it. He thinks this is window dressing. You're just
here to prove those two boys ran off to become terrorists, or whatever we're
meant to call them.'

'I
can handle a few rowdy kids. Tell Rhys to get lost.' She took a gulp of water
from the glass on her desk. Alison watched it shake in her hand but made no
comment.

Jenny
said, 'Have you got hold of McAvoy yet?'

Alison
grimaced. 'His office says he's been in court on a long-running trial, but
he'll try to get over this afternoon.'

'Do
you know him?'

'Everyone
in CID knew McAvoy.'

'Really?
What's the story?'