‘Just a minute, Gum – that’s all I want.’
He swore and stepped aside. His foot brushed another bin liner that was waiting to be put outside.
‘Some little shit has nicked my wheelie bin again, and the council won’t collect black bags anymore.’ He shook his head as Kim walked past the bag that was starting to smell as bad as its buddies just outside the front door.
He guided her into the kitchen and picked up a can of beer from a collection on the kitchen work surface. He’d brought her into a room where there was nowhere to sit, and she wasn’t sure she would have wanted to anyway. The smell in the kitchen was a mixture of old frying fat and alcohol.
‘I remember when we had real bin men, the ones that picked up your tin bin, chucked it over their shoulder and tossed the contents into the back of the truck before putting it back outside your front door.’
‘Gum, why did you question Jenson Butler in connection with Melody’s disappearance?’
‘Because we knew him?’ he answered quickly, with no pauses for recollection. Despite the abuse to his body, his brain was still sharp, and it appeared that every memory associated with Melody’s disappearance was still fresh in his mind.
She leaned back against the countertop and folded her arms. ‘How?’
He swigged the last of his budget beer and tossed the can towards the bin. It missed. He reached behind and opened another.
‘One of my first jobs as a detective back in ’89 was to take the statement of a girl and her parents claiming she’d been raped by Jenson Butler.’
‘Are you kidding me?’ she asked.
‘Her name was Sylvie and she was thirteen years old.’
‘Oh, shit,’ she said, pushing her hands into her pockets.
‘Obviously, he claimed it was consensual, and they’d met after a pub crawl to celebrate something or other to do with his education.’
‘He was at university?’ she asked.
‘Final year.’
‘So how did he get out of it?’ Kim asked, trying to fathom the complexities this added to her case.
‘He didn’t. He was convicted of the crime and served twenty-four months.’
Kim shook her head. ‘Gum, that stuff has finally got to your brain. There’s no conviction record on the PNC, and nothing on the Sex Offenders Register.’ Both of these would have been checked by her colleague and flagged up to her.
‘Sex Offenders Register didn’t start until ’97 and wouldn’t have been indefinite anyway, as he was sentenced to less than thirty months.’
Okay, she got that, but his conviction should still be on his record.
‘Butler pleaded no contest.’
Kim rolled her eyes. Pleading no contest meant that while you weren’t admitting guilt, you were allowing the court to determine your punishment.
‘But his conviction would still have to remain on record until he’s one hundred years old,’ she said, citing the rules for data retention.
He took a swig of his drink and nodded. ‘Those are the rules now and in place since 2006, but before that a process called “weeding” was carried out.’
She’d heard the term and understood that it meant the removal of convictions and all associated evidence like fingerprints and DNA.
‘It wasn’t an automated system and there was little rhyme or reason to the process, but some crimes that should have been kept weren’t, and some that should have been destroyed were kept. Hence the need for an automated system that can count to one hundred.’
‘Bloody hell, Gum, why didn’t you say any of this the other day?’
‘You never mentioned his name as a person of interest, and there was nothing to tie Butler to Melody’s abduction. We expected him to lawyer up immediately but he didn’t.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘Because he had a pretty solid alibi of being on a construction site thirty miles away with more than a dozen members of his team, a site foreman and the main contractor.’
‘Jesus Christ,’ she said, rubbing at her forehead.
‘Is he a person of interest now?’ Gum asked, narrowing his gaze. His eyes were bright and alert, and he had barely touched his beer since they’d started talking.
‘Right now, Gum, your guess is as good as mine,’ she said, heading out of the kitchen. She needed air for more reasons than the overwhelming stench of filth.
She needed to process the fact that Steven Harte was doing business with a convicted sex offender.
Fifty-Four
Kim hadn’t expected to be back at Butler’s premises quite so soon.
‘Mr Butler is in a meeting,’ Barbara said. ‘I can’t disturb him,’ she added, looking flustered.
It was clear the woman had a very different working relationship with Butler Junior than she’d had with Butler Senior.
‘I’m afraid we must insist, and if your boss would prefer us to sit in here wearing full high-vis uniform until his visitors leave, that can be arranged.’
There, the woman had something to threaten him with that had come directly from her.
‘I’ll be back in a minute,’ she said, leaving the reception area.
‘Isn’t it strange how one piece of information about someone can change your entire opinion about that person?’ Bryant asked once they were alone. ‘I remember before becoming a police officer, I worked with a bunch of guys in a warehouse. One guy, salt of the earth, do anything for you. Most popular guy in the place until he let out in conversation he often drank and drove. Most folks cooled towards him after that.’
Kim understood what he meant in relation to Butler. Yesterday they’d viewed the pictures on the wall, impressed by the scope of his works, the growth of the company, the number of employees from the local area. All of those things were still true today and yet none of it counted for anything after what they’d learned.
‘Inspector, what is the meaning of this interruption? Your demands will not—’
‘Mr Butler, I suggest we take this somewhere private.’
‘I don’t need privacy to tell you that I am not available to speak right now. Please make an—’
‘This is your last warning to make this private, Mr Butler; otherwise we will have this conversation now and we will have it here.’
He hesitated before huffing and motioning for them to follow him.
They passed the glass meeting room they’d used the day before and entered a much smaller room with a round wooden table and four chairs.
‘Inspector, please give me the name of your superior officer, as I fully intend to make a formal complaint against you.’
‘His name is DCI Woodward and he’s used to it. As you’re in a rush, I’ll get right to it. Is there any reason you chose not to tell us you’re a convicted sex offender?’
He opened his mouth to argue and then fell into a chair.
She waited for an answer to her question.
‘I don’t tell everyone I meet.’
‘Not even the police officers who are investigating the abduction of young girls?’
He shook his head. ‘It has nothing to do with me.’
‘Your company carried out the construction work where our victim was buried. Do you want to tell us more about it or do you want to give your lawyer a call? Either way we’re going to have the conversation.’