She didn’t care about the groan, young Ryan always hit the nail on the head and his enthusiastic participation propelled what could be a long drawn-out process along at a rapid rate of knots.
Her conversations with both the group of girls she’d stopped, and Mr and Mrs Crawford circled in her mind and a sick sense of what might have happened nagged at her.
Jenna’s gaze met Taylor’s across the room and the thought was already there in his steady, experienced look.
He squared his shoulders and stepped forward. ‘There are six members of the family registered as living at that address. Mother and father, Linda and Gordon, and the children, Poppy – sixteen, Joshua – fourteen, and twins Talisha and Geraldine – aged eight.’ He held up a hand. ‘We cannot, until we have forensic evidence of the identity of those victims of the fire, assume that they are all family members.’ His voice deepened with command to hold onto the team. ‘Our duty now is protection of evidence and essentially protection and respect of any potential relatives and consideration of their needs and requirement of privacy.’ DI Taylor held his hand out towards the police media representative, Jasmine Tate. ‘Press announcement should be kept to bare details at present. You know the form. A fire at a residence in Farley. As yet the cause is unknown.’ He circled his hand in the air. ‘We would ask you respect the family’s privacy at this stage, et cetera, et cetera.’
Jasmine inclined her head and made a quick note on her notepad. New to the position, Jasmine’s first forays into journalism had proven her an excellent judge of diplomacy and tact. Exactly the requirements the Force had for their media, unlike newspaper journalists who would dig deep and in the case of some, dirty. Jasmine’s job was to deal in cold, hard facts ensuring the need to protect individuals against the public’s desire for information.
Jenna caught DI Taylor’s eye and he nodded for her to go ahead. ‘On the way to attending the fire, DC Mason and I almost took out a herd of deer along the Wenlock road.’ She paused to allow the hoots of laughter to roll around the room, nodding her head to acknowledge police humour. ‘Coming from the Wenlock direction, we came across three young women who also stopped to allow the deer to cross the road. Sophie Maxwell, Chanel Gosling and Olivia Brown. The eldest, Sophie, just turned seventeen. Chanel and Olivia only sixteen. On talking with them, I could smell alcohol, so I had to arrange for them to be detained and for the driver to be tested.’ She held her hands out, palm up and shrugged. ‘Nice girls, but once I felt they were compromised, I had no choice.’ She turned to pat Donna on the knee. ‘PC Donna McGuire and…’ she scanned the room to acknowledge the other officer, conjuring up a name she seemed to have difficulty grasping, ‘… PC Natalie Kempson tested the driver at the scene.’
Donna drew a breath and Jenna nodded for her to continue. ‘As Sergeant Morgan suspected, the driver blew a negative.’ She let out a low humorous chuckle. ‘She was too scared of her mum to even begin to think of drinking.’
Jenna took up where she’d previously left off. ‘During my conversation with the girls, it transpired that they knew Poppy Lawrence.’
Donna tapped her pen on the notebook in front of her. ‘The girls were really put out. Poppy was supposed to have been with them that night, but apparently her father insisted she attend his birthday party. According to the girls, Poppy was peeved because she knew it would be a washout and they’d all end up going to bed early and she’d miss out on her trip with the girls.’
Jenna swivelled to look at Donna, confident that she could trust her steady officer with this. ‘Could I ask you and Natalie to pick up on this and interview all three girls, individually and at their home addresses?’ At Donna’s nod, Jenna continued, ‘There was mention of Gordon Lawrence being not a very nice character.’
Donna nodded. ‘Yeah, they implied Poppy was too scared to say no to him.’
‘I didn’t think much of it at the time, but later in the evening when DC Ellis and I spoke with Mr and Mrs Crawford, we gained the same impression.’ Jenna turned her back on Donna to search the other side of the room. ‘Which brings me on to Mr and Mrs Crawford.’ She held out one hand towards the two officers in the corner. ‘DC Salter and Wainwright, could I ask you to follow up with them? They had some very interesting information regarding Gordon Lawrence and his penchant for what sounded like inappropriate use of his firearms. The quantity, variety and frequency of use is a little suspect.’
The buzz around the room made her pause. She didn’t need the team to formulate ideas, even though they were planted in her own head.
She held one hand up and raised her voice. ‘Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Salter and Wainwright will be collating facts and no assumptions should be made. We need to put together a robust background on the entire family.’ She turned to the team of three intel officers. ‘Any chance you can check on a shotgun and firearms certificate issued to Gordon Lawrence? Furthermore, we need to find out who else attended the party. Who were the guests? We need information, timelines. What happened?’ She scanned the room to ensure they were all on board, paying attention.
She caught PC Gardner’s sullen stare.
Paused. He gave her a little hitch in her stride and a whip of annoyance.
She moved on.
‘Why did the party finish early? Was it early for them? Was it a domestic? Did they have a fight and all go to bed early? Or have the Lawrence family been the subject of a targeted crime. A break-in gone wrong? A planned target?’
Whatever it was, they could make no assumptions at this point. But the sneaking suspicion had already taken root and Jenna had difficulty pushing it away.
Satisfied she’d allocated her best people to deal with key areas, Jenna zoned out as DI Taylor assigned further tasks to each of the team members.
Six family members at home for a party. What had happened for it to end the way it did?
She took in DI Taylor’s confirmation that the intel officers had initiated an investigation into the family’s finances. Always a good baseline to start an investigation.
DI Taylor addressed the duty management team, grabbing her attention at the mention of her name. ‘At the scene, DS Morgan assigned scene guards. I assume you have the continuation of that plan in hand?’ At Rob Fenwick’s nod, DI Taylor drew in a deep breath to expand his broad chest. ‘And finally,’ he tapped the papers he’d rolled up while he spoke against the palm of his hand, ‘I cannot stress enough. Remember – T.I.E.! Trace. Identify. Eliminate.’
As the shuffle of movement started, DI Taylor held up a restraining hand.
‘Before we go. There’s more.’ He shot Jenna a wide grin. ‘Congratulations to DS Morgan, DS Bennett, DCs Ellis, Downey and Blue on a swift and successful operation on their way into work this morning.’
The vertical creases down each side of DI Taylor’s cheeks deepened and Jenna almost groaned out loud.
‘It turns out DS Morgan has a drug-pushing dog, but, more to the point, our officers took quite a downline of pushers and users this morning without pausing for breath. Currently, DS Bennett and DC Ellis are continuing the search of three houses on the Mountside estate after arrests were made this morning at the gym. We have our hands full in custody. You may recognise some of the names: Lamonte Junior, Lena Alexander, Marie West and Joel Hopkins.’ A collective groan rumbled around the room at the mention of the last two names. ‘I’ve allocated officers who are already questioning our suspects. Most importantly,’ DI Taylor eyeballed everyone in the room from underneath a furrowed brow, ‘there is one Shaun Cunningham, barista extraordinaire at The Coffee Shack. He is not to be approached or touched. Drug Squad have requested we leave him in place for them to conduct further investigations without arousing suspicion. They may well use him to get further up the chain of command.’