Confessions of an Undercover Cop. Ash Cameron

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       Strapped

      My first injury of significance was eight months into my probation. By the time it happened, I’d dealt with plenty of abusive, drunk and violent prisoners and I suppose I’d been lulled into a sense of security. When tackling someone who doesn’t want to be arrested, or someone who wants to fight, you rely on your wits, your colleagues and your senses, one or all of which are prone to letting you down.

      Female officers were armed with a little wooden stick, a truncheon, that was usually used to smash the windows of houses to which we needed to gain entry because the occupants were either avoiding us, or dead. We didn’t have CS spray, or utility belts with heavy equipment to weigh us down. Nor did we have body armour. All that came later. Women didn’t even wear trousers, mounted branch excepted.

      It was a Friday night duty and I was posted with PC Jim McBean. I liked him. We got on well. He was a family man with four years’ service and eight years older than me. He knew everything, everyone, and was what was known as an ‘old sweat’.

      It was nearing one o’clock in the morning, our refreshment time, and all the pubs had shut, or were closed having a landlord’s private party, common practice in the East End on a weekend night.

      Jim drove slowly past a block of flats on a notorious estate and I glanced into the car park as we passed by. I saw a stationary vehicle facing towards us, blocking the car park entrance. The headlights flicked off as we drove by.

      ‘Can you go back, Jim? There’s a car there. I don’t know if it’s stalled, or something. Maybe it’s nothing,’ I said.

      Jim stopped and reversed back a few yards, pulling up in front of the car park. It was dark with the shadows of the building blocking natural light. The security lamp that was supposed to be lit had been smashed. We got out of the panda car and walked across to the purple Porsche. I heard the engine of the car ticking, cooling down. The driver’s door creaked open and a tall dark-skinned man climbed from the driver’s seat.

      Jim called for a PNC check on the vehicle to see if it was reported lost or stolen and to find out who the registered keeper was.

      The guy backed away into the car park, towards a stairway.

      ‘Wait!’ I shouted, rushing to the driver’s door, which he’d left open. The ignition barrel was missing. The car had been hot-wired.

      I ran to the stairwell and blocked the suspect from going into the building. He was broad and well over six foot and I felt tiny as he looked down at me. He did that sucking spittle in between his teeth thing.

      ‘It ain’t what you think,’ he said.

      Jim stood behind him.

      The guy turned, waving his arms up in the air, as if brushing us away even though we hadn’t touched him. ‘You only stopped me ’cos I’s black.’

      ‘Rubbish,’ I said. ‘We stopped you because we thought there was a problem with the car. That you’d broken down or something. Whose car is it?’

      He sucked into his teeth again. ‘My mate’s, man. I jus’ stalled it.’

      ‘You’ll have the key then?’ Jim asked.

      I saw the man’s head coming towards me but I couldn’t do anything, go anywhere, my back against the stairs. He moved fast and smashed his head down onto my shoulder. The pain was like a metal spear shooting down through my chest. I fell to the ground. I know I screamed because I heard it, but it didn’t sound like me. It was a yowling, yelping animal. The pain was sharp, sheer and I’d felt nothing like it before.

      Jim grabbed him by his T-shirt, flung him up and then down in one sweeping motion in a swift black-belt judo move. The guy’s head impacted with the tarmac and his left eyebrow split open. Jim pulled the prisoner’s arms up his back and straddled him. I crawled towards them and hurled myself onto my attacker’s legs, tights all tattered, my arm hanging limply.

      Jim radioed for urgent assistance. When the cavalry arrived, the man, who gave his name as Colin Abehu, was taken away in the back of a police van. I was carted off to hospital for my shoulder to be set and strapped. It was dislocated and the collarbone smashed.

      Abehu had a split eyelid.

      The Porsche had been stolen from a financier who lived on the Isle of Dogs. Abehu was charged with theft of a motor vehicle and assault on the police. He admitted nothing and the case went to trial.

      The jury found him not guilty on all charges. It was my first time giving evidence at Crown Court. I don’t know why they didn’t find him guilty. It left me with a bitter taste and a deformed collarbone and I didn’t like it at all.