Chapter Fifteen

"Why are you so obsessed with bad-mouthing one of the few decent cops left in Greater Manchester Police?" He had turned to Superintendent McNally fully, almost shouting into his face. "I see myself in Chris, when I was that age. If I thought things were shit back then in the 1980s, they're even worse now." yelled DCI Gene Hunt annoyed with McNally in his office.

DI Alex Drake replied "What he sounds like is an honest copper who's had enough of all the bullshit that we've been wading through since Mac. And right now, we need a damn sight more of those."

By now she was sure that Chris would have got the call through from the retired bent coppers who were lying in wait. She just hoped that he would be okay; she'd promised Shaz to ring through via the Motorola police radio handsets for back up if things got out of hand.

She shook her head, feeling her heart cracking within her chest. "No. He was a Detective Inspector. But in 1982, he was a Police Constable."

"But -" he faltered, "I dunno if you've checked an old paper, but it was 1982."

She inhaled sharply, expelling the breath quicker than she should have done.

"I know. At least, here it is. But DI Martin Summers and PC Kevin Wells. One died, but he wasn't supposed to. I was...I was there when he did it. And he put the gun in my hand, Gene. It's in my drawer."

He was aware he was still crouching after a few moments, feeling more than his eight years older than DI Alex Drake and stupid for sitting and watching her like she was still the child; Gene rescued from the blue Ford Escort Mk3 Ghia car bomb when he was just nearly 16 or 17.

"Take it you don't fancy a fry-up, then?" asked DCI Gene Hunt eating his cooked breakfast.

"Ugh." From the corner of his eye he saw her bringing her hand to her mouth again, though she didn't retch. "I don't know how you can have one sober."

"You're a Southerner, Bols. It's not in yer blood." sniggered DCI Gene Hunt smiling at his DI.

As she leant against the desk, DCI Sam Tyler noticed the small evidence bag in the palm of her hand. She had been the one to notice the tag at the crime scene and had come back to it repeatedly since. DCI Gene Hunt had been too troubled by trying to figure out what breed of scum would injure a woman in her fifties and leave her in such a state afterwards. The bruises that circled her neck reminded him too much of his bastard of an uncle and the marks he had left on his stepmother.

He woke with a start, pain searing through his chest and his senses all over the shop. The clock at the bedside read 09:10 AM.

"Shit!"

He got himself ready and out the door in a record time, bombing the Ford Mondeo TX down strangely quiet streets, which were a blessing, ensuring that he arrived at the station just on twenty five past.

Once that was done and the Ford Mondeo Titanium X was secure, he got into CID at half nine.

And then there was Gene. He was as he often was in traffic piled streets, largely attentive aside from the odd word of banter to the two officers in the back. Even then his volume didn't reach even a gentle roar, the sound of the Mondeo's humming engine as he brought its speed a little faster outdoing him. His gloved hands gripped the steering wheel, his eyes fixed upon the road. Considerate, careful, almost contemplative in a way that she had only encountered a handful of times, though they had all happened fairly recently.

It was a dream come true - the Sweeney, the Persuaders, Starsky & Hutch, all those shows Gene had enjoyed watching in his life as a child of the Seventies. DCI Sam Tyler walks to Gene's beloved Ford Mondeo Titanium X waiting to help his old childhood friend and colleague with a significant case that is occurring on the Boss's birthday; something Gene's dreamed of since childhood even before becoming a police officer.

"How kind of you to tag in, Sammy dude. I wouldn't want to cause you any inconvenience," said DCI Gene Hunt kindly opening the front passenger door for his junior Detective Chief Inspector and clicks his seat belt into place.

Sam Tyler had to get on his feet again, to get back to work with fellow DCI Gene Hunt. To police work. In 2007 with modern methods. Not those of 1973. The building hadn't changed much on the outside; just the cars standing in the car park were, of course, modern. But when he entered the building, he immediately noticed the smell. Or the lack of smell. It didn't smell like cigarette smoke, and there was no faint smell of whisky hanging in the air. The air was clean and smelled of disinfectant, of cleaning products, of paper, of warm air coming from printers and copiers.

Sam saw that Gene's father had aged about 30 years but still looked rather young for his 60s.

Gene's 42nd birthday today came with a case that every police officer dreams of: Stopping more police corruption as other scandals were brought to the attention of the Cold Case Unit when Greater Manchester Police A Division and London Metropolitan Police officers of the 70s and 80s worked with criminals, made many false arrests, operated on violence and drunk on duty.

To: CarlingR35891, LizzieC4681, TylerS487, SkeltonC1980,RoyM 777, DrakeA
From: DCIGeneHunt . .uk
cc: J_GreaterManchesterPolice .
Subject: Cold Case Unit's r.e bent 1970s-80s Greater Manchester and London Metropolitan Police officers.
10:34:04 AM Thursday 22 June 2007

Listen up guys, ladies and read my briefing e-mail very carefully!

There's been more old ex bent police officers than I can collate in the archives den downstairs; their lazy and rogue approach to policing is starting to bother my old mentor Detective Superintendent Harry Woolf, who remembers the backstabbing coppers when he was just a young DC. I came across my old uncle's violent methods when I was first promoted to DI in 1988.

Yours Sincerely

DCI Eugene Hunt

Gene finds himself confronting a formerly corrupted force, another legacy left over from the 1970s and 1980s when Sam Tyler calls over his and the Boss's status over the Motorola in car radio "8-7-0 to Alpha One. That ex Chief Inspector, Hunt lives in Winton Drive."

"Right. Shall we go and have words?" asked DCI Gene Hunt leaning on the car, "When a big old copper at the top of the rogue police ladder goes, the other smaller police goldfish get excited. They wanna climb that ladder to easy street." said Gene as Sam picked up his theory of the unofficial ranks that used to run in Greater Manchester Police during their formative years.

There came the familiar, hoarse tones of roughness of a certain voicebox which had been steeped in a lifetime's worth of hard drinking, bad diet and innumerable fags. "I've done my bit, yeah," Ex DCI Hunt smiled, showing badly tobacco-stained teeth. Where there still were teeth that was. He was missing quite a few as well; as a result had a slight whistling sound to his voice on the e or s.

The car had slight nagging rust spots that persisted in trying to grow in the wheel wells of older Hunt's beloved classic Cortina Mk3, no matter how often he just as persistently scrubbed them out with a bit of steel wool.

Gene spat, particularly disdainful of the fact this man couldn't even catch suspects without using the old fists first, think later policy and intimidating witnesses "I remember bringing you down, when my mentor Harry Woolf was a DCI, even though I was only barely out of my teens as a Detective Inspector!" he fumed over needing to settle an old bent copper battle circa 1988.

DCI Gerry Hunt had been a DCI years and years ago complete with bad greasy mouse-brown greying hair, his massive pot belly totally unrestrained by two-sizes-too-small flared trousers, cheap suspenders, cream loafers and a rumpled, badly stained button-down hideously 1970s patterned shirt completing the look, he failed quite badly in his attempted task.

"Oh, now the great div nephew baby spotted dick is a DCI!" referring to Gene's acne covered face quite offensively forgetting that he is now 42 years of age and that it isn't the late Eighties anymore. "You're forgetting that I was a copper, when you were still fighting acne!"

"Hark, the bent copper sings." Gene joked at the overweight elderly ex police officer in front of his eyes. "It will catch up and bite you finally, once we get you and your old cronies arrested, especially as you caused DCI Tyler's accident!"

XXXXXXX

DCIs Gene Hunt and Sam Tyler went to visit a former Woman's Detective Constable named WDC Mabel Stubbs from the staff archives of Greater Manchester Police on the computer systems.

"I'm sorry, officers, but you could never tell in those days, when I worked in the police service" she said, not unkindly. "What can I help you gentlemen with today?"

"We're sorry to disturb you, Mrs. Mabel Stubbs, but if we could just have a moment of your time." Sam was a winning combination of straightforward and deferential.

"Yes, love?" Gene showing his warrant card and took another sip of his tea, looking for all the world as though he'd never tasted a better cup in his life, writing down into a notebook what life was like for her as a police officer back in those male dominated days.

"Obviously, my old Guv, your uncle Hunt's got some priorities in the right place, him taking care of his mum and all. She's getting on in years and unfortunately, it doesn't seem everyone can be lucky enough like me in keeping it all together, do you know what I mean?" Mrs. Stubbs took another sip of tea and seemed to be contemplating the pattern on the cup for a few seconds before continuing. "Nasty man, like so many were back then, did what they wanted in CID and thought they could treat people like shit." Gene was writing what had happened to DCI Gerry Hunt since his retirement from the force, she asks if Gene's partner would like another cup of tea or coffee.

"No thanks, ma'am, though it was very nice," Sam smiled when Mrs. Stubbs offers tea or coffee.

"Ta, very muchly!" Gene flashed a grin, eyes sparkling, as he extended his cup forward and let Mrs. Stubbs pour out. "My uncle looked to muscle in on the gap left by the previous Guvs. Trouble is, their former big time DCI years puts them squarely on my radar."

"I feel much safer knowing modern police like you are on our streets, and can do your jobs without treating people like shit or being nasty men like so many of them were back in my day of the 70s when you Genie and Sammy were barely out of nappies." Mrs. Stubbs returned, rising to show the two out. "You search my Guv's house, see if there's anything from his police service."

"Trust me, my stepmum knew everything about everyone on our street. Mrs. Stubbs knows." Gene's faith in this was unshakable. "Still, couldn't hurt to ask. We'll stop in; it's on our way back. I could do with some lunch, too."

"Good to see you taking such joy in your work, Boss." Sam responded dryly.

"This is the chance every copper dreams about, I've been waiting for this since I was a kid." stated Gene who last saw his uncle as a child, his family lived near Mabel Stubbs during the 1970s when he was a skinny little boy with glass blue eyes. She has lived in the same street since he was born somewhere in 1965, for nigh on nearly four decades and knew Gene's family. She still has an original maroon 1978 or 1979 Ford Granada Mk1 Ghia automatic saloon with Ronal alloys since her days as a WDC.

Gene's happiest moment was the day he made DCI in 1997. The bracing swell of triumph in his heart throbbed there still, the pride in Harry's eyes as clear in his mind as any photograph.

Meanwhile he gathers intelligence on former DCI Gerry Hunt, now retired after 50 years of police service since 1957 as he was born in 1938 a year before World War II began their bombing outbreaks on Britain from the Germans.

Name: Gerry Hunt

DOB: 5/7/1938

1954 - 1956 Two years National Service.

1957 - 1967 Joins the Lancashire Constabulary as a Police Constable, stationed until transfer to Salford and Manchester in the city centre, rising through the ranks was a Detective Inspector prior to transfer into 'A' Division.

1967 - 1982 Stationed in Salford and Manchester Police (from 1974 onwards Greater Manchester Police) promoted to Detective Chief Inspector in 1971 when DCI Stockdale was given a position of Detective Superintendent. He only suspiciously had one black mark against his record for two investigations, the cop killer Leslie Johns and the murder at a local underworld boxing club.

1982 - 2007 Transferred to Metropolitan Police in London, but was suspended from the Police Force on grounds of retirement after corruption from his Greater Manchester Police days reared their ugly head four to forty five years later since the original cases.

The entire CID gathered around a computer and interactive whiteboard to view ex DCI Gerry Hunt's police records. "What have you got, Cybercrime?" he leans over their slim desktop computer monitors viewing his Cybercrime colleagues each find from the Greater Manchester Police archives.

"Trust the Gene Genie." Gene referred to his nickname he's had since ten years of age referring to a 1973 David Bowie song The Jean Genie "Get your popcorn and watch this old archive film we have of DCI Gerry Hunt beating witnesses up in A Division, fitting crimes up on innocent people." The Greater Manchester Police archive footage starts to play on the interactive whiteboard via a desktop computer and plug in projector.

The old camera moves out shakily to briefly show a few plain clothed CID police officers watching witnesses get beaten by their Guv, DCI Hunt but Gene's uncle, it is unclear as to which year of the Seventies or Eighties this was taken in. Gene sits forward, resting his chin on his cupped hands and sighs softly in disgust.

DCI Gene Hunt pauses the digitalised archive film shown in Microsoft Media Player via a SMART board and computer projector "See that? Go back."

The footage is "wound back" by clicking on Rewind and paused on an image of the four police officers involved accusing a blonde long haired female witness wearing a red jumper with a medallian necklace of being involved with a smash and grab at a jewellery shop.

DC Chris Skelton turns the sound on, which allows DCIs Gene Hunt and Sam Tyler to note down a transcript for the encounter. In using modern technology to find new evidence against the former DCI who put DCI Tyler in the nasty hit and run six months ago on Manchurian Way motorway.

To everyone's surprise, Sam is discharged from hospital six months after his admission. Well, Sam isn't surprised. To the contrary, he's been hoping for it. Gene and Liz are there when he limps out into the reception area, his bag hanging awkwardly off his good shoulder – but not for long, because Liz reaches out and takes it, not listening to Sam's protests.

FIN