Henley nodded as she picked up the phone.
‘Inspector Henley, SCU.’
‘It’s Anthony. I’ve got news for you. It’s up to you whether you take it as good or bad.’
‘What is it?’ Henley asked, catching the exhaustion in Anthony’s voice.
‘Members of my team were allocated to Ezra’s case. I made it a priority and there’s no way I wasn’t going to keep you in the loop.’
‘Thank you,’ Henley said, sipping the coffee that Stanford had made extra strong. ‘So, what have you got for me?’
‘We were able to recover fingerprints from the standpipe that was used to assault Ezra and DNA from the broken strap of Ezra’s rucksack. Unfortunately, we didn’t get a hit with the fingerprints but Ezra being a clever little bugger had a lot of skin under his fingernails.’
‘He must have been scratching away, defending himself,’ said Henley.
‘Getting evidence for us,’ said Anthony. ‘The labs are chocked full with a backlog so I can’t say when we’ll get a DNA result back.’
‘Shit,’ Henley said as an image of Ezra lying in the hospital bed, his face swollen and bruised and his head heavily bandaged as the monitor recorded his vitals flashed in her mind and hot coffee spilled on to her fingers.
‘You all right?’
‘Not really,’ Henley paused as the door opened and the borough commander, Geraldine Barker, walked in. ‘Anthony, I’ve got to leave you, but thank you.’
‘So, let me see if I’ve understood this correctly,’ said Barker as she stood in front of the SCU team. ‘Fonseka will only reveal the name of the man we know as Don if he’s granted immunity from prosecution?’
‘That’s the long and short of it, ma’am,’ said Henley.
‘How much time do you have left on Fonseka’s custody clock?’
Henley checked the clock on the wall. ‘Four hours and thirty-four minutes,’ she said. ‘As far as I’m concerned, I’ve had enough of Fonseka wasting our time with this immunity nonsense.’
‘I agree. You’ve got more than enough to charge him with conspiracy to murder and misconduct in a public office,’ said Barker. ‘It’s between him and his legal team to propose a deal to the prosecution. I want him charged and out of my cells before lunchtime.’
‘We can do that,’ said Pellacia who had been sitting quietly next to Henley.
‘Are we any closer to identifying this Don?’
‘Not yet but we’ve circulated enhanced CCTV images of the vehicles seen at the scene of the acid attack. We’ve also got the description that Laurence Durant gave us. The composite image is on the Crimestoppers website and has been shown on the local news. We’re also arranging for the witnesses at the acid attack scene to give their full statements,’ said Pellacia.
‘And what about Mikaela Fonseka?’
‘No idea,’ said Henley. ‘The last sighting of her was about an hour after Elliot Fonseka was arrested. A neighbour saw her entering her home and leaving forty-five minutes later.’
‘And what about the Section 18 search?’
‘We retrieved copies of court documents from the garden office, and we seized the computer equipment but there were signs that someone had left in a hurry, ma’am,’ said Copeland. ‘The wardrobe in the main bedroom was in a state of disarray and what appeared to be a document folder had been emptied on the bed. We recovered Elliot Fonseka’s passport, birth certificate and insurance papers but nothing for his wife.’
‘She’s clearly on the run but I don’t think that the remaining defendants on their list are safe,’ said Pellacia. ‘Bartholomew Gardner, Mason and Paige Jones.’
‘Which is one of the reasons why I’m here this morning,’ said Barker. ‘UK protected persons services are refusing to offer protection on the grounds that there isn’t a real and imminent threat to their lives.’
‘The fact that we’ve got eight people on our board, six of them dead, isn’t evidence of a real and imminent threat?’ said Stanford.
Barker raised her eyebrow at Stanford.
‘Sorry, ma’am,’ he added.
‘Look, I understand the frustration, but that is the reality. My hands are completely tied and, before you even suggest it, I do not have the bodies spare to sit on Gardner and the Joneses until they’re either convicted and remanded immediately in custody, or your outstanding suspects are caught.’
