Something to Declare by Cyclist

Chapter 53

We left the court and went off to the noodle bar in the next street, I really needed something strongly flavoured to clear my mouth of the bad taste left both by my illness and the facts that had come out in the trial.

I had material for nightmares for eternity, and I pitied the jury. They had been presented with several files of photographs….I shuddered.

All witnesses now dismissed, we formed quite a group, with the solid mass of Commandos around us, Sally wrapped round one of her very own. Albert had volunteered to stay at the court just in case the verdict arrived that day, but I had my doubts. This was a heavy case for a jury, and the judge’s instructions had been very clear: what was their intent, were they trying to make her jump, or just gloating as she did?

All I had heard of Melanie Senior’s character made me regret deeply that we had never met, and I realised yet again my luck. That could so easily have been me…Geoff felt my shudder, and pulled me close.

No, Simon, Stewart, all had been right. We were the majority, the ones who cared, and we far outnumbered the Ansteys and Smiths of this world, even the rest of the Stevens family and their ilk. It was like the job; so many arseholes abuse you, you click over very early in your career to realise it is them who have the problem, not yourself, and then it becomes hard not to laugh out loud at their posturing.

No, what happens is that every so often you meet real people, and understand yet again why you do the job pompously referred to as “protecting society”, because there IS a society out there, a solid majority of good folk who deserve better than being left to the likes of our four friends.

My phone rang, and the rest started, but it was Simon.

“Hi Steph, how has it gone?”

“Jury has retired, Simon. To be truthful, it was awful. I don’t envy them at all. Once we get a verdict I will let you know immediately”

“I am sure, thank you. I just had something to run past you, well, two things, really. This has hit my parishioners hard, you know, to have such an obscenity happen in their safe little world, and they have made a number of suggestions.”

“And….?”

“I have spoken to Jerry already, and we are making our office facilities available for his group’s use rent-free from now on. They will have to provide their own stationery and that, of course, but there s a room they can use for counselling and so on.”

“How will that sit with your more….traditional parishioners, Simon?”

“I think I have enough bits in His book to remind them of the unconditional love He has for all of His children, Steph. It is my job…and I have another request you may be able to help with. That was a very unusual funeral, Geoff’s idea being a superb way to celebrate life. What do you think of the idea of making something like that an annual event?”

That made perfect sense to me. It would indeed be shouting at the Devil, and there are very, very few things more joyful than music and dance. I told Simon that I would make the calls, and returned to the physical group around me.

Ashley had been left with a child minder, and I felt real warmth in thinking about the hope she represented. This was the granddaughter and great granddaughter of bigots, and yet her parents had come out of it as human and humane. The Smith boys were probably a lost cause, but Ashley showed that things could change. She brightened the world, and I giggled at the memory of her irruption into the bootneck-shrink snogging event.

“So, Sal, when’s the wedding?”

“Sod you, Jones!”

“Just remember…” I said, putting on an awful imitation of her Sarf Lahndun accent,

“We wants pitchers!”

There was a roar from the rest of us, and Sally herself blushed.

Albert rang as we were having coffees just up the road, and it turned out that the jury had been very, very quick in their verdict, as well as unanimous. The judge had instructed them to return in the morning to deliver the verdict, and having already received all the reports he would be able to sentence, or release, as necessary. I had a feeling that the sexual assault lie may just have turned them, and wondered if those four had any other ideas in their heads apart from “unnatural” sex.

I couldn’t help it, and started to roar with laughter at a vision of Anstey in my Lavender Excess. Geoff asked me what was so funny, and when I explained Sally snorted coffee all down her blouse.

Laughter. It keeps us sane, and puts the night horrors in their place.

We arranged to meet outside the court the next day, and Albert said that he had “asked very nicely” that the ushers reserve a family space n the gallery for us.

The next morning was grey and damp, but I didn’t care. Today, hopefully, Melanie would be given peace. The usher had fulfilled her promise, and we made a solid block of intimidation for the foursome when they arrived in the dock. There were several large and tattoo-ridden men elsewhere in the gallery, and I recognised Anstey’s Gunter of a wife, who very, very clearly recognised me. There were also rather a number of uniformed police around.

There is a quirk I have often seen with juries in contested trials, in which when a guilty verdict is delivered the foreman looks away from the accused as he or she does so. It is a big thing to deprive someone of their good name and liberty, and most people find it very hard to do. The jury were in, and I noticed several of them look at the accused with real and obvious distaste, disgust almost.

“All rise!”

The judge entered, and the clerk stood.

“Have you elected a foreman?”

A middle-aged woman stood. “Yes, we have, your honour”

“There are a number of charges against the accused. They stand or fall depending on the verdict in respect of the most serious charge, which is that of murder. Have you reached a verdict in respect of that charge, and in respect of all defendants?”

“Yes we have, your honour”

“In respect of Billy James Anstey on the charge of murder, what is your verdict?”

The foreman looked away from Anstey.

“Guilty”

“Is that the verdict of you all?”

“Yes”

“In respect of Alfie John Smith on the charge of murder, what is your verdict?”

“Guilty.”

And so it went. All four were condemned. Gunter Anstey began screaming abuse, and the judge had her forcibly removed. Once silence had been restored, he began his address.

“ I have had the misfortune to preside over a number of unpleasant trials, but this has been one of the most revolting examples of inhumanity I have ever encountered. A family have been deprived of the love of a woman who was just about to start a new and exciting life. Service colleagues have been left with nothing but the memory of a comrade who saved their lives under the fire of the enemies of the country you live in. The world itself has been deprived of an individual who, by all the accounts we have received in this courtroom, was of great credit to the humanity that you seem to have discarded.

“Not only did you attack this person, best her and hound her to her death, but you did it as a pack. You did it for no other reason than that she was different to you. I have examined your antecedents, and it will, I am sure, come as no surprise to the good and honest people of the jury that neither of those words could ever be applied to any of you. Your history is one of violence, intimidation, dishonesty and predation upon those weaker or more vulnerable than you, and your depraved and inhuman attack on Melanie Stevens simply follows the pattern you have chosen for what passes for your lives. You selected what you thought was a defenceless individual. Having discovered that you were unable to subdue her in what could be called a fair fight, a term I use with reservations here, you resorted to the tactics of hyenas.

“When caught, you constructed an edifice of lies with no foundation, lies intended to blacken the memory of the brave soldier you so brutally and inhumanly beat and then murdered, even so far as to claim that she was a paedophile.

“Alfie John Smith, Billy James Anstey, stand. Life imprisonment, with a minimum period of detention of not less than twenty five years.

“Billy Boy Smith, Alfie Obie Smith, stand. Detention at Her Majesty’s pleasure in a young offenders’ institute, your detention to be reviewed periodically.

“Take them down and out of my sight”

Alfie junior was crying for his mother as they took them away. No sympathy, none at all.

There was still another trial to go, that of the Gunter, her sister and Smith’s wife for the conspiracy, but I had had enough. We left the court and walked straight into them n the public area, along with the collections of tattoos I had noticed and, yes, they were really that stupid. She launched herself at me, followed by the rest, and I felt myself jerked backwards as a fist flew past my head and struck her in the face.

Sally has a surprisingly good right. The rest was very, very quick, as twelve Royal Marine Commandos did what they do very well, but what made me almost giggle was the behaviour of two coppers nearby.

As one started forward to intervene, the other pulled him back. Only after the rather rapid Marine response did they step forward, and I got a very clear wink.

Ah well, I suppose we would have to come here again. I just wished it could all be over.