Influence Read online

  Influence

  by

  Andrew Snadden

  Dedicated to my Family, Friends and the Police Service

  Without Fear or Favour

  Chapter One

  “Oh shit, it's the filth!” A sense of urgency and fear reverberated in the middle aged man's voice.

  “We're screwed lads, he's coming! What are we going to do?!” said one of the four men sat around a circular table in a poorly lit room inside a disused warehouse, whilst another hurried to cover up the large amount of white powder that was in the centre of the table.

  A tall, slim, middle aged man wearing a tailored suit walked forcefully into the room. He was there for business, and he meant it. As he walked up to the table there was a sense of apprehension in the room that was almost tangible. These five men had a lot to lose, and this man represented the very thing that could snatch it all away from them; an officer of the law, a police detective.

  The suited detective's footsteps grew louder as his weight caused the worn floorboards beneath to flex, creating that familiar and annoying creak, the type of creak that someone needed to repair but had never had the time or inclination to bother.

  “Why the guilty faces lads?” the detective enquired, knowing full well what these guys were about and what they were up to. The question was met with silence as the five faces stared back at him defiantly, unwilling to provide him with an incriminating answer.

  “Come on, the game's up” the detective shouted at them as he pulled a badge that signified his power from his right jacket pocket and threw it down onto the table.

  “What are you waiting for? Come on, share it with me!” he said with an air of satisfaction and a Cheshire cat like grin on his face. Suddenly the five men burst into laughter.

  “And use my warrant card to cut my line!” he said without any sign of remorse.

  The detective took a seat at the table as one of the males cut him a line of the white powder using his police identity card. He pulled an appreciative smile before he leant down and snorted the whole white powdery line with expert precision; this was certainly not the first time he had taken cocaine. The detective finished the line and leant back in his seat rubbing the remnants of the powder from his nose.

  “Good to see you, it's been a while. Done any police work recently? Or are you still hiding behind that lovely desk of yours?”

  Brothers in Arms

  Chapter Two

  Inside a large briefing room in the City's HQ, two teams of black clad Specialist Firearms Officers with enough equipment to invade a small country, sat waiting for a last minute operational briefing from a Firearms Silver Commander who would be in charge.

  “For God's sake, I should be eating a kebab right now instead of waiting for another shit job as usual” said PC Dave Allen, a slightly chubby officer, who somehow managed to look like he hadn't visited a gym in years despite actually maintaining a high level of fitness.

  “I know, don't get me wrong, I'm hanging out for a decent job too but why they've called a last minute operation, I'll never know. Could be a good crack though” answered PC John O'Keeffe, an athletic looking officer in his early forties whose use of military slang could be hard to fathom at times for those who were not fluent in 'squaddy talk'.

  “John, Dave's right, this is going to be a load of bollocks” interjected PC Steve Evans an officer in his early thirties with an average build. “It's a Saturday and I should be at home with the wife and kids”

  “Count yourself lucky then” Allen said to Evans.

  “Why is that Dave?” Evans asked with a confused expression on his face that was shared by O'Keeffe too.

  “Because if I had a wife that looked like yours, I wouldn't be rushing to get home!” Allen said whilst trying not to laugh at his own joke. If there was one thing you could count on with Allen, it was that he thought he was hilarious, even if others didn't.

  “Piss off!” Evans said as he shook his head and turned to face the front of the room, in attempt to ignore Allen.

  Suddenly another voice came from over their shoulders, interrupting the idle chit chat and stating what should have been obvious to the specialist officers.

  “They've called it because it's their job, and believe it or not, it's our job to respond to it without question! And besides Dave..........you're a fat bastard who could do with laying off the kebabs for a while; Oh and by the way, at least Steve's wife wants him at home!” the pointed remark caused both O'Keeffe and Evans to burst out laughing as Allen shook his head with embarrassment before laughing himself.

  With a pleased look on his face, the officer leant back and slumped into his chair with a feeling of satisfaction derived from his sharp and witty put down. The officer, Anthony 'Jodie' Foster was a rugged but good looking man with a powerful athletic build, five foot eleven tall and with brown hair fashioned in short and smart cut. His nickname, Jodie, was the result of sharing his surname with the famous Hollywood actress Jodie Foster. If there was one thing that the officers on the unit could be counted on for, it was inventing nicknames for their colleagues, no matter how obvious or silly they may have been. Foster had joined the 'job', slang for the police service, at the tender age of twenty one and was now celebrating his fourteenth year in the service. He loved being a copper but still had a work hard and play even harder philosophy on life which revolved around his job, women and partying. And as a result of this sometimes wild persona, Foster was seen as a 'good old boy' by his colleagues on the unit, which in a nutshell meant that he was well liked and accepted within the elite group of officers. From an outsider's point of view, you would have been forgiven for believing that the four men were not on friendly terms because of the highly offensive and personal humour, but the reality, as strange as it may have sounded, was that they were all incredibly close. The way the members of the unit saw it was; if you don't like the humour, you had best piss off somewhere else.

  “Alright lads, pipe down” ordered Sergeant Kevin Marriot, a tall, dark haired man in his early forties.

  As silence fell around the large room, a youngish looking Chief Inspector got up out of his seat and took centre stage at the front of the lecture theatre. He switched on the tape recorder and identified himself before stating the time, date and location of the briefing.

  “For those of you who don't know me, I'm Chief Inspector Ben Murray, and before we move on to what we're here for, I would like to apologise for the last minute operation, I know some of you were looking forward to an after shift kebab! The time is 18.00hrs hours, the date is 10th October 2011 and this briefing is taking place in the lecture theatre of City Police’s HQ, the operation's name is OP Barrier”.

  As a rule operational briefings were always taped in the event of a post incident Independent Police Complaints Commission (or IPCC) enquiry where the recording would provide a deeper insight into what information had been provided to the officers and why. The IPCC, not above controversy itself, didn't seem to have to adhere to the same level of accountability when it came to their own work.

  “Great, he heard me talking about the Kebab!” Allen whispered under his breath to Foster and O'Keeffe.

  The Chief Inspector swiftly moved on to the point of the briefing. “Right, I'm going to cut to the chase, this ain’t a crap job, I know you've all heard that before but this one is the real McCoy! A few hours ago one of our Intel handlers was told by a snitch who has links to Ahmed Mahood's extremist group that Ahmed is beefing up his terror operation and plotting an attack in the UK, the City to be precise.” Murray said, catching the attention of everyone in the room.

  “Firearms have been seen at the target address so it would seem that Mahood is serious about doing it. The intelligence is that the attack is imminent, possibly within the
next few days, so we can't just sit around waiting, we need to act now; tonight!” Murray continued.

  The subject, Ahmed Mahood, was a wealthy Syrian immigrant who came to England to study, hardly your average suicidal terrorist. He was an elusive man with a high level intellect, and barring an assault charge, he had barely put a foot wrong, which made him appear as a normal member of the public. That was until he popped up on the radar of MI6 by sheer coincidence after a Special Forces operation that was conducted in Afghanistan, uncovered a number of laptops that contained a wealth of information on their hard-drives, some of which made for very interesting reading.

  “Sir, what intel has the snitch provided and is it sound enough to call an operation like this on short notice” asked Evans.

  “I was just about to get to those bits Evans; if you'll let me” Chief Inspector Murray replied with a put out expression.

  “Right shall I continue? Ok, Mahood is said to be planning an Active shooter style attack, we don't know when or exactly where yet, but we do know where he is. Last night our snitch discovered that Mahood along with a team of five are planning to drive six cars onto the Motorway, a mile south of the City's airport, where they will stop their vehicles at an agreed designated point on both the North and Southbound carriageways, and bring the traffic to a complete standstill. Once a huge traffic jam has developed, Mahood and his team will exit their cars in possession of assault rifles and walk down each lane of gridlocked vehicles and............” Murray looked around the room with a serious face before finishing his sentence. “And walk down each lane of traffic, executing every single person in the vicinity that doesn't manage to escape. I guess it doesn't take too much of an morbid imagination to work out what would happen if this tactic was carried out at rush hour, it would be a very, very bad day. The word is that the attack could happen any day now, who knows, maybe even tomorrow. Listen guys, we have an extremely unique opportunity here to prevent this attack from taking place, rather than the usual picking up the pieces after it's happened, surely that's the most important point here; questions?”

  A stunned silence filled the room, something unprecedented in tactical firearms briefings due to the number of characters the unit possessed. “Sir, is Mahood definitely in possession of these assault rifles yet and if so how did he get hold of them?” PC Calum MacNeil, a Scottish officer in his early forties enquired.

  “Mahood has a wide range of contacts in the middle east and Somalia, most notably high level rebel commanders in Mogadishu, Somalia and a few terrorist cell leaders in Afghanistan. These contacts were established when he attended training camps in the two countries for a number of months; please don't ask why this information wasn't passed to us! And if you haven't had your head buried in the sand for the last five years you'll be aware that piracy in Somalia is at an all-time high which means that the Royal Navy are very busy looking for them and not the smugglers, making it easier for them to enter the Med. Well because of this, Mahood's weapons, along with other terrorist paraphernalia, have been smuggled through the Med into Algeria then France and across the Channel right into............believe it or not, the City's Marina! Like I said, please don't ask why this wasn't mentioned to us earlier!”

  The briefing continued for a further thirty minutes with details of the Mahood's current address and its layout, further intelligence and the usual reminder about use of force legislation being read out to the officers. The latter being the most boring as every firearms officer knew exactly what they could and couldn't do with regards to using force. Chief Inspector Murray finished up the extensive briefing by thanking everyone for their attention before he walked out of the lecture theatre, followed by PC Ian Phelps who was Murray's Firearms Tactical Advisor. Phelps, prior to his own departure gave the room a rude gesture and a bow, causing the other officers in the room to give him the middle finger in return. Tactical Advisers were firearms officers themselves who worked with commanding officers to advise them on the unit's tactics and policies. Although they were still part of the unit, the operational officers saw them as overtime snatchers who sat around drinking tea in a nice warm room with the brass while they froze their backsides off outside in the elements. The reality was quite different of course but coppers being coppers, they weren't happy unless there was someone to slag off or moan about. Even if it was the result of financial jealousy.

  Sgt.Marriot waited for the Chief to walk out before continuing with the tactical phase of the briefing, which most certainly was not taped.

  “Sarge, are they being serious? I think an operation this serious needs a little more planning than a few hours, it needs planning, and planning again. This is stupid!” PC Mark Collins remarked from the back of the lecture theatre.

  “I know, I know Mark, but what can we, or I, say that will change their minds? This is last minute intel that needs to be acted on as soon as possible, nay, now! We can't wait, you know that” Marriot replied, although he agreed with Collins, he couldn't be seen undermining the command.

  Collins slumped back into his seat while gesturing to PC James Simpson across from him that he wasn't happy with the unfolding situation, he knew full well that the 'Op' had to happen immediately but he also knew that a lack of decent planning could bite them.

  “Sgt, I understand what you're saying but this is high end stuff with the assault rifles being involved. Are the brass fully aware of what could go wrong with such little planning? Now I'm all set with the old 'better to be judged by twelve than carried by six' but in reality the 'twelve' aren't always pro Police and if this does go wrong, we really could be on the defendants side of the courtroom being judged. Simpson said, being a little more constructive than Collins.

  O'Keeffe and Simpson had both served on a Special Forces unit in the British Army and seen active service around the world and on the Counter Terrorist Unit in Hereford. After becoming fed up with the army lifestyle they decided to join the City's Police Force and had settled into the unit very quickly, appreciating the down time between jobs that just wouldn't have been afforded to them in the 'mob' that was the Special Forces.

  “Look, Command understands the risk but they also know what the ramifications of waiting too long would be. I've been assured by the Gold Commander Superintendent that no matter what happens, we will have the force's full support” Sgt Marriot said trying to reassure his team.

  Allen gave him a sarcastic thumbs up, he and the others knew full well that if the shit hit the fan, they would be alone. Sgt Marriot rolled his eyes, the others may have had concerns but as the third in Command, if things went south, he would be the one answering a lot of questions in any subsequent enquiry; a hell of a lot more than the PCs. Whether he was concerned or not, the show had to go on. Marriot directed his team's attention to a smart board where details of crew information and individual tasks were highlighted on a Powerpoint presentation. The plan was that the twelve officers in the room, would be separated into two teams of six, Blue and Red team. Blue were tasked with entering the building through level one, while Red team would split into two further pods of three to allow them to enter the first floor of the house via the front and the rear bedroom windows using ladders and the unit's armoured Land rover as a platform. Both Red and Blue teams would use an array of Stun grenades and explosive devices to force and secure their entry, and to distract the subjects inside, creating an element of surprise and maximising the safety of all those involved. In support of the two teams there would be three pairs of Snipers and six Authorised Firearms Officers who would help create a secure perimeter for the team to work within.

  With all their questions 'answered', the two teams stood up and began filing out of the theatre to head back down to the unit's office in the basement of the main HQ building. O'Keeffe stood up from his seat, turned to Foster and said “You, me and Calum through the main bedroom window from on top of the armoured land rover, doesn't get better than that. All we need now is a bus full of Swedish cheer leaders to play with our 'wangers'
and we've got the perfect night” He said

  “Are there any brunettes on that bus” Foster asked.

  “Just loads of different kinds of chicks” O'Keeffe explained while letting out a dirty laugh.

  “Then I'm game mate. OHHH SHIT, I DON'T BELIEVE IT! John, I was meant to be meeting Amy at six”

  “The beautician with the nice arse that you've not stopped talking about?” O'Keeffe enquired.

  “Yes, that one John!” Foster replied with his right hand covering his forehead in frustration.

  “Well you're up the creek then mate, six o'clock is long gone and isn't this the second or third time that you've stood her up? Come on, we best crack on, lots to do” He replied with a grin whilst patting Foster hard on the shoulder in a pseudo sympathetic manner. Foster's problem was something that all coppers would learn at some point in their career; relationships and police work don't always mix; if at all.

  Purposely hanging back from the others, Foster switched on his phone to try and make a quick apology call to Amy. Before he even dialled her number, the phone vibrated in his hand.

  “Beep, you have one new message, message received today at six forty..................YOU COLD HEARTLESS BASTARD, DON'T EVER BOTHER CALLING ME AGAIN, YOU'RE AN ARSEHOLE!” a female voice boomed from the speaker, filling the corridor.

  Foster's anti-social habit of playing all of his answer-phone messages on speaker as opposed to putting the mobile up to his ear meant that everyone around him would hear his various conquests voice's at the same time he did. Seriously pissed off, he walked through the doors and onto the stairs that descended down towards the TFU office.

  “AHHHHHHH Gutted!!!!” The members of Red team called out on seeing him come through the doors. The volume of his phone's speaker allowing everyone within a mile to hear what Amy's angry banshee like shouting was for! Foster stopped and rested against the wall as the others ran off down the stairs. He peered down at his phone and considered calling her before realising that he would never have been able to think of a good enough excuse for why he had stood her up again, it wasn't as if he could tell her the real reason. Foster had blown it and he knew it. The anger started to boil up inside of him to the extent where his hands were beginning to shake, he grasped the phone and squeezed it tighter and tighter in his palm until cracking noises could be heard coming from it.