CSI Hackney

The forensic detective who so meticulously recovered fingerprint and DNA evidence from our insignificant domestic crime scene has a distinguished history. He was present in April 1980 when a misfired bullet took off the tip of a policeman's finger, triggering the SAS raid on the Iranian Embassy in West London that dramatically ended the six-day siege, watched live on TV by millions, including me and my then five-year old son: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/in_depth/uk/2000/iranian_embassy_siege/intro.stm
He had worked on the 1983 case of the serial killer Dennis Nilson, whose crimes were only discovered when the body of one of his victims blocked the drains of his house in Cranley Gardens, Muswell Hill. He had also investigated the 1993 IRA bomb that devastated Bishopsgate in the City of London - we heard the explosion and felt the aftershock as far away as Finsbury Park; and the 1989 Marchioness disaster when a neighbour's son was one of the 51 victims who drowned when the pleasure boat capsized:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/april/24/newsid_2523000/2523345.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marchioness_disaster
CSI Miami may be more glamorous, but our mini drama merited the Horatio of Shoreditch: only the best.

Postscript - old fires

For sixty years the postbag lay undiscovered in the corner of a barn beside a track that skirts the Llwchwr Estuary, abandoned by a wartime postman who had other things on his mind than finishing his round, undisturbed by the high tides that flood the road in winter, indifferent to driving rain off the Irish Sea, to boundary changes, to social transformation, to time as it moved on from one century and one millennium to the next.

Builders renovating the farm for its new owners uncovered the sack, releasing its dusty messages and dead voices: “29th May, My Darling Wife …”. Addressed in carefully pencilled script to his new bride back home in Elba Cottage, a young airman’s hopes and dreams for the future and the dull routines of war filled twenty thin ruled pages still bound together with glue from the writing pad. Elba Cottage was gone, demolished more than thirty years before along with the steelworks it was named for. Ffos felin, the yellow ditch on which it had stood, returned briefly to marshland, then other streets and houses with different names reconfigured the landscape. While the postbag kept its secrets still, the airman was demobbed, had daughters and then grandchildren, died, and was buried just across the windswept common. The wife took a new name, a new husband, moved to a new home. Then one unremarkable autumn night a stranger knocked at her door holding the letter out to her and turned time back for a moment.

"Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires,

Old fires to ashes ..."

http://www.tristan.icom43.net/quartets/coker.html

Christmas spirit

Two nights ago we'd just driven back from Christmas in Wales, unpacked the car, fed the cat, prepared leftover turkey pesto risotto for ourselves with some mulled wine and settled down to watch the back story of University Challenge when the doorbell rang. The young man at the door was shivering in just a thin sweater and jeans. He introduced himself as Jonathan, the nephew of Peter and Elizabeth, our next-door neighbours. They were on their way home from the theatre and he was locked out and needed money for his taxi. Double-time fare, he said, £27. Elizabeth and Peter would repay us when they got back. We handed over the fare, made him a bowl of risotto when he returned from paying off the taxi, poured him a glass of wine, sat him down, made him comfortable, showed him where the loo was when he asked and the bathroom to wash his hands. We thought he might have ADHD as he kept jumping up to answer his phone and popping out onto the landing so as not to disturb us, apologetic for intruding on our evening, quaintly spoken - "Marvellous, marvellous!" being his effusive response to our hospitality. Then another mobile call and he announced in tears that his aunt had died and he had to go. Of course, with hindsight and to everyone hearing the story, the outcome is obvious - no sooner had he gone than I saw that my camera case had disappeared from my study, packed so conveniently with my precious digital SLR, all my lenses and my camcorder. So had the remaining notes from my mother's Christmas gift to my daughter, her iPod and the notes from my wallet, buried deep in my handbag. Credit cards, car keys were left, so it could have been much worse. The police arrived within ten minutes and discovered that he'd scammed taxi fare from several other neighbours, including Peter and Elizabeth, but not got into their houses. Their names had been his passport into ours. Forensics found fingerprints on the bowl of risotto and some DNA on the wineglass, but he'd used toilet paper to put up the toilet seat and hold the flush. The rooftop and moon photos on the blog banner were the last ones taken with the stolen camera and my new telephoto lens, but fortunately, I'd downloaded all my irreplaceable photos just before going down to Wales. The moral? I guess 2009 has to be better than 2008, which started with major computer problems, consequent messed up deadlines and stress, continued with lost leave and no summer break, the threat of redundancy as the university is reorganised and ends with this tale of goodwill. Roll on the new year!