The Perfect Crime Read Free

I would like to find out about you so I would like to ask you some questions. O.K?
    You want to know what makes us tick?
    Something like that.
    Fine by me.
    O.K. Let’s start at the beginning. Tell me about your childhood. What’s your earliest memory?
    Me Mam cuddling me. Dad were hard. He’d take his belt to us soon as look at us. Mam looked after me, she did.
    Are your parents still alive?
    Mam died when I was ten. Dad died a couple of year back.
    You were very young when your mother died – how would you say it affected you?
    Never got over it, really. Situation just got worse with me Dad. Went to live with some neighbours after a while.
    How about school?
    Hated it.
    Why was that?
    All those books. And the other boys always got on to me. Because of me being small and my name – Nappey. ‘Nipper Nappey.’ They called me. ‘Dirty Nappey.’ ‘Change your Nappey.’ Twats.

 
    THREE
     
    The police reacted swiftly to Richard Skepper’s 999 call. Within minutes, four officers attended and began a preliminary sweep of the area. When asked in which direction the killer escaped, neither Richard, nor his mother could recall hearing a car, but both were still in shock and more concerned with getting an ambulance and medical attention for Donald than anything else.
    Police forces across England and Wales were already alerted to the ‘brace and bit jobs’ so when one of the first officers to attend, PC David Smith, saw the tell-tale holes in the window frame, he knew that professionally, the CID would probably be as interested in that as they would be in the murder. He tried to recall details, but could not think if any of the other raids had ended in such tragedy.
    The duty senior officer on call that night, was Detective Superintendent Bill Dolby, head of West Yorkshire’s Number One District CID. Bill could have been mistaken for a professor perhaps, or a bank manager; not an error that criminals he dealt with were likely to make. Not more than once, anyway. Always immaculately attired, his glasses and receding hairline lent him a scholarly air. He immediately ordered Harrogate to be cordoned off with police road blocks and ordered each checkpoint to be additionally manned by two armed officers, in case they were fortunate enough to stop the murderer. There was no concrete evidence to link this incident with any other – especially as no one had been badly hurt before – certainly not killed, but as he contemplated the situation, Dolby felt a chill run down his spine and the phrase ‘stop at nothing’ ran through his head. Determined to effect an early arrest, he set about detecting his murderer. A major incident room was established in the car park of The Little Wonder pub across the road from the post office and police dog patrols were ordered to search the area for any suspect or discarded items, such as clothing or weapons. Dolby arranged for the post mortem to be held and was pleased that the most experienced Home Office pathologist, Dr Michael Green was available to take it on.
    At first light, a small army of officers assembled, amongst their number, three task forces. A total of one hundred and seventy men were joined by local residents searching the area. They were briefed to be as thorough as possible and examine outbuildings as well as private gardens and anywhere else they could reasonably go, looking for any evidence, especially a hood, or a discarded shotgun. House to house enquiries were also instigated at a reasonable hour, but Dolby was to be disappointed. Everybody had been in bed. Nothing seen or heard by anyone.
    Police underwater search units were drafted in from Leeds, Bradford and as far away as Durham – more than twenty men in total. They searched the freezing waters of the River Nidd nearby at Knaresborough and Ripley. They dived in the treacherous River Wharfe at Wetherby and where it runs under the A1 road. Later, they widened the search to include places where the murderer could