Over the next couple of days Ottey was in regular contact with Jacky Collins in Kent. The three other victims were willing to come forward now, in light of Alice’s attack and her determination to press charges. As were dozens of other women, some of whom claimed to have been sexually assaulted by Warner. Others were the subject of inappropriate touching or the recipients of unwelcome indecent texts from him. Collins was more than happy not to tell her DCI or detective superintendent of the imminent arrest of one of their lead detectives. She felt they had been complicit in allowing Warner to get away with his behaviour for all this time, simply because he ‘got results’.
Warner duly returned to work the following Thursday morning as if nothing had happened. As Cross had predicted. He had scratch marks on his face which he laughingly, in Collins’s opinion, blamed on an elderly neighbour’s cat he had rescued from an old coal flue. Collins thought he might have come up with something more original than a cat. She also couldn’t believe how he was welcomed back into the fold like a returning hero, despite the fact that the verdict in the Cotterell case had gone against him. She was also aware that he’d been dismissed by Carson and so to hear him claim that he’d decided for himself that fresh eyes were needed was galling. But she comforted herself with the knowledge that his self-satisfied smile would be wiped from his face soon enough when he was arrested the following morning. She wondered whether his confident smile emanated from thinking he’d gotten away with it once again. That to his mind, he really was untouchable.
Cross and Ottey sat in her car at eight thirty the next morning outside the building which housed Kent’s serious crime office. It had been an early start from Bristol. They watched as Warner pulled up an hour later, parked, got out of his car and stubbed a cigarette out on the ground. He tightened his loose tie and went into the building looking like he didn’t have a care in the world. He didn’t realise that world was about to be turned on its head. Cross had been happy to arrest him in the car park. But Ottey and Collins wanted it to be done in front of all his colleagues and, more importantly, their superiors.
Ottey received a text from Collins. Warner was at his desk.
She met them at reception and walked them through security. They went upstairs and then through an area that was not too dissimilar to the MCU. Desks, computers, cork- and whiteboards. If you’d taken a photograph and shown it to someone, then asked them what business or organisation worked from that office, they would probably be hard pressed to answer. Warner was at a desk at the far end of the room, which afforded him the opportunity to see the two Avon and Somerset detectives enter and walk the length of the room towards him. Interestingly, he made no disparaging gags at their expense, just waited till they reached him.
Cross spoke first.
‘Robert Warner, I am arresting you on suspicion of sexual assault and attempted rape.’
The reaction round the room was immediate. Everyone stopped what they were doing, looking up from their computers, cutting off phone calls abruptly. Some of the men stood up, as if this was in some way a supportive action. Then Collins and six other women walked forward and formed a semicircle behind the detectives from Bristol. Presumably they had all been subjected to advances from him, maybe more, and this was a tacit demonstration for him of how serious things were. That they were not going to back down. Ottey produced her handcuffs.
‘You’ve got to be kidding,’ Warner said in disbelief.
‘I am not,’ she replied firmly. ‘Put your hands behind your back.’
‘Boss!’ yelled Warner like a small child in need of help from a parent, as Cross read him his rights.
A man appeared from a side office.
‘What the hell is going on?’ he asked as he saw Warner being cuffed, and strode across the room.
‘We’re arresting Mr Warner,’ Ottey replied, deliberately not using his rank.
‘For what?’
‘Sexual assault and attempted rape,’ said Cross.
‘And I have a feeling that’s just for starters,’ added Ottey.
‘For Christ’s sake,’ spat Warner.
‘You’ve been cautioned, Bobby, don’t say any more. As for you two, you can’t just come in here and arrest one of my detectives.’
‘DI Warner being in handcuffs would suggest otherwise,’ replied Cross handing him their warrant.
‘And why didn’t you, or for that matter your CO, have the courtesy to forewarn me?’ DCI Hart, as the badge on his lanyard proclaimed him to be, asked.
‘The general thinking was not to forewarn you in case you forewarned him,’ Cross replied candidly.
‘Names. Your names.’
Cross handed him their cards which he had ready in his pocket for exactly this.
‘Were you in on this?’ Hart asked Collins.
‘Very much so,’ she said, with no apparent regard for any possible consequences.
Hart looked up from the warrant. ‘Who is your CO?’ he asked.
‘I’ve written it on the back of my card together with his mobile number which he was very insistent you had,’ Cross told him.
‘Let’s go,’ Ottey said to Warner with a suggestive nudge.
‘Boss, are you just going to let this happen? They can’t bloody do this!’ Warner protested over his shoulder as he was led away. Hart didn’t answer, instead he turned to Collins.
‘My office in five,’ he barked, before leaving the open area.
Ottey and Cross walked Warner through the open area. Cross was conscious of how slowly Ottey was walking, as if to make the very most of this walk of shame. Warner said nothing further, probably mindful of having been cautioned and that any ill-advised comments might not look great for him later. The other detectives stood, looking on in silence. Whether they saw it as a salutary warning or simply something that should have happened long ago, it was impossible to tell.
When they got to the car Warner turned to Ottey.
‘Josie—’ he began in a conciliatory tone.
‘You’ve been cautioned, DI Warner. I suggest you say nothing till you’ve spoken with a lawyer.’
She opened the door and gently pushed his head down as he got into the back seat, as she would with any other suspect. Then she re-cuffed him with his hands in front of him for the journey.