Half past ten came around and court was in session.
I hadn’t managed to catch up with Zara, which I was a little sorry about, though I had enough faith in her ability by now not to let it worry me too much. Sooner or later, we are all sent plummeting out of our nests. I knew that, in her moment, Zara would fly.
The clerk started off the trial of Regina v. Charli Meadows with the usual formalities.
‘All persons who have business before the Queen’s justices draw near and give your attendance. God save the Queen.’ We stood for the entrance of Judge Evelyn Allen QC, who was kitted out in her full violet and lilac robes with a red sash, and then Charli was asked to confirm her identity. As prosecuting counsel, it was Garrick’s job to introduce us both to the court.
Trials, and their traditions, take time. After the protracted jury swearing come the legal arguments, case opening and agreed facts; witness statements have to be read and live witnesses to be called. While televised legal dramas have the luxury of being able to dip in and out of the action for pacing’s sake, a genuine trial is a meticulous, occasionally arduous affair that stretches over days, weeks and even months. This is mostly because of the judicious care required, but it’s also because barristers really do like to talk. We are professional orators, after all. The prosecution have to fight a tactical trench war, covering every conceivable defence, painstakingly laying any plausibly relevant evidence before the jury. They carry the burden and standard of proof; the defence only need to cast doubt on a single element of their case. A defence campaign, then, should be a blitzkrieg; we hold back, look for the weakest point, and then smash through it. At least, that’s the idea, but the odds are always in the prosecution’s favour for one simple reason: they choose the fight. The CPS considers the evidence and only charges people when the evidence reveals a realistic prospect of conviction.
We adjourned for lunch after the jury had been sworn, and ten minutes later I was sliding a plastic tray along the length of the counter in the Bar mess, peering down at the selection of food dehydrating under heat lamps. I settled on chips, bread and butter and, after noticing her unpacking her meagre lunch onto a table in the back corner of the room, an extra cup of tea for Zara.
‘Thought you could use this,’ I said, placing the steaming mug in front of her.
She glanced up from a noticeably dry cheese sandwich and smiled. ‘Thanks.’ She’d removed her wig but still looked older than usual in her professional black court suit; if it wasn’t for the rather pitiful lunch of one sandwich and only half a KitKat, it would be quite hard to believe that she still lived in a shared student house in Brixton. ‘Don’t they do anything stronger than tea?’
‘That bad?’ I dropped into a chair, and used my teeth to rip into two sachets of sugar. ‘How was Bowen? Do you need me to rough him up a little bit?’
‘He’s been all right. As boring as ever. His opening speech had all the flair of being lifted word for word from the CPS guidelines.’ She lowered her voice to a pompous drawl. ‘“Intentional obstruction of a police constable exercising his powers to search and obtain evidence, contrary to Section 23(4) of the Act. There is a strong public interest in prosecuting those who destroy or conceal evidence of serious drug offences, blah, blah, blah …” I swear, the man could kill Shakespeare.’
I had to chuckle, tapping my teaspoon dry on the edge of my mug. ‘And Andre?’
‘Alive, which is a bonus. Not especially happy that he has to share a cell while he’s here.’
‘Who’s he sharing a cell with?’
‘I don’t know. Just some bloke. Belmarsh, I think. This Osman warning seems to have messed with his head a little. He’s … scatty. Not that I can blame him. They warn the lad that somebody is going to try to kill him, then lock him in a cramped, dirty cell with a morally ambiguous stranger. Seems backward to me.’
I started fashioning my food into a butty. ‘Did you submit the Section 8 application? The disclosure request?’
She nodded, chewing her sandwich. ‘Not that I expect anything positive to come of it after that PII ruling. It’s so stupid. A participating informant set up the crime in league with the police, and somehow that’s not disclosable to the defence!’
‘Maybe Bowen will have a change of heart.’
‘He’d need to have a heart first. What happened with Meadows?’
I shook my head, still not quite managing to believe it myself. ‘You may want to strap yourself in for this one.’
Her eyes lit up and she froze with the sandwich halfway to her lips. ‘Go on.’
‘Deacon, former drug dealer, inmate of the Scrubs and potential cuckoo of the Meadows household … is also the proprietor of an independent drill label by the name of Banged Up Records.’
She slammed the sandwich down onto its foil. ‘Get the fuck out of here!’
‘At this rate, I almost wish I could.’
‘He produced for Andre and Omar Pickett.’ She squeezed her eyes shut. ‘What have we got ourselves into?’
‘There’s more. You recall the Meadows family dog?’
‘Oh, you mean the county lines guard dog of choice? Yeah, I think I do recall that.’
‘My client got it from Deacon.’
‘Inevitable, really. How did you find that out?’
‘Charli told me all about it this morning, when she was explaining how it died.’
‘It died?’
‘Poisoned, it would appear.’
‘Poisoned?’
‘And it is now buried under the very allotment where we sat last week.’
She gawped at me for a moment, then slid the last of her sandwich away across the table. ‘They’re not still going to eat those tomatoes she was growing, are they?’
I couldn’t say.
The afternoon brought Garrick’s opening speech. I’d been staring at the strangers gathered in the public gallery when the judge invited him to start, and he got to his feet and turned to the jury, notes sprawled before him on our shared row.
‘From ten o’clock on the morning of Monday 15 January this year, a joint operation between the Prison Service’s Anti-Corruption Investigation Unit, the National Crime Agency and the Metropolitan Police’s Organised Crime Division was undertaken at Her Majesty’s Prison Wormwood Scrubs, a Category B local jail in the Hammersmith and Fulham borough of London. Code-named Operation Triptych, this strategic manoeuvre consisted of searches on all members of staff as well as every onsite vehicle in response to drugs-related fatalities within the prison. Specially trained canines were employed for the task.
‘At approximately 10.35, Operation Triptych uncovered a large quantity of synthetic cannabinoids, generically referred to as Spice, concealed within the boot of a vehicle in the prison’s private staff car park. These drugs, which were disguised as ten individual packets of rolling tobacco, were estimated to have a combined prison value of £10,000. The vehicle in which they were discovered was an unassuming Vauxhall Corsa, a dark blue model from the year 2000, registration number X326 ADM. This vehicle was owned by Charli Meadows, the defendant brought before you today. She was the only suspect to be arrested and charged under the efforts of Operation Triptych that day.
‘Charli Meadows was a trusted employee of HMP Wormwood Scrubs. Her role, officially titled Operational Support Grade, was one tier below officer level, but no less integral to the running of the prison. For more than four years, her responsibilities included everything from direct contact with countless inmates to having control of the very locks designed to hold them on the premises. It would be no hyperbole to say that Charli Meadows quite literally held the keys to Wormwood Scrubs in the palm of her hand.
‘The single count on today’s indictment is one of smuggling psychoactive substances, as defined by the Psychoactive Substances Act 2016, into a custodial institution. This is in direct violation of Section 40B of the Prison Act 1952, which concerns the unlawful conveyance of List A articles into one of Her Majesty’s Prisons. It is the Crown’s case that the defendant, Miss Charli Meadows, did knowingly smuggle these drugs onto the premises.
‘But who is Charli Meadows?’ Garrick’s eyes turned briefly and indifferently towards the dock, his hollow expression revealing that he didn’t really see anybody inside it. ‘A single mother to three children, she has by all accounts been a hard-working woman before now. The sort that you will, perhaps, recognise from your own lives, your own families. And make no mistake that the defence will attempt to use that to distract you. To cloud the fact that this crime has been committed, committed knowingly, and committed by the defendant alone. The drugs were found in that car. This fact is agreed upon, meaning that it is presented before you unchallenged by the defence. The sole individual who has access to that car is its owner, Charli Meadows, another hard fact that the defence has not even bothered to deny. You will hear that the defendant chose to drive the two-hour round trip from her home in Walthamstow to the prison every single working day for more than four years. What was so important about braving the city’s congestion to have her vehicle onsite in that prison car park is answerable only by the conclusion of her time there.
‘The defence may suggest that Miss Meadows simply did not know that she was committing a crime. That, as far as she was aware, the packages contained nothing worse than ordinary tobacco. As Her Ladyship Lady Allen will direct you on the law as to what constitutes mens rea, you shall discover that ignorance does not legally excuse any such actions. It may even be suggested that Miss Meadows did not have a choice in the matter whatsoever. That she was being coerced into her crime. Well, the answer to this is that we all, always, have a choice.
‘In her interviews, the defendant was given ample opportunity to explain where she acquired the drugs. Her solicitor suggested that she reply “no comment” to all questions asked, but, to her credit, Miss Meadows did respond a little. She denied knowing anything about the drugs. No excuses, no theories, no alternative explanations. The Crown says that she could offer no alternatives, because there is only one possible explanation: Charli Meadows was smuggling Spice into those prison walls for financial reward. True, it might not have been for a lavish, millionaire’s lifestyle – it might simply have been to make a better life for her family – but the fact remains that she broke the law, and intentionally so. The trafficking of drugs is never a victimless crime.
‘On that note, it will become quite obvious to you, as the trial progresses, that Operation Triptych was conducted almost immediately after the tragic, drugs-related deaths of thirteen inmates on the night of Tuesday 9 January. Though the relationship is undeniable, it is vital that you do not allow the horror of those fatalities to impact your eventual decision. The pathologists were not able to legally link the drugs seized to the deaths prior, and the proof of intent to supply does not prove past supply. Therefore, those deaths should not be considered when judging this defendant. The charge brought against Charli Meadows is one of smuggling drugs into Wormwood Scrubs. Through the course of this trial, I shall make you absolutely certain of her guilt. There can be no doubt – there can be only justice. It is every bit as simple as that.’
Garrick returned to his seat, and a single word was muttered in the public gallery – it carried on a draught through the silence of the room, a gust so quick and cold that nobody turned towards it. But we all knew what had been said. Everyone.
‘Murderer,’ the whisper called.
We adjourned for the evening twenty minutes earlier than expected, and while changing out of my robes I sent Zara a text telling her to meet me at the Toby Carvery a block away from the court, where I would treat her to dinner; the thought of her going home to the other half of that miserable KitKat after her opening day had been playing on my mind. I was conscious of the number of hours Scout had been alone and, strangely, I was looking forward to getting back to her after dinner. I resolved to make it quick.
I arrived at the pub and purchased the tickets for two roasts, one king-sized and one vegetarian, before commandeering a table away from the bar to wait for Zara. She arrived at half past with a face like thunder, slamming her bags down under the table as she dropped into an empty seat.
‘As soon as the prosecution received my disclosure request, they once again applied for public-interest immunity and Judge Bromley granted it.’
‘They really aren’t going to disclose what led them to the raid?’
‘They aren’t going to disclose shit, Section 8 application or not. They’re claiming that if they were to reveal their source then it could affect a number of ongoing investigations, so it’s in the public’s interest to withhold the evidence.’
‘Omar Pickett.’
‘Has to be, but I can’t even approach the topic in a court of law. I can’t get answers to the fundamental questions supporting my own case! It’s a damn gagging order, that’s all it is. A sham!’ She removed her glasses, folded them and closed her eyes. ‘Without a miracle – without Omar Pickett magically popping up to testify at some point during the next few days – it’s just a losing battle.’
I sighed, then slid the meal ticket over the table towards her. ‘Let’s get some food in our stomachs and have a think about this.’
‘You shouldn’t have,’ she said, ‘but thank you. Again.’
‘That’s all right.’ I pushed my chair out and got to my feet, feeling thirsty. ‘You get us a place in the queue, and I’ll get the drinks.’
The inexplicably enthusiastic barman drummed his hands across the beer pumps as he approached, grinning broadly. ‘Good afternoon, sir. What’s your poison?’
And after the day I’d had, the image that word brought to my mind was almost enough to put me off my dinner altogether.