AFTERMATH
HOW did things pan out back in Cambridge over the next few years? Calvin Hall was found not guilty over the killing of Adam Fraser. This was a huge blow at the time. I’d waited more than three years for the certainty that his life sentence would bring, and now he was off the hook. He was released in 2001.
I sustained myself with the knowledge that Hall had seen prosecution witnesses testify against him when on trial for Fraser’s murder. Many of these witnesses had known him well, whereas I hadn’t known him at all. It seemed logical that Hall would have a far bigger grudge against those people, although this didn’t provide any guarantees.
I remained cautious, still used a false name in London, and ensured that very few people knew I lived there. The racing industry still thought I was based in Cambridge. I told friends from Cambridge that I’d settled in the Manchester area. My mail was still sent to Cambridge, then forwarded by the post office to another local address from where someone would collect it for me. In time, when I believed it safe to do so, I told a few more people the story of what had happened. Some laughed and some cried. Some wanted to get to know me a lot better, whereas others preferred to keep their distance. Apart from the odd lapse, they all did their best to respect my security.
As time passed, I came to accept that being careful about my own security issues was part of my life. It was only in 2004 that a breakthrough finally came, although unfortunately it sprang from near-tragedy in someone else’s life. Hall and an accomplice were arrested for the attempted murder of a policeman following a stabbing incident. The officer was wounded extremely badly.
At the beginning of December, I made contact with the police to ask the big question. What was the chance that they finally had their man? “Don’t worry, Patrick, we’ve definitely got him this time,” I was told. Not only would the victim be there to testify, but Hall had been arrested on the run.
It was distressing that another man had to be so badly injured before Hall was finally brought to justice. I was now one step from freedom, but that last step was important. Despite the CID’s confidence, I needed a conviction to be confirmed before being able to relax completely, but the cloud that had hung over me for so long had finally begun to lift. Although I still carry a deafening panic alarm, it’s a comfort to know that I’m extremely unlikely to ever need it, but that day I went out without one for the first time in six years.
I spent that Christmas with my parents, visiting my brother Jonathan in Hong Kong. As we enjoyed lunch outside on a warm Christmas afternoon, Jonathan asked everyone to nominate their best day of the year. I assumed there would be no need to ask me, but he did. I replied in that slow questioning voice people use to imply that the answer was really obvious. “The – day – the – guy – was – arrested.”
My family seemed surprised at my answer, which shocked me but pleased me too, as I’d evidently been able to successfully shield them from the magnitude of my problems, a course I’d undertaken to protect their security. My answer to my brother’s question was the first real hint to them of the extent of the ordeal I had been through.
The case against Calvin Hall finally came to court in 2005. The progress of court proceedings could be tracked on the internet, and it was a Friday afternoon when I saw that the jury had returned. I could phone the court to discover the verdict. I left three of my staff working in my flat and walked away through the hustle and bustle of Piccadilly Circus, an area where I could be totally anonymous. I had gone into this on my own and I was coming out on my own. The lady on the phone confirmed the guilty verdict. The nightmare was finally over. It would be a couple of months before Hall was sentenced to 25 years in jail, but the verdict was enough.
It had taken seven years, so I divided up my friends and had seven big nights out to celebrate. None of the nights finished early.
There was one final postscript. Jerome Davies, who had brought the trouble to my door in the first place by putting Calvin Hall in contact with me, knowing full well the type of person he was, finally got his comeuppance. In 2005, he was jailed for fraudulently altering the mileage of cars. His masquerade of being a successful businessman was further exposed in 2006, when his convictions included benefit fraud. It couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.