Cold Death (D.S.Hunter Kerr) (25 page)

Grace nodded.

Hunter pushed back his chair and gathered up his notes. He took a final lingering look at the incident board time-line sequence, confirming and double-checking in his head that he had it all lodged
, ready for when he needed to dig in to his memory banks during the interview. He pursed his lips and nodded to himself. He was prepared.

“Okay Grace let’s put this job to bed.”

* * * * *

Ari Arshad presented a cocky look despite the painful pink flesh graze to his right cheek. That had been caused when Hunter had tripped him prior to his arrest and he had already bleated to the Custody Officer that he had been assaulted when he had been booked in.

He was leaning back on the rear legs of his chair, arms folded defensively.

The duty solicitor who had been called in was seated next to him scribbling notes into his legal pad. The minute the two detectives had walked into the room Hunter saw him check his watch and make a note of the time.

Hunter dropped his paperwork and the evidence on the table in dramatic fashion.

It made the solicitor jump and he scowled over his spectacles.

Hunter cracked a false apologetic smile. “Sorry about that,” he said raising his eyebrows and taking his seat opposite. He nodded to Grace and she started the tape recording machine.

Hunter went through the customary preamble to an interview, flicking open his folder even though he knew in his mind he wouldn’t need to refer to it.

“For the tape can I confirm you are Ari Arshad?”

The prisoner exchanged a look with his solicitor who shrugged his shoulders and returned a nod.

Ari rocked slightly on the back legs of his chair. “That’s right, I am the one and only Ari Arshad,” he sniped.

“And not Habib-ur-Begum as it says in the Pakistan National Passport which we found amongst your possessions?”

“No comment.”

“Why were you in possession of a false passport and a one way airline ticket to Pakistan?”

“No comment.”

“Okay if that’s the tack you wish to take Ari I’ll ask you a less incriminating question. Just for the record what relation are you to Mohammed Hassan.”

He glanced at his solicitor again who gestured with raised eyebrows that it was okay to answer.

“Mohammed is my uncle.”

“And so Samia Hassan, his daughter, is your cousin?” Hunter removed a photo of Samia from beneath his papers. It was a blown up shot from the Meadowhall CCTV footage. “For the tape I am showing the defendant a colour photograph of Samia Hassan. Is this the Samia we are talking about?”

Ari nodded, “yes.”

“When was the last time you saw Samia?”

He bunched his shoulders. “Can’t remember.”

“Rough guess. Couple of weeks, couple of months?”

“Couple of months I guess.”

“Where was that?”

“At my uncle’s place.”

“What address is that?” Hunter was hoping for a slip up. They still did not know the attack site.

“His shop in Hoyland.”

“You have already been told the reason for your arrest this morning haven’t you?”

“Yes, but that’s shit. I haven’t murdered Samia. You’ve got the wrong man Mr smart detective.”

Hunter rolled with the sarcastic retort – let it wash over him. “I’m guessing you’ve seen the TV news and the newspapers headlines about Samia’s murder?”

“Yeah.”

“When did you first become aware of her disappearance?”

“Can’t remember.”

“Who told you about it?”

“My uncle – I think?”

“Can you remember when that was?”

“Nope.”

Hunter knew he needed to move things forward. He replaced the photograph in his folder and took out another. It depicted the white Renault van, which had been recovered from the Rotherham car dismantlers. “Ari, slight change of questioning now. Do you recognise this van.”

Hunter clocked a reaction in Ari’s face.

He dropped his chair back on to its four legs but he did not respond.

“I’ll ask the question again. Do you recognise this white Renault van?”

Ari coughed. “I think so.”

“You think so?”

“My uncle owned a similar van.”

“This is the van owned by your uncle – Mohammed Hassan – I can confirm that from its index number. Have you ever driven this van?” Hunter knew from Duncan Wroe’s SOCO report that Ari’s fingerprints and DNA were all over the van and that he had been seen in the Country Park by Doctor Christopher Woolfe.

There were a couple of seconds silence then he replied softly, “Yeah I used to do deliveries for him.”

“When was the last time you drove or were in this van?”

There was a delayed response again. “Can’t remember,” he returned.

“Let me help you remember. Have you ever been to Meadowhall in the van?”

Now there was a clear reaction. Ari locked his arms tighter and his face hardened.

Hunter waited for twenty seconds but there was no reply. “I’ll ask the question again. Have you ever driven or been in this vehicle to Meadowhall shopping centre?”

Ari turned to his solicitor as if seeking to be helped out with an answer. His solicitor picked up on the look. “DS Kerr is this line of questioning going anywhere?”

Hunter opened up a CD case and took out a DVD and slid it across to Grace. She rose from the table and slotted it into a small TV/DVD player set on a shelf in one corner of the room. The screen flashed immediately from dark grey to blue.

Hunter turned to the solicitor. “There is some significance to this line of questioning which your client obviously finds uncomfortable answering. Could it be that he has something to hide?”

“DS Kerr that is out of order.”

Hunter diverted his gaze and fixed Ari with a determined stare. “Mr Arshad, my question relating to your use of your uncle’s white van at Meadowhall has in my view hit a raw nerve. I am therefore going to show you some CCTV footage which may help jog your memory.”

He turned and nodded to Grace who hit the play button on the TV. Over the next five minutes the horrific sequence of events depicting the attack upon Samia by Ari and Pervez in the underground car park at the Meadowhall shopping complex played out across the screen. The entire time Hunter explored his prisoner’s face. He watched him attempt to put on a front as he surveyed the damming evidence but Hunter could see from the continued movement in the young man’s Adam’s apple that he had him rattled.

He heard Grace pause the TV and knew it had finished. “Do you want me to play that again or are you happy for me to ask you questions in relation to what has just been played on the TV?”

Complete silence.

“You have just watched an attack upon Samia Hassan in the underground car park at Meadowhall shopping centre which was carried out by two men on the twenty-eighth of July this year. Do you recognise the two men you have seen carry out that attack?”

Complete silence again. Ari’s eyes widened. He glared back in defiance.

“Mr Arshad I would appreciate an answer. From what you have just been shown do you agree that the one of the people who beat Samia Hassan until she was unconscious was yourself?”

Ari unlocked his arms and slammed them onto the table. “No comment. No fucking comment.”

The solicitor reached across and nervously tapped Ari Arshad’s arm. “DS Kerr I would like ten minutes with my client,” he announced.

The ten minutes went beyond twenty minutes. Hunter leaned against the wall of the interview corridor, his eyes fixed on the gap at the bottom of the door. He knew that inside the room there was some serious client solicitor storyline being hammered out. A smile played on his lips; they had Ari on the rack.

Then just as he was checking his watch again the door opened and the solicitor stuck his head around it. “My client is ready to answer your questions.”

Hunter and Grace started afresh. Grace switched on the tape recording machine and Hunter reminded Ari of his rights. “Okay before we had a break you were shown CCTV footage of an attack upon Samia Hassan by two men. Was one of those men you?”

“Yeah, but I didn’t kill Samia?”

“And who was the other person who carried out the attack with you?”

“You know who it is. It’s Pervez, my brother.”

“Why did you attack Samia.”

“We were forced to do it.”

“Forced?”

“Yeah, you don’t know what my uncle Mohammed is like. He’s a violent man we’re scared of him. He told us to do it.”

Hunter knew that this didn’t ring true, especially given the criminal records of the pair, but he encouraged him to continue.

“Mohammed used to ring me lots, telling me that Samia was dishonouring the family. He told me she was sleeping with a man outside of marriage and wanted us to warn her off and get her to come home. Then a few months ago he came to see me and Pervez and said we had to do something about Samia. She was refusing to marry a cousin of ours after agreeing to the marriage and he wanted us to make her go to Pakistan. I told him we couldn’t do that but he threatened me and Pervez. He is a very violent man. That day at Meadowhall, me and Pervez were making deliveries for our uncle and he phoned me up shouting and swearing. He said Samia was at Meadowhall threatening to run away and he told us to go and get her and bring her back. I know on that footage it looks worse than it was.”

“Looks worse than it was,” interrupted Hunter. “You beat her unconscious and threw her in the back of the van as if she was a rag doll.”

Ari shrugged. “We didn’t mean to beat her like we did, we just got carried away.”

“So what happened after you left the car park.”

“Uncle Mohammed met us on an industrial site near Rotherham town centre and took her out of the van and drove her away. We didn’t kill her. The last time I saw her was when we helped put her in the back of Uncle Mohammed’s car.”

Hunter hadn’t expected this response.  He was glad he had damning evidence to refute what he had just said. His spirit lifted.

“You say you took Samia out of the van and put her in her father’s car?”

“Yeah.”

“Was she conscious or unconscious?”

“Conscious. She was struggling.”

“Then why did you get need to get rid of the van. To dispose of it at the car dismantlers like you did.”

Ari dropped his head for a few seconds before returning his gaze. “Because Mohammed just told us to. If he tells you something you obey.”

“Did you do this straightaway?”

“No we hid the van in a garage for a few days then took it there.”

“Did anyone else use it?”

“No we hid it.”

“Ari I’ve let you go on a bit but that’s because I wanted to give you enough rope to hang yourself. What you have just told us is complete bullshit. And how do I know that?  Well firstly, how do you account for fibres being found in the rear of the van?  The same fibres, which match those of the rug, in which Samia’s body was found, when it was dragged up from the lake. Before you try and dig your way out of that one I also want to introduce some other evidence as well. Do you remember a few years ago when Samia was at University and she had a relationship with a young man who was training to be a doctor?”

Ari’s eyes rose up towards the ceiling.

“A young man, who you, and your b
rother assaulted, because of their relationship?”

His eyes lowered. “No complaint was ever made about that.”

“No it wasn’t but we know that on a later occasion you and your brother paid him a visit when he was working at Barnwell Infirmary and warned him off, and also damaged his car. And the bad news for you is that he just happened to be driving his car at Barnwell lake on Friday the first of August, the night you and your brother dumped Samia’s body in the lake, and he recognised you driving your uncle’s white van away from the scene.”

He saw from Ari’s changed expression that he had him. The man closed his eyes a few seconds then snapped them open. “I’ve told you what happened, now I’m saying fuck all else.”

Hunter tried a few more probing questions which Ari batted off with ‘no comment’ and he realised he had lost the impetus of the interview. He made a decision to sum things up, draw it to a close, and return him to his cell.

* * * * *

Hunter and Grace waited in the custody suite. Tony Bullars and Mike Sampson had not fared any better with Pervez Arshad who had also made no comment to the majority of the questions, and once he had been shown the CCTV footage of the attack upon Samia had refused to talk to the detectives except to demand to be locked up back in his cell.

They still had to interview Mohammed and his wife Jilani. At least Ari’s evidence had implicated Samia’s father and would provide a wedge, though Hunter doubted the truth of that, especially as they knew that Samia had been violently raped prior to being murdered. From his experience that just didn’t feel like something a father would do. He knew they had made in-roads that afternoon but they were still no nearer to getting a clear-cut confession to the murder of Samia.