Wild Thing (24 page)

When Del arrived back in London, he went into hiding, but within a week the police found out his address and arrested him. Del was charged with attempted murder and remanded in custody. While awaiting trial in HMP Belmarsh, heroin was smuggled in to him by ‘friends’ who knew of his addiction to the vile drug. Del was extremely grateful and eagerly injected the heroin that he had been craving without knowing it was pure. Nobody knew for sure if Del was going to talk about who employed him to attack the man in Lincoln or to carry out the Dalton murder, but it was decided he was never going to be given the opportunity. Del Croxson died within minutes of injecting the drug. He was 32 years old. He had a wife who was pregnant at the time of his death and three children. Two men dead, two families destroyed, numerous others injured: did anybody really win in the end?

I have been offered the chance to get involved in the lucrative drug trade on several occasions. The misery it causes, which I have witnessed, would never allow me even to be tempted. Anybody reading this who is involved or even thinking about getting involved should look at those they love and think again.

A new nightclub opened in Dagenham, Essex, called Lautrec’s. Because it was in a rough area, Kenny Lynwood, the manager, knew it would attract trouble, so he asked me to work there. ‘How much do you want a night, Lew?’ he said confidently. ‘I’ll pay you well to run the door for me.’

I thought for a moment and replied, ‘Two hundred and fifty pounds a shift will cover it.’

Kenny nearly fell out of his chair. ‘Two-fifty? I can’t afford that,’ he said.

‘Good luck with your club then,’ I replied, ‘because you obviously can’t afford me.’

I walked out of Kenny’s office and was getting into my car when I heard him call me. ‘Two-fifty it is then, Lew,’ he said, ‘but for fuck’s sake don’t tell any of the other doormen, or they will all want ridiculous wages.’

I assured him that I wouldn’t and drove home. I would be unable to work at the football club and Lautrec’s, so I gave my friend Dave Armstrong the football-club door. If he ever needed backup, I was only a phone call and a short drive away.

I’m not sure if the proprietor was trying to import some much needed culture into Dagenham or if he was taking the piss when he chose the name Lautrec’s for the club. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was a famous French painter in the late 1800s. He stayed in the Montmartre section of Paris, the centre of the cabaret-entertainment and bohemian life that he loved to paint. Circuses, dance halls, nightclubs – all these social activities were brought to life on his canvas. Toulouse-Lautrec would sit at a crowded nightclub table, laughing and drinking, and at the same time he would make swift sketches of people and events going on around him. The following day he would use the sketches to produce his now famous paintings.

I couldn’t see the link between Lautrec’s paintings and Dagenham, so I assumed it had to be the man’s appearance and lifestyle. Many of the customers who staggered into the premises certainly behaved and looked like Toulouse-Lautrec. As a child Lautrec was extremely delicate and more often than not sick. At the age of 12 he broke his left leg and at 14 his right leg. Lautrec’s bones did not heal properly, and the limbs ceased to grow. The painter reached maturity with a body trunk of normal size but with abnormally short legs. He was only 4.5 ft. Unable to live what most would consider to be a normal life, he drank heavily. By the 1890s the drinking started to affect his health. Eventually he was confined to a mental institution, but he could not overcome his alcohol addiction and died in 1901. That, I concluded, had to be the link between him and the customers we had to deal with at Lautrec’s. Most were drunk out of their minds by 10 p.m., ranting and raving like lunatics by midnight and suffering from physical abnormalities after being kicked around the streets at closing time.

Kenny got good value for his money when he paid me £250 each night. Lautrec’s had its fair share of heroes, but the door staff I picked to work there were solid. They dealt with trouble firmly and efficiently. One bouncer was a guy named Paul Dobson. Through him I was introduced to two lads in their early 20s who said they were looking for door work. Johnny Butler and Carlton Leach were friends who had earned a bit of a reputation amongst their own age group causing havoc around the East End and at football matches. On Paul’s recommendation, I gave them both a job. They turned out to be decent lads who did whatever I asked of them and were always there when needed.

There were several incidents each night at Lautrec’s. Some were minor; others far more sinister. There was one guy who used to come in with three of his friends. They were always courteous and always offered to buy the door staff a drink. One evening he pulled me to one side and said, ‘If a big blond lad comes here, don’t let him in. He is my son. He is on drugs, and he is a nightmare. I don’t want him allowed in anywhere where he can hurt himself, others or get into trouble.’

I assured him I would look out for his son, but the problem was there were plenty of big blond lads in Essex.

I had forgotten all about the ‘big blond lad’ when, a few months later, he came to the door asking for Kenty. I told him that no such person worked at the club, but he refused to listen. ‘I want to see Kenty,’ he shouted, ‘and I want to fucking see him now!’

I repeated what I had already told the man and added, ‘Even if there was such a person, you couldn’t come in, because it’s nearly closing time.’

The man became abusive, so I advised him to walk away while he still could. He glared at me, walked five or six paces away and then pulled out a handgun, which he aimed at my head. ‘You’re going to die, you bastard!’ he screamed. ‘You’re going to fucking die!’

The man wasn’t drunk, but he did appear to be on something, which I guessed was making him brave. ‘Am I going to die?’ I said, laughing at him. ‘Pull the fucking trigger then, you mug.’ I gripped the push bars on either side of the fire doors and began to swing back and forth. ‘If you’re going to shoot me, then fucking do it.’ The man pulled out a magazine of bullets, banged it into the butt of the gun, spun the weapon cowboy-style on his finger and pointed it back at me. ‘You fucking fool,’ I said, ‘it’s you who is going to die.’ I had gained quite a bit of momentum swinging back and forth on the doors. I knew that he would only get one shot off before I could grab him. If he failed to pull the trigger or missed, he was mine. ‘This is stupid,’ I said. ‘Put the gun away, and come in and have a drink.’

‘Fuck you,’ he replied. ‘I don’t trust you. If you try anything, I swear I will blow your head off.’

I assured the man I didn’t want any trouble. ‘You’re armed. What on earth could I do if you came into the club?’

He fell for it. As soon as he took a few paces forward, I let go of the doors and flew at him. I hit him as hard as I could with a left hook, which shattered his jaw. I grabbed the gun and smashed him repeatedly over the head with it. His forehead split open and began pouring with blood. I stood up, grabbed his arm and dragged his lifeless body around the side of the building, where I left him. I went into the club and said to Kenny, ‘I have got a present for you.’

‘What’s that?’ he asked.

‘Somebody outside who thinks your name is Kenty wanted to give you this,’ I replied as I handed him the gun.

Kenny’s face drained. ‘You are joking, aren’t you? Tell me you’re fucking joking, Lew.’

When I walked back out to the front door, I was confronted by a large group of armed police, who demanded to know who had a gun. I pointed towards Kenny, and moments later they were dragging him outside. All of the door staff were laughing. I was tempted to let the police take Kenny away. He was looking at me with terror in his eyes, pleading with me to intervene. I eventually explained to the police what had happened and they released Kenny, before taking the still unconscious gunman away.

A year later I was subpoenaed to attend court to give evidence against the man, but, out of respect for his long-suffering father, I refused to go. I have no idea of the outcome of the case and never saw father or son again.

The owner of Lautrec’s purchased another nightclub called Moonlights in Stratford, east London. The venue had been open for a number of years, was tainted with a fairly bad reputation but was controlled by a group of half-decent doormen. As I had done a good job of controlling the hooligan element at Lautrec’s, I was asked to run the door at Moonlights. I agreed to do so but saw no reason to change the door staff. They had done their job in the past, and they knew who to let in and who to refuse entry to. I decided to leave them in place and pay sporadic visits to the club to ensure that everything was running smoothly.

Within days of the club changing hands, a mob stormed in, smashing furniture, beating the doormen and stabbing one who had the audacity to fight back. The following day I was asked to supply a completely new door team. Carlton and Johnny were from the Stratford area, knew all the local faces and had a reputation amongst them, so I sent them to go and work at Moonlights. Around midnight I decided to leave Lautrec’s and visit Carlton and Johnny to see how they were getting on. When I arrived at the club, only Johnny Butler was standing on the door. I asked him where Carlton was, and he motioned upstairs with his eyes. I went up, looked around the bar but couldn’t see him. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw this familiar face bouncing around the dance floor looking happy as Larry. ‘No, it can’t be,’ I said to myself. ‘Surely fucking not?’ But I was wrong; it was Carlton. He was raving on the dance floor, pilled out of his head with all the other revellers, having the time of his life. ‘For fuck’s sake, Carlton,’ I said when I’d fought through the crowd to reach him. ‘You can’t leave your friend on the door while you dance.’

Carlton apologised and reluctantly left the dance floor to continue his work. I made my way to the manager’s office to reassure him that everything was in order. He shook my hand, greeted me warmly, made me a cup of coffee and then we sat talking about nothing in particular. Behind the manager’s head was a CCTV screen that showed various images from inside the club. ‘That Carlton’s a decent lad,’ the manager said. ‘He seems keen. I wish there were a few more like him.’

I spat my coffee out to prevent myself from choking on it. As the manager had been talking, Carlton’s face, with a huge moronic grin, had appeared on the screen. He was back on the dance floor giving it loads. ‘Yes, top bloke,’ I said, trying to hold back my laughter. ‘I’m sorry, really got to go – dodgy curry.’

I flew down the stairs and onto the dance floor. Carlton saw me coming and froze in his dance tracks. I had to pretend that I was annoyed, because it was my job to ensure that the door staff remained on their toes – that is, on the look out for trouble, not throwing shapes on the dance floor. I bollocked Carlton, and he went back to work. In later years Carlton employed his own door teams to run some of the most prestigious nightclubs in London. A film titled
Rise of the Foot Soldier
is currently being made about his very eventful life. In his book
Muscle
he says some very complimentary things about me and the way I went about my business. I thank him for that and hope he doesn’t mind me revealing a story from his apprenticeship that he probably wanted to forget.

I needed some spare parts for my car, so a friend suggested that I go and see a man named Brynmor Lindop, who owned a scrapyard just a short walk from my flat. When I arrived at the scrapyard, I eventually located an office that was tucked away under an old railway arch. Outside were parked various old military vehicles that appeared to be guarding the door. I guessed that I was about to meet some sort of army-barmy anorak. When I walked into the office, I saw that the proprietor had stuck machetes in his desk, imitation firearms hung from one wall and another had been strafed by a machine gun.

A Welshman about 30 years old, 6 ft 1 in. with an enormous frame, stood up from behind the desk and said, ‘Hello, my name is Bryn. What can I do for you?’ I explained that a mutual friend had sent me and I needed some car parts. ‘No problem,’ Bryn said. I don’t know what it was, but Bryn and I clicked, and from that day on we became good friends. He would call round to my flat in the day for coffee and a chat and to offer me the cheap stolen contraband he always had on offer. Bryn was quite deep. He didn’t say too much about the business he was involved in, but he did tell me that he had a serious problem with ‘some people’ from Stratford. I offered to help him out, but he was adamant that he could sort the matter himself. A few days later Bryn drove over to Stratford and shot the ringleader of these people in the leg. The bullet smashed through the man’s thigh bone, causing it to protrude through the skin. The problem, Bryn calmly announced, had been resolved.

 

I WAS WORKING ON MY CAR ONE DAY, AND MY SON BILLY, WHO WAS THEN
aged about eight, was riding his bike nearby on the forecourt outside our flat. I heard a woman shouting, ‘If you come past my window again, you little cunt, I’ll cut your fucking head off!’

Not quite believing what I had just heard, I got from underneath my car, stood up and looked around. I saw that a bleached blonde woman was screaming at Billy from outside her front door. I jumped over a low wire fence that divided the gardens and when I reached the woman I said, ‘Excuse me, you’ll do what to my son? Cut his fucking head off, will you?’

Instead of being intimidated by me, the woman shouted in my face, ‘You big useless bastard, my husband will fucking kill you!’

It was apparent to me that this foul-mouthed trollop had skipped finishing school and opted to be educated in the gutter, so I saw no point in debating the issue further. ‘Send your husband around,’ I said. ‘I’m home until 8.45. I must warn you, though. If he does come to my front door, don’t expect him to come home, because you will lose him.’