Serial – Part 3:

Casey loathed prison visits – but this crucial interview could shed a whole new light on the late Diana Hunter, and why she was murdered…

The Other Diana by Geraldine Ryan

Casey would never get used to captive humanity, no matter how many times she visited a prison. The sight of so much decay was depressing.

Then there was the smell which, in a male prison was made up of equal parts sweat, stale cigarettes and pent-up testosterone. Add to that the clamour of slamming doors and the almost electrical charge of menace that emanated from the landing, and, before 15 minutes was up, she had a raging headache and was desperate to leave.

Rowan Moody, it appeared, had decided to do a bit of sleuthing herself. She’d only got as far as social media, but Carl Crane’s Facebook page had yielded enough information to intrigue both Rowan and – once she’d relayed the information – Casey herself.

Diana Hunter’s stepbrother was doing time for GBH. Didn’t that prove he was a violent man, Rowan had demanded? And that he’d probably been a violent teenager? One capable of murdering his stepsister?

Casey had struggled to leap to Crane’s defence. The time had come to put Diana’s case before the Super and suggest reopening the investigation.

Much to her surprise, the Super had agreed. She’d even offered Casey PC Leila Rasheed as an assistant. OK, so one officer didn’t a team make. But Casey had never been one to look a gift horse in the mouth and, as gift horses went, Leila ticked all the boxes. Not only did she possess plenty of stamina, but she was totally unflappable. To say she was easily worth two officers was an understatement.

Before putting in a call to the prison governor to arrange a visit, Casey had familiarised herself with Crane’s interview over 20 years previously, when he’d been a boy of 17.

On the weekend Diana disappeared – the weekend of the Brockhaven Festival – he’d claimed to be either at home or, once he’d emerged from bed after midday, out in town with friends. There’d been no reason to doubt his story, and he hadn’t been questioned again.

Since speaking to Rowan, she’d made herself familiar with Crane’s colourful past and now had a good grasp of it. This was his first sojourn in prison, but it was by no means his first brush with the law. By all accounts, he described himself as an activist. If there was a demonstration anywhere within a radius of 30 miles, Crane would be there with his banner and megaphone.

It was during one of these protests that he’d had his first official brush with the law. His second had been more serious and had landed him inside.

He was already seated in the interview room, guarded by a burly prison guard, when Casey walked in. The guard gave her an indifferent nod.

‘Hello, Carl,’ she said, keeping her voice pleasant.

At her appearance, Carl sat up, his pale eyes curious and alert. The shaved head and muscley arms, covered in tattoos, were at odds with his small, neat facial features.

‘What’s this about? This lot don’t tell you nothing.’

His voice was stamped with the local accent, which Casey suspected was an affectation, like the tattoos and the pumped upper body. It was all part of the armour all inmates with any nous aimed to acquire as soon as possible, in order to avoid being bullied by their fellow residents.

‘Tell me what you’re in for, Carl,’ Casey said gently, once she’d introduced herself.

‘It wasn’t my fault.’

If she could have had a pound for every time she’d heard that line…

‘So who’s fault was it?’ she asked him, adding, ‘on both occasions?’

He shrugged. They’d never got as far as exchanging names, he explained. The prison officer sent him a warning look, and Carl responded with a contemptuous one of his own.

‘I was at a demo,’ he said. ‘Both times. Those things can get a bit lairy. You have to protect yourself.’

‘What was it you were protesting against?’ she asked him.

‘First time, it was fracking. They said we’d caused some criminal damage.’

He’d received a community sentence, he said.

‘Next time, it was a big supermarket chain. They wanted to set up two miles away from the local shopping centre. It would’ve killed everybody else’s trade.’

Casey had read the details. This ‘local’ shopping centre was 25 miles from Brockhaven. Had he really been concerned by the plight of those shopkeepers? Or did he just enjoy a punch-up?

The time had come to put Diana’s case before the Super…

‘You struck an officer,’ she reminded him. ‘He ended up in hospital, walks with a stick now.’

‘Look. All I was doing was trying to protect some old bloke next to me. This copper was picking on him. I couldn’t let him carry on.’

‘So you knocked him out?’ ‘Mate of yours, was he?’ He received a second glance from the prison officer, this time accompanied by a verbal warning. Casey raised a hand to signal she didn’t need any help, then turned back to Carl.

‘Look, I didn’t mean for him to fall and hit his head like that.’ His tone softened. ‘But you have to stick up for your cause, know what I mean? That copper should’ve been ashamed of himself, defending some big corporate machine that was bent on tearing the heart out of a community.’

‘Would you say you were a violent man when provoked?’ Casey asked.

He looked aggrieved, then suspicious. ‘What’s this really about?’ he demanded.

‘How well did you get on with your stepsister, Carl?’

It took him a moment for the penny to drop. When it did, he jumped to his feet. The prison officer was there in an instant. Casey could see what would be coming next unless she intervened. Crane would feel provoked and start kicking off. Next, he’d be hauled back to his cell and that would be the end of their chat.

‘Please, Carl,’ she said, trying to placate him. ‘No-one’s accusing you of anything.

Just hear me out.’

With some reluctance, he sat back down again.

‘You lot took a statement from me all those years ago,’ he said. ‘I never laid a finger on her. If anything, she was the one you had to look out for.’

Casey’s ears pricked up. ‘How do you mean?’ she asked him.

‘Nothing.’ Carl’s expression suddenly closed down.

Casey reiterated that he wasn’t accused of anything. But, just recently, something had come to light about Diana. It was possible she might’ve been blackmailing someone. And that someone had decided it was time to put an end to it.

‘I don’t know what you think I’ve got to do with it. I don’t know nothing about blackmail.’

In that case, what was he implying about Diana?

‘Are you telling me the truth, Carl?’ Her question had made him wary.

‘Look,’ she said. ‘I know they say you should never speak ill of the dead. But, by all accounts, Diana had her faults.’ She spoke softly. ‘Did she have something on you, Carl? Something it was important that no-one else found out?’

‘I’ve already said I don’t know what you mean.’

‘Perhaps she’d caught you taking money from her mother’s purse?’

At that, he just gave a contemptuous snort.

‘Or did she maybe catch you with a bit of weed?’

‘You think that’s worth killing someone over, do you?’

‘I don’t know, Carl,’ Casey said. ‘You tell me. What is worth killing for?’

He was keeping something from her, of that she was sure. All she could do was keep on guessing and, sooner or later, she’d hit the nail on the head.

‘Perhaps you were in a relationship with someone your dad didn’t approve of?’

Briefly, he raised his eyes from his hands before once more fixing them on the table.

‘Some girl they didn’t think good enough for you?’ she said. ‘Wrong background? Wrong class? Wrong religion even? Parents can be funny about stuff like that.’

He gave a laconic shake of the head. ‘You’re wrong, officer,’ he said. ‘There was no girl. There never were girls. Not for me, anyway.’

So, then, that’s what it had to be. Diana had discovered he was gay and that he

had been desperate to hide it.

‘Are you telling me you’re interested in men?’ she asked.

‘Took you a while to get there,’ he said. ‘She found out somehow. But I didn’t kill her because of it. In fact, it was the best thing she ever did for me.’ ‘How come?’

Up until that moment, he said, he’d been confused and ashamed of his sexuality. The thought of no longer having to keep it secret was liberating.

‘I told her to get lost. Said I wasn’t so easily blackmailed. Then I marched downstairs, told Dad to turn the telly off and came out to him there and then. So what possible reason did I have to kill her?’ he asked. ‘Right, time’s up.’

Casey had got what she wanted. She believed him. And now she was sure that Rowan was right. Diana Hunter was a blackmailer. Perhaps Carl had been one of her early targets… except he hadn’t risen to the bait. Maybe others hadn’t, either. But someone had, until they’d had enough and decided to put an end to her game.

Casey knew she ought to get back to the station, but the idea of exchanging one enclosed space for another didn’t appeal. The only remedy, she concluded, was a walk along the beach. There was nothing like the smell of the sea to kick new life into someone.

She had a sudden idea. Right now, this investigation seemed to be all about people. But what about places? Keeper’s Cove was a mere half-hour drive away, and so far she hadn’t been near the place. So what better opportunity than now? She could spend half an hour there, taking a look round and studying the geography, while the sea air

worked its magic and buffeted away all traces of the prison.

If she timed it right, she could pick Finlay up from school and drop him home, remind him he still had a mother. But first, to ease her conscience, she ought to call and brief Leila on her morning’s work.

‘So if Diana Hunter’s attempt to blackmail her stepbrother had failed, then, presumably, she didn’t give up there,’ said Leila, when Casey told her what she’d discovered.

‘You have to ask yourself how many other people she tried to get money from,’ Casey agreed. ‘And how many of them she succeeded with.’

‘You mean she could have been successfully blackmailing more than one person?’

Casey didn’t know. But she did know they were going to have to think seriously about anyone in Diana’s life who might have had a secret big enough to destroy them.

‘Someone who’d kill to make sure it never did,’ she said. ‘It might be a long list.’

‘Well, we can leave out the natural father,’ Leila said. ‘He emigrated to Canada after his divorce from Diana’s mother. He was well out of her life.’

‘We ought to interview Carole Hunter and the stepfather again. Remind me of his name?’

Tony Crane, apparent pillar of respectability. Not that a reputation had ever stopped anyone committing murder.

‘Check him out,’ Casey said. ‘At the time, he never came under any suspicion. But think about it – if Diana did have something on him, there’s a good chance other people heard rumours, too. Brockhaven’s a small place.’

‘I’m on to it,’ Leila said, then paused. ‘Gov, what about Ian Dawlish? Are we going to go back and interview him?’

The same question had also occurred to Casey. So far, she’d managed to dodge it. The thought of revisiting all that again filled her with dismay. Dawlish would be – what, 39, 40 by now? Was he still living with his mother? Was he happy? Settled? If he was, the chances of him remaining so once the police started probing into his life again were remote.

‘We should leave him for the time being, Leila,’ Casey said. ‘Last time, he was put under undue pressure to confess.’ ‘I didn’t know that!’

Casey apologised for not saying anything sooner. She couldn’t explain why not, unless it was because, even after all these years, the memory of Ian Dawlish, handcuffed, crying and shaking with fear, was still raw in her memory.

‘The guys who interviewed him – Barry Hardy and Jeff Taylor – went in hard. Before 24 hours were up, he was signing a confession.’

There was a rustle of paper at the other end of the line.

‘I haven’t located that yet,’ Leila said. ‘Nor any tapes. Just an initial interview he did with you. At least, I think that’s your signature at the bottom of his statement, isn’t it?’

‘Must be,’ Casey said. ‘But you won’t find any tapes or any other record of his interview with Hardy and Taylor. They would have gone to the CPS and then onto the Independent Police Complaints Commission.’

‘Seriously? What happened to those guys?’

‘Demoted. I think Hardy resigned later. And Taylor got a transfer to the Met.’

‘Good riddance to bad rubbish,’ remarked Leila, and Casey couldn’t disagree.

Now that she’d put some distance between herself and the prison, she began to relax.

‘Keep up the good work, Leila,’ Casey said. ‘I’ve got to go.’

‘Shall I call you if I discover something interesting?’ ‘Absolutely,’ Casey replied. Only, please, don’t let it be too soon, she thought, catching her first glimpse of the sea.

Diana Hunter was a blackmailer. Perhaps Carl had been a target…

Thank God for Doc Martens, thought Casey, as she picked her way along the narrow cliff path. The wind was bracing today and seemed to be coming from every direction, whipping her hair around her face and wrapping her coat around her legs. Seagulls wheeled overhead, piercing the air with their maniacal shrieking. Below lay the sea, grey and wrinkled where it met the horizon, foamy and wild where it hit the wall of rock below. The tide was in.

Casey stood as near to the edge as the cordon and the warning signs permitted. She wasn’t about to sacrifice her life just to get a good enough look at the drop. But she needed to fix in her mind how much or little of the town below could be seen from up here, and, by the same token, how much of this spot was visible from the town. Even on a clear day like today the answer was very little.

Few people came up here. There were too many stories of lost dogs and people suddenly slipping as the cliff edge crumbled beneath their feet. Erosion was happening so fast that it was a common belief that sooner rather than later the entire wall of cliffs would fall into the sea and disappear.

Nowadays the place was full of warning signs, but 21 years previously, there had been far fewer. Even back then, though, it was still relatively off the

beaten track. On the weekend of the Festival, it would’ve been even more isolated, making that a good weekend for a murder without witnesses.

From the material available, Casey had committed to memory everything she needed to know about the day Diana Hunter went missing. She’d failed to arrive home on the evening of Saturday 26 July, after leaving in the morning to go to her job on the Pier.

Before she left, she’d told her mum she’d probably be later back than usual because someone she knew was performing on the stage at around half six. But she definitely wouldn’t be later than nine, she'd insisted, as there was something on TV she wanted to watch.

As part of the Festival, Carole and Tony had volunteered to run a vintage clothes sale the next day, so were stuck at home sorting and labelling all the items they’d had dumped on them by generous Brockhaven residents. By the time they’d finished, so their statements had read at the time, they were too exhausted to do anything other than sit in front of the TV with a bottle of wine, where they’d both fallen asleep.

When Carl arrived home at around half eleven, along with a couple of his mates who’d missed their last bus, they naturally asked him if he’d seen his stepsister in the market square where they’d been for the last four hours.

When Carl said he hadn’t seen her all day, they’d first tried to contact Jenn Stone, who ran ‘Pierless Gifts’ where Diana worked. Then, when no one picked up, they rang round all her friends. But this was back in the day when the only people who had mobiles were city types. So, with everyone out on the town, they’d have received few answers that night. It was after so many fruitless enquiries that they’d decided to ring the police.

Casey’s phone emitted a muffled ringing from her coat pocket. It was Leila. As usual, she cut straight to the chase.

‘Boss,’ she said. ‘That conversation you had with Rowan Moody about the last time she spoke to Diana…

She said she’d told Diana she wouldn’t be able to see her the next day because they were off on holiday, right?’

‘Right.’

‘It’s just, well, I’ve been reading back through Jenn Stone’s statement. She ran the shop where Diana worked.’ ‘Yes?’ Casey replied.

‘I don’t know why it wasn’t picked up at the time,’ Leila said, her tone urgent. ‘But she says that around lunchtime that Saturday, someone came to the shop looking for Diana. A friend of hers, she said.’

‘Did she say who it was?’

‘That Saturday, someone came to the shop looking for Diana’

‘No. But she described a well-spoken, very pale, skinny girl with long dark hair. Said she looked like she hadn’t been out of the house in months.’

It was just how Casey herself would’ve described Rowan when she’d interviewed her as part of the original investigation.

‘What did she want?’

‘The girl asked if Diana could come to lunch. But Jenn Stone said they were being pulled out of the shop by the customers and Diana’s lunch break was going to have to wait till things calmed down.’

Casey turned this over in her mind. So Rowan had lied, not only 21 years ago in her statement, but just recently, on the phone to Casey. What else had she lied about?

‘Look, I’m out at Keeper’s Cove, Leila. But I’m just about to leave for St Bede’s to pick Finlay up,’ she said. ‘Rowan’s bound to be somewhere in the building. I think the two of us need to have another little chat.’

CONTINUES NEXT WEEK