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  Towards the end of September 1994, he arrived out of the blue at his mother’s workplace. He pleaded with her to help him because he was in serious trouble. Joan asked him what kind of trouble, but Kevin refused to elaborate. ‘I will tell you one day, but I can’t at the moment,’ he said. Deeply concerned, Joan told her son that he would have to come home with her and explain things to his father.

  Kevin’s father, Albert, recalled that his son was ‘white as a sheet’ as he sat down to speak to them. He explained that he desperately needed £2,500 to pay for a kilo of drugs he owed. Albert commented at the time, ‘He told us that if he did not get the money, he would kill himself; that he would jump off the multi-storey car park or something. He appeared nervy and in trouble. I’d never seen him in such a state. He’d never talked about committing suicide before, so we knew he was genuinely worried.’

  Kevin’s parents were due to go on holiday to the Far East in a few days’ time, so they agreed to help their son in the hope that he would settle his debt and have no more to do with drugs. They certainly didn’t want to go away and leave him alone in such a poor frame of mind. On 30 September, Albert wrote out a cheque for £2,000. Kevin told him to make the cheque payable to Russell Tate, Pat’s younger brother. As well as the cheque, Kevin’s parents gave him £500 in cash. The very next day, they left for their holiday. When they returned three weeks later, they learned that Kevin and Alison had split up and he was living with a friend named Simon Smith.

  While staying at Smith’s house, Kevin appeared to slip deeper and deeper into a depression. He never had a bath, or washed himself or his clothes. This was totally out of character in a young man who usually took pride in his appearance. Nobody knows if the separation from his girlfriend and their newly born son was the cause of his demise or if he had other problems on his mind. Everyone agrees that Kevin Whitaker was an extremely troubled man.

  On Wednesday, 16 November, Kevin got up from the settee he slept on at Smith’s and told his friend he was going out to meet someone. Smith asked him if he wanted a lift, but the offer was declined because Kevin said he was only going to nearby Rectory Road. When Smith got into his own car, he saw Kevin sitting in the passenger seat of a vehicle being driven by Craig Rolfe. Later that afternoon, Smith returned home to find Kevin asleep on the settee. When he awoke, the two talked about what they had been up to that day. Kevin appeared excited. He said Rolfe had agreed to let him get involved in another drug deal that would help him get back on his feet.

  The following day, Smith dropped Kevin off at his parents’ home. Every afternoon between Thursday and Monday, Alison would go to Kevin’s parents’ house so that he could see his son. This particular day, Kevin appeared happier than normal. He played with his son and received several phone calls. One of them was from Smith, who arranged to visit Kevin that afternoon. Later that day, Kevin spoke to Smith again, saying he would not be able to see him because he had to meet Craig Rolfe. Smith asked if everything was all right. Kevin assured him it was, adding, ‘I’ll talk to you when I get back.’

  As the evening drew on, Kevin’s parents became increasingly concerned about their son’s whereabouts. ‘Whenever he left us with the baby,’ his father later said, ‘he would call every hour or so to check everything was OK. This was the first time he had not done so. Kevin had seemed fine when he went out. He did not seem depressed or anything. The split with Alison had upset him but he seemed all right. There had been times in the week since the break that Kevin had been down, but he had not mentioned harming himself nor did he seem particularly stressed since he had asked for the money.’

  Having escaped a severe beating over the missing kilo of drugs, Kevin had been careful not to get involved with Rolfe or drugs again. But after the split with his girlfriend, he had decided he would need to find money somewhere to live and get himself back on his feet. Kevin heard about a dilemma Rolfe was facing and, thinking he could help him out, he telephoned him.

  A drug dealer had approached Rolfe and asked him to supply 25 kilos of cannabis for £60,000. Rolfe, unable to come up with such a large amount at short notice, stalled the potential buyer and frantically rang around everyone he knew, buying their stock in the hope he could supply the 25 kilos. Kevin knew where he could get his hands on a substantial amount of cannabis on short-term credit; in fact, not only could he get the drugs on credit, he could get them at a discounted rate if he bought in bulk. Kevin thought that this would be his chance to make some quick, easy, much-needed money. He worked out that he would make at least £5,000. Rolfe, however, convinced him he could earn more if he would once again act as a courier for the deal. Foolishly, Kevin agreed. When he met the dealer to purchase the drugs, the cash was taken from him but no drugs were handed over. Kevin had once more been ripped off.

  Tucker and Rolfe had turned up for the meeting with Kevin in Rectory Road in Tate’s cream-coloured BMW. As soon as Kevin joined Tucker in the back seat of the car, Tucker demanded the money. Terrified and with nowhere to run, Kevin blamed the drug dealer for the loss, so Tucker and Rolfe said they would take him to the man to confront him. The pair of them got increasingly annoyed as they headed down the A127 towards London. It was dawning on them that they weren’t going to get their money.

  Tucker later told me that he had grabbed Kevin by the throat and said, ‘Thieve our gear, would you? If you like drugs that much, have some more of ours.’ He had then injected Kevin with cocaine and Special K. He said Kevin had tried in vain to resist; he thought he was going to die, he was absolutely terrified. Kevin sobbed and pleaded with Tucker and Rolfe to let him go, but they’d just laughed. Kevin was injected three times with massive doses of drugs. Tucker said Kevin had then passed out.

  As they reached the Laindon/Dunton turn-off on the A127, Kevin was drifting in and out of consciousness. Rolfe drove up the slip road, as there didn’t seem much point in taking him any further, and turned left towards Laindon. Kevin had completely lost consciousness by now. Rolfe pulled up at the Lower Dunton Road and ordered Kevin to get out of the car, but he got no response. Tucker and Rolfe pulled Kevin from the back seat, but he was unable to stand and collapsed on the side of the road.

  They got into the car and drove off. Rolfe pulled up a short distance away and looked back. Kevin remained motionless. Tucker told me Rolfe had got out of the car and ran back towards him. He was standing over Kevin, telling him to get up, but still there was no response.

  ‘Fucking leave him,’ Tucker said.

  ‘You can’t leave him here,’ Rolfe replied. It was about six o’clock and everyone was coming out of work.

  Rolfe went back to the car, turned it around and drove to where Kevin lay. Tucker got out of the car with Rolfe and they both manhandled Kevin’s lifeless body back inside. Rolfe then drove back over the A127 to Dunton Road. Tucker said they looked at Kevin and knew he was dead. They pulled him out of the car and he was put face down in a ditch strewn with bin bags and rubbish.

  Nearly 30 hours after Kevin had left home, Albert and Joan’s worst fears were realised. Just after 10 p.m. on Friday evening, Detective Sergeant Sharpe and Detective Constable Mayo knocked on their door and asked them to attend the mortuary at Basildon hospital to assist with an identification. After his distraught parents had positively identified Kevin, an autopsy was performed to determine the cause of death. There were no signs of violence but five puncture marks on his right forearm and elbow indicated he might have died after injecting drugs. A toxicology report found Kevin had cocaine, Ecstasy, ketamine and lignocaine in his bloodstream. Each drug was present in high enough concentration to have caused death on its own. The police began interviewing Kevin’s friends and family to piece together his whereabouts in the hours leading up to his death.

  Considering the amount of drugs detected in his body, it was obvious to the detectives that Kevin could not have made his own way to the secluded spot where his body was found. He could not drive and it was extremely unlikely he would have been able to walk
anywhere.

  A few days later, Craig Rolfe was arrested and taken to Basildon police station, where he made the following statement: ‘I met Whitaker at a friend’s flat five years ago. Over the years, I have got to know Kevin fairly well. Having said that, we were not particularly close, although I have done him a few favours in the past. We have only gone out socially together on one occasion and on average I would see him two or three times a month. The last time was on Tuesday, 15 November around mid-afternoon when I saw him standing in a telephone kiosk in Rectory Road, Pitsea, making a telephone call. I stopped the car I was driving and had a conversation for approximately ten to fifteen minutes. I then drove off and left him to walk to Simon Smith’s house. The last time I spoke to him was between three and four on Thursday the 17th, when I phoned him from my home address to his father’s address. The conversation lasted five minutes and I can recall that he said he had been to see his little boy that morning. At no time did he mention that he was worried about anything or that he had any problems other than the fact that he was a bit down having split up with his girlfriend. That evening, I went out to a friend’s. I received a call on Saturday saying that Kevin was dead.’

  Rolfe’s girlfriend, Diane, who told police that she was with him at the time Kevin had died, supported his story. Diane said they had stayed in together watching a video. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened; it was just a quiet evening in.

  The police investigation soon ground to an unsatisfactory halt. It was frustrating for Kevin’s parents because they were sure Kevin had been murdered, but the police drew a totally different conclusion. They said the most likely explanation for Kevin’s death was that he had accidentally overdosed at a friend’s house. The friend, terrified of being implicated, would have put Kevin’s body in a car and dumped it where it was later discovered. Joan and Albert could not accept this. A few years earlier, they said, Kevin had been bitten by a dog and they had tried to take him to hospital to have a tetanus injection. Kevin refused point-blank because he said he was terrified of needles. Despite his parents’ protests, he never did go. Then there was the fact that the puncture marks were on his right arm and elbow – Kevin was right-handed. For him to inject himself in such a spot would have been extremely difficult if not impossible.

  ‘There is no way my son died by accident. It was murder,’ Albert told reporters at the time.

  In January 1995, an inquest was held at Chelmsford Coroners’ Court. Detective Inspector Peter Hamilton told the court that the police had investigated the possibility that Kevin had been murdered because of a drug deal that had gone wrong, but there had been no hard evidence to support this. The file, he said, had now been closed. The court also heard evidence from Craig Rolfe, who turned up for the hearing with Tucker in tow. Rolfe repeated what he had said in his statement. The coroner, Dr Malcolm Weir, had no choice but to accept what the police had to say about Kevin’s death: depressed after the split with his girlfriend and the loss of his job, Kevin had started to inject hard drugs and had accidentally overdosed. An open verdict was recorded. Kevin’s parents want to authorities to recognise the fact that their son was murdered. Having him labelled as a depressed junkie who overdosed is deeply upsetting.

  Only one person can end Mr and Mrs Whitaker’s torment. Everybody else who could assist the police is dead. I hope that person will look at their own child, understand what the Whitakers are going through and come forward. Only then can the Whitakers have closure.

  Chapter 7

  Tate had lost a lot of flesh from his upper arm after being shot by Nipper, but he remained in good spirits as he lay in his hospital bed. The firm made sure of that. Each evening, they would gather around him, listening to blaring house music, taking drugs and generally having a party. The other patients complained bitterly about the noise and bad language, and so Tate was soon moved to a private room.

  When Sarah, Tate’s long-suffering partner, would take their son, Jordan, to visit him, the nurses used to say to her, ‘What’s a nice girl like you doing with someone like that? As soon as you walk out with your little boy he has girls sitting on his bed.’ Embarrassed, Saunders made her excuses to Tate and stopped visiting him.

  A cocktail of prescribed and non-prescription drugs had made Tate paranoid. He would ramble incoherently about setting up Nipper so that he could kill him. It was obvious to everybody present that Tate was troubled and embarrassed by the fact that Nipper had not only stood up to him but also fought back. In his paranoid and confused state, Tate would think that Nipper was coming to the hospital to finish him off and so he asked Tucker to give him a firearm to keep in his bed. He was supplied with a handgun, which he hid under his pillow.

  Before Nipper had gone on the run, he had telephoned Tucker and left a message on his voicemail. ‘Hey you, you cunt,’ he said, ‘this is Steve Ellis. I’ve fucking just shot Pat Tate and you’re next. Now fucking leave my family alone, you fucking wanker.’

  Tate advised Tucker to phone Nipper and say there was no need for any more violence. Tucker was to tell Nipper that Tate wanted him to visit him in hospital so that they could resolve their differences. Nipper was no fool, he sensed that he was being lured to his death and refused to go anywhere near Tate or Tucker. Tate’s intention had been to blast Nipper in the head when he walked up to his bed. The gun would then be taken away from the crime scene by another firm member and destroyed. Tate would then tell the police that a hit man had shot Nipper and fled.

  It was while at Tate’s bedside that I first met Darren Nicholls, the man Tate had met in prison and who considered himself a bit of a face in the drugs world. Nicholls had been released from prison on 17 May 1994. Despite ringing all of his ‘friends’ to announce his release, not one of them took him up on his request to give ‘the big drug baron’ a lift back to his home in Braintree, Essex. Feeling humiliated and desperate, Nicholls telephoned Jack Whomes and pleaded with him to give him a lift. Never one to refuse anybody in need, Jack agreed. When Jack asked Nicholls why none of his friends and family had met him out of prison, Nicholls told him that he hadn’t informed them of his release because he wanted to surprise them.

  In an effort to help Nicholls return to the straight and narrow, his mum had pestered his brother, Graham, to employ him as a labourer. Graham had a landscape gardening business and he agreed to let Darren join him. The venture was doomed from the start. The brothers argued constantly and they parted company after only two weeks. Nicholls then tried to set up his own business, but he could not attract any customers as nobody seemed to trust him. Another brother, Jonathan, offered him a job, but his wife and father-in-law objected to the proposed partnership because they did not want their family to have anything to do with him. After several heated arguments, Jonathan withdrew his offer.

  Finally, Nicholls managed to secure employment as an electrician with a friend of his named Ricky Snell, who had his own electrical business. The hours were long and the pay was poor, so Nicholls began selling cannabis around Braintree to subsidise his income.

  Since being released from prison, Steele and Jack Whomes had visited each other regularly. Jack would take a mechanical problem he had to Steele and Steele would do likewise. John Whomes remembers their conversations about mechanical matters as boring him ‘to the brink of suicide’.

  One afternoon, Nicholls turned up at Whomes’s yard with his wife Sandra and their children. He told Jack he had ‘been passing’ and had decided to pop in to say hello. Jack and John were taking a speedboat they owned down to Felixstowe, so they invited Nicholls and his family to join them. Jack and John were keen sportsmen who enjoyed water skiing, parascending and diving. Nicholls said he would love to try it and they all spent the day together on the boat in which, John recalled, Nicholls appeared to take a great interest. ‘He kept asking Jack how it could be navigated at night and what speed it could do. Jack thought nothing of Nicholls’s questions and answered them the best he could.’

  Around the same time, Nicho
lls heard on the grapevine that Tate had been shot and he thought it would be in his interest to contact him. In prison, Tate had been the man to arrange things. Nicholls was sure Tate would be able to help him expand his drug-dealing business by selling him cheaper stock and introducing him to more customers. Nicholls rang Mick Steele and asked him if he had a contact number for the man he had once described as a ‘great bloke’.

  When Nicholls finally got through to Tate, he learned he was in Basildon hospital. Tate sounded pleased to hear from him, and so Nicholls arranged a visit the very next day. When he arrived at the hospital, he was carrying four bottles of lager, which he said were a ‘well done for not being dead’ present. Within a minute of being in Tate’s company, Nicholls realised the ‘great bloke’ he had met in prison was no more. An attractive teenager named Lisa was sitting on the bed and Tate asked Nicholls if he wanted her to perform oral sex for him.

  ‘She’s just here to give me a blowjob, so I don’t have to trouble Sarah when she comes to visit me,’ Tate said. ‘Lisa doesn’t mind, she does it for a living; she’s fucking good at it too,’ he laughed. To emphasise the power he had over this 17-year-old girl, Tate started ordering her about, telling her to sort his pillows out, sending her to fetch drinks and generally treating her like a servant. Nicholls was embarrassed and changed the subject by asking Tate if he could supply drugs to a friend of his. Tate, always one to relish the prospect of making money, began to reel off what and how much was available. ‘I can get fucking truckloads. I can get the lot: Ecstasy, speed, cocaine, cannabis. Tell him, no matter how much he needs I can get it. I’m the man.’ I could see Nicholls was regretting visiting Tate, who was making it clear he considered Nicholls ‘nothing more than small-time’.