'IT'S A WRAP' - 4/25 - 'Birmingham's Front Line - true police stories'

Birmingham's Front Line was published by Amberley in 2016. The book offers a fascinating and unique insight into police culture and the problems faced by those on the ‘thin blue line’ during a tumultuous time in Britain’s second city. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1445657872/

Containing personal accounts as well as from former colleagues of robberies, rapes and murders, these true stories reveal some of the tools and tactics used to combat the violence, and general disregard for law and order encountered every day as the police fought to bring criminals to justice.

Covering the period from 1976 to 1988, Birmingham city centre represented a microcosm of criminal activity throughout the United Kingdom in this period – at one end of the spectrum, hardened armed robbers out to make a fast and brutal ‘buck’: at the other, the ‘punks’, ‘mods’, ‘bikers’ and ‘skinheads’ just looking for the cheap thrill of mindless violence. Hooliganism was rife, and the notorious ‘Zulu Warriors’ were always sure to make their presence felt.

Relationships with informants are described, and there is an inside view of the world of criminal intelligence, as well as explaining how, after much strife, police and criminals learnt to co-exist in the Midlands.

It also provides an insight into the days of ‘cottaging’ and the activities of so called ‘rent boys’ offering sex and operating in and around New Street Station. Once again previously unpublished accounts are included by former BTP officers that clearly illustrate how local police and those working with a railway environment, in the main worked closely together.

They say that within everyone there is at least one book, and I would encourage anyone who has stories in their heads to make that step and to start writing. Whilst clearly it is extremely challenging it is also exciting, and hugely satisfying

Extract One: ‘During the early morning BBC News, on an extremely cold day in November 2013, the words of a very successful fictional crime writer caught my ear. He had just completed his twentieth novel about a fictional career detective based on a real-life character in Scotland, and he had many contacts within the police service who had provided him with invaluable background knowledge. During an interview with the presenter, he said that many ‘cops’ were keen to write about their experiences but that they didn’t know when to ‘take the boring bits out’.

The reality is that much about policing is routine, and it can be mundane and boring, whilst at the same time being unpredictable, exciting, and occasionally explosive.

This book, in part, recounts my journey, over a twelve-year period, from being a young officer attached to the Criminal Investigation Department in the West Midlands Police in 1976, through to becoming an experienced detective sergeant on a very busy city centre division, before being promoted to the rank of inspector in 1988.

If you see a police officer on patrol you rarely look at the age of the officer behind the uniform which gives them immediate authority. Working in plain clothes, or as a CID officer, presents different challenges and your authority comes more from the way in which you conduct yourself as an individual, and how you use your own personality to achieve success.

During those years I was proud to work with many accomplished police officers who regarded their job as a profession, and their duty to protect the communities we served.

?I learned from them, and in due course others learnt from me.

On occasions I was involved in the investigation of robberies, rapes, and murders and saw at first-hand the effects that such crimes have on both the victims and their loved ones.

As ‘guardians of the law’ our job was to confront those who sought to inflict such misery on ordinary people and that’s what we did ‘day in day out’ relentlessly. We were not fanatics but for the most part we were very determined.

Relatively few people in life are lucky enough to experience the many positive things that come from becoming a police officer, nor the sadness of being exposed to so many tragic situations. I decided to put myself to the test to see if I could ‘miss some of the boring bits out’ and tell just a small part of the inside story about my life as a police officer in Birmingham.

A number of retired officers, who also worked during this period, have added their own first-hand recollections of working the streets of Birmingham. They provide a unique insight into policing in Britain’s Second City, set against a backcloth of some of the major national and international events of that time.

Sometimes funny, sometimes sad, and often extremely serious – but all true.’

Extract Two: ‘I had done my research: ‘Skinheads’ were the youngest age group but adopted intimidation tactics by virtue of the size of numbers that they could put out. Numbers fluctuated weekly depending on which football team was playing at home. They were responsible for most disturbances and offences of assault and minor robberies in the city centre. They rarely gathered for long in one place, and at the first sign of police action ran away, which it made it more difficult to make arrests. They frequented the Crown in Hill Street and the Rail Bar on New Street Station as well as the Bull Ring Open Market and Edgbaston Street.

The ‘Punks’ were much smaller in numbers and did not cause a great deal of trouble. However due to their exhibitionist tendencies they tended to attract attention to themselves anyway. At times they aligned themselves with the skinheads and frequented the same areas of the city centre.

The ‘Mods’ were still emerging as a group identity and initially caused no major problems. In December 1979 they initially aligned themselves with ‘Skinheads’ but subsequently distanced themselves from them.

The ‘Teddy Boys’ were a group of about twenty-five seen every Saturday, together with a small number of females under sixteen years of age. On their own their numbers were not sufficient to cause serious trouble, however when grouped together with ‘Bikers’ they became much more aggressive.

Between 2pm and 5pm on Saturdays they could be found at either ‘The Hole in the Wall’ in Dale End, ‘The Golden Eagle’ in Hill Street, or ‘Bogarts’ in New Street. They also congregated around ‘Reddingtons Rare Record’ Shop in Moor Street Subway.

Reddingtons was a veritable institution for lovers of vinyl records who would spend hours browsing through box upon box of second-hand records looking for long lost classics. The business was owned by Dan Reddington who more than three decades later sold his entire remaining stock of 75,000 albums and singles for just ￡1 each.

The same group of ‘Bikers’ twenty-five strong were seen every Saturday. Numbers were sometimes swelled by groups from outside the city. Whilst they did not class themselves as Hells Angels they sometimes operated on a similar ‘Chapter’ system and were potentially capable of causing serious problems. Drink could play a contributory part in their behaviour.

Steve Burrows, who retired as a Chief Superintendent, has first-hand knowledge of Biker activity in Birmingham during this period and recalls “The Hells Angels of USA wore what were known as top and bottom ‘rockers’ which included the words ‘Hells Angels MC’ a ‘Deaths Head’ symbol and the name of their Chapter at the bottom. You had to be officially sanctioned by the ‘Hells Angels’ to wear these symbols and were liable to a ‘stomping’ if found to be wearing them without approval.

More locally there were ‘Bikers’ and ‘Greasers’ who generally wore sleeveless denim jackets and leather jackets, with perhaps one or two pairs of trousers, one of which would probably be pretty dirty. They formed biker clubs centred around clubs and pubs so for instance there was the ‘Horse and Jockey Motorcycle Club’ which was twenty strong and met at the Horse and Jockey pub in Sparkhill. It was usual to have nicknames. The culture of Bikers is to shock people without much thought. They do not want to be ‘Norman Normal’. There were even ‘posh’ Bikers who wore good quality leathers.

?In the 70s there was already a very strong group of Hells Angels based in Wolverhampton. They regularly came into conflict with a group known as ‘The Cycle Tramps’ who originally had some connections in Hay Mills and at the ‘Speedwell’ pub in Tyseley. At some point they became one of the biggest groups in Birmingham. Another group known as the ’69 Club’ used the ‘Royal Oak’ pub in Hockley Heath as a meeting place and came into conflict with the ‘Cycle Tramps’. Yet another group emerged which became known as the ‘United Bikers of Great Britain’.

Violence was endemic amongst these groups as inter-group rivalry erupted into street battles on occasions.

During this period the ‘Motorcycle Action Group’ was also formed which sometimes attracted thousands of bikers to rallies and demonstrations. On one occasion hundreds of bikers rode through Birmingham City Centre protesting about new laws on the wearing of crash helmets.”

The biker culture was not new to Birmingham City Centre and even in the early seventies retired BTP Detective Constable Ian Mabbett recalls a robbery he dealt with involving a group of six he arrested single-handedly, “I was on patrol in uniform on New Street Station, at the top of the steps leading up from Station Street, when I saw a youth covered in blood who had been kicked and punched in the face. We looked over the balcony and he pointed out the attackers, all wearing leather jackets and jeans, who had robbed him of just fifty pence. I went after them and stopped them outside the ‘Crown’ pub where I drew my truncheon and ordered them to stand facing the wall with their hands against it. Fortunately, they did as they were told, and other officers arrived after I radioed for assistance. We recovered three lengths of motorcycle chains nearby which they had threatened the victim with.”

The public order problem on Saturdays revolved around an average of some two hundred youths in total from these groupings and it was our job to sort them out.

Normally public order problems were dealt with by officers in uniform, but I decided that we needed to get up close to them, so we would stay in plain clothes. It was a risky strategy, but I had confidence in the team and our ability to control situations even if outnumbered. Any arrests were to result in immediate handcuffing for safety reasons and we would frog-march them down to Digbeth Police Station as fast as we could, which would be quicker than waiting for a police car to pick us up and helped to avoid crowds gathering. Speed and surprise were essential. I was also keen to maximise on media opportunities and my plan was to bail those arrested to specific court dates so that we could highlight the problems as well as importantly what we were doing to address them.

On Saturday 15 December 1979 I booked on duty at 9.15am and went to court with a prisoner we had arrested the day before. I came back and briefed the team, and we went out at 1pm to cover the areas where our troublemakers met. Just over an hour later we made two arrests for threatening behaviour in the Rag Market, lodged them, and went straight back out.

At 2.35pm I was with three of the team in the Outdoor Market area and observed a group making their way towards the glass doors leading into the Indoor Market. As they were about to enter, some of the group pounced on a young ‘Mod’ and started punching and kicking him. Everyone surged through the doors as he tried to escape from his attackers and down some steps into the market which was crammed with stalls and shoppers.

We ran after them and as we did so I ran through one set of doors and straight into the screaming melee. My team went through the adjacent set of doors and in that instant, we became separated amongst the crowds of ordinary shoppers. I jumped on one of the attackers shouting ‘Police’ as loud as I could. He lashed out punching me. We fell to the floor in the struggle, and I hung on with him on top of me. I was now the centre of attention with various boots flying in my direction. Fortunately, my prisoner, a twenty-two-year-old from Quinton, took most of the kicks. A Markets Police Officer ran forward and was also assaulted.

?After what seemed an age, the crowd parted, and my team seemed to fly over the heads of the attackers and four more arrests were made. The rest scattered as uniform officers arrived. We had our five prisoners and after a quick check-up with Doctor Wilson at the General Hospital for bruising to my back, we spent the next few hours documenting them.

Secretly I think the team felt a bit guilty that I had got a kicking, but it was not their fault and apart from some initial banter I chose not to give them a hard time over it. My attacker, who later got sent to prison for a month, kept apologising profusely and showed real regret for his actions I had been involved in many scrapes when struggling to arrest people, but this was the first, and the last time, that I was deliberately assaulted during my police career.

We had made a start, and this was reflected in media coverage over the next couple of days. One headline read ‘Policeman hurt, 18 arrests in battle - Gangs fight it out amongst shoppers’ and a reporter described events of the day as follows ‘A Security man and a Police Sergeant were injured, and eighteen youths were arrested as gang violence plagued Christmas shoppers in one of Birmingham’s Indoor Markets. Mothers with children, pensioners and families out buying presents became embroiled in the disturbance at the Bull Ring Indoor Market. At its height it involved as many as 150 youths, 20 West Midlands policemen, 20 security men and five corporation markets department security men. It was the second week that gangs of youths – many dressed in the jeans and jackets of Hells Angels – caused trouble in the area. Last week stalls were overturned and produce scattered as fighting spread. Yesterday’s trouble flared when a gang of 50 youths began assaulting a ‘mod’ in the Indoor Market. The Police Sergeant Michael Layton and a member of the markets police security force were knocked to the ground and kicked in the back. Other policemen moved in and made further arrests. A senior police officer said later “The two men who were kicked were not seriously injured and have remained on duty. Unfortunately, it is a fact that we do get this kind of violence in the city centre particularly between rival gangs.” …’