London Street Gangs: A modern history
Part Four: Operation Shampoo
During the 1950’s and 1960’s Indian and Pakistani
immigrants began to arrive in west London, providing a source of cheap
employment for the industrial factories located in areas such as Hounslow and
Hillingdon. Their intention was to stay temporarily whilst work was available,
however, through a combination of immigration regulations and other government
policy, workers decided to take up permanent residence and would later be
joined by their families. Southall in the London Borough of Ealing, west
London, became a draw for South Asians[i].
English and Irish residents moved further afield into Hillingdon and beyond
whilst Southall grew to be a majority Asian area with less than 15% of
residents being white by 1991. The community became dominated by Indian Sikh’s
and Indian Hindu’s, there were also smaller numbers of Muslim’s from Pakistan. During
the partition of India and Pakistan there were no documented issues occurring
in Southall, to the contrary there was said to be unity amongst all Asians in
Southall, united in their struggle against oppressive groups such as the
British National Party and National Front supporters. Violence targeted at
Asians by nationalists provoked a number of protest riots, or race riots, during
the 1970’s in Southall. On April 23 1979 the National Front chose Southall Town
Hall as the venue for a racist campaign which resulted in anti-fascist
protester Blair Peach dying after receiving a blow to the head demonstrating
against the National Front[ii].
Like many Asian communities in Britain, who suffered disproportionately from
racial violence when compared to other immigrant groups, those in Southall
formed vigilante defence groups. One of the defining influencing moments was,
tragically, the heinous killing of teenage student Gurdip Chagger who was
stabbed to death by a gang of five white youths on June 4 1976.
Lack of action by the government and police in dealing
with racial violence towards immigrant groups saw the vigilantes begin to
develop more gang-like tendencies, becoming the aggressors as well as
defenders. The two gangs which developed in Southall were called the Holy
Smokes and Tooti Nungs, also written as Tuti Nangs. The Holy Smokes, or Holies,
came from the old part of Southall which is situated around the Gurdwara Sri
Guru Singh Sabha temple. The later Tooti Nungs, or Toots, were situated in the
new part of Southall to the north of the Holy Smokes area. Those who began the
defence campaign with the Holy Smokes “belonged
to a higher Sikh caste of Jats, a warrior race from the Punjab...Holy Smokes
being a reference to the connection their parents had with the local temples.
In the early eighties, a dispute broke out over the leadership of the group.
Those from the lower castes felt their interests were not best being served by
the Jat leaders who tended to look down on them...the lower caste broke away
and formed their own gang – the Tooti Nungs[iii].”
Translated, the Tooti Nungs means the ‘Worthless Ones’, it’s also Sikh slang
for ‘Ruffians’. According to former Southall resident Sanjeev, “the originators of the Toots and Holies
were considered successful in defending Southall, they protected the community,
and they grew in numbers and in reputation. Then the next generation came
along, even some who’d been recruited by originators, and they fed off the
reputation. But they weren’t vigilantes, they were developing into two opposing
criminal syndicates” – those early leaders were said to be Malkiat Hyare in
the Smokes and Jhalmal ‘Jumbo’ Dhillon and Armarjit Sandhu in the Toots[iv].
A series of symptomatic assaults, property attacks and intimidating incidents
began to occur in Southall with greater frequency in the early 1980’s, police
believed them to be unconnected. Then in the spring of 1983 a further series of
assaults and reprisals forced police to propose a full inquiry into the
violence. Up until this point there had been a total ignorance of Asian gangs
in Southall by the Metropolitan Police. An intelligence gathering exercise
began, liaising with H.M Immigration and Special Branch, and there was a
growing conviction that these gangs had connections in other cities with Asian
communities, and that criminal elements may have roots in India. It was
confirmed during enquiries that gang members in Southall were involved in
illegal immigration and trafficking of drugs, namely heroin. Furthermore an
unexpected finding was participation in ritual rape offences, having
implications for the whole community, disclosing a new behavioural aspect. The
known rape of a single girl makes her unmarriable and so there was the serious
problem of those incidents never being disclosed.
In 1981 Operation Fisherman was launched by Customs to
address trafficking conspiracies being organised by members of Britain’s Asian community.
Customs believed that Indian and Pakistani criminals in Britain had taken over
from Iranians as the principal traffickers of heroin into the United Kingdom,
having originally been concerned mainly with helping illegal immigrants gain
access into the country[v].
Operation Fisherman focussed its investigation on employees of the Acme
Cleaning Company which worked at terminal three of Heathrow airport in west
London. What they observed during their surveillance was drug courier Santokh
Johal, from Amritsar in the Punjab, travel on an Air India flight from Delhi
carrying a holdall. When he left the plane at Heathrow he was intercepted by
employees of the Acme Cleaning Company, including Inderpal Makh from Slough, as
he walked through the pier connecting to the terminal. He was then guided to an
emergency exit where the holdall was handed over to Inderjeet Balu of Southall,
who put it into a black rubbish sack and into a vehicle belonging to the
cleaning company. The holdall contained 17.1 kilograms of heroin worth an
estimated value of £2.2million. The four men involved, all of whom were aged
between 37 and 43, were later jailed for a total of more than 30 years. It was
later suggested, although unconfirmed, that the violence which had been
occurring amongst young gang members was orchestrated by older criminals to
defer attention from such smuggling operations. The series of violent incidents
included pitched battles whereby axes, machetes and ceremonial maces were used.
It escalated with a series of fire bombings, kidnappings, shootings and
stabbings. A key incident which cemented the prolonged rivalry between the two
gangs was in May 1983 when the Holy Smokes attacked two members of the Tooti
Nungs leaving one victim with permanent brain damage.
Three years after the this incident, and following a
succession of tit-for-tat reprisals, a more notable and carefully planned
revenge attack was plotted by members of the Tooti Nungs. It occurred at The
Green in Southall when twenty Toots arrived jumping out of a car convoy and
chasing down their rivals. People fled in terror as Jaswir Bumbra, 23, was
chased down the street with blood streaming from 22 stab wounds. Another
victim, Armarjit Khumra, 21, was surrounded and slashed from his ear to his
chin. Bhinder Gill, 30, of Hayes, was jailed for five years after the events.
He was one of the leaders of the Toots, who were by now heavily involved in
drugs and protection rackets. He had two previous convictions for affray which
had arisen from gang fights against the Holies. Other members of the Toots
jailed in relation to this incident were Surinder Dadwal, 21, and his brother
Ranjit, 18, both of Southall. The Toots’ Jhalmal Dhillon, then 24 of Trinity
Road, Southall, was jailed for two years for his involvement. He was acquitted
of a second charge of wounding with intent against Amarjit Khumra. Four other
members of the Tooti Nungs who were aged between 17 and 20 and were all cleared
of affray. Another major battle between the two rival gangs took place outside
the Victory Public House at Southall Green on March 8 1985. Sukhcharm Singh
Bath, 30, also known as Lugi, admitted that he was a senior member of the Tooti
Nungs at the time of this fight in which a rival gang member was badly knifed.
Jaswir Singh Bumbrha, known as Sharka, was left with serious injuries. He had
cuts to both eyes and hands and was slashed from the middle of his back to his
thigh. He spent five days in hospital and had to undergo numerous stitches.
Again the attack had been started by a group of 10 and 15 members of the Tooti
Nungs who set upon members of the Holy Smokes as their pub was closing. Victim
Bumbrha had been drinking at the pub with friends when they saw members of the
Tooti Nungs walking down the road. As they sat on a wall to observe, two cars
pulled up with more Toots who got out and confronted Bumbrha before assaulting
him. Sukhcharm Singh Bath who denied fighting and causing an affray was
acquitted by a jury at Isleworth Crown Court.
More members of the Tooti Nungs went on to be convicted
of violence against the Holy Smokes, including a 17-year-old boy who stabbed
his rival at a petrol station near Southall Green. The 17-year-old and his
16-year-old co-defendant arrived at the location where they intimidated a rival
provoking a fight. During the fight a knife was produced and used to stab the
Holy Smokes member in the upper torso. The defendant who denied wounding was
remanded in custody. The Holy Smokes were equally as capable of arranging
vicious ambushes against rivals and during one trial in 1986 they were accused
by a judge of trying to reduce London’s streets to the Chicago of the 1930’s.
The comment was made during a month long trial, the seventh in a series involving
the Holy Smokes, in which six defendants were found guilty of conspiring to cause
grievous bodily harm and affray. Their victims the ‘Billy Brothers’, or ‘Billy
Boys’, included Nahim Illyas and Mohammed Ayub who noticed that they had been
followed by a transit van as they drove home from a wedding in north London. It
was suggested at court that they and their associates were involved in an
attack whereby Holy Smokes member Surjip Dhami was injured the previous day.
Fearing retaliation Illyas and Ayub picked up three of their associates outside
Willesden Library before parking up at Willesden Green police station for
safety. The transit van then appeared, wedging the victims into their car
parking space. According to witnesses between six and thirty Indians jumped out
of the back of the van, smashed the car’s windows and begun to beat the
occupants with various weapons. Zia Zammurad was stabbed in the leg and Sajjad
Jabbar received such a heavy knife blow that the blade went through his arm.
Several minutes after the attack outside Willesden police station had ended
police picked up five members of the Holy Smokes gang in a transit van. The
police told the prosecution that they’d found a number of hockey sticks, iron
bars and knives in the van but the five denied any knowledge of the attack
which had just took place. A sixth person was later arrested after their fingerprints
were found on the windscreen of the victims’ car. He claimed that he had
touched the windscreen to warn the passengers they were about to be attacked.
At the end of the trial the jury found all six people guilty of conspiring to
cause grievous bodily harm and causing an affray. The three eldest defendants,
who were Jaspir Bal, 23, from Hanworth, Onkar Sehajpal, 23, from Greenford, and
Surjip Dhami, 24, also from Greenford, were each sentenced to two years
imprisonment. The younger members, who included 17-year-old Sitkar Sehajpal of
Greenford and Ranjit Braich of Wolverhampton, were given two years youth
custody. Mr Brian Lett, prosecuting said, “We
cannot be certain these men were actually responsible for the attack but one
can accept that they were a part of the conspiracy.”
Behind the violence, heroin seizures linking back to
Southall gangs were occurring on an annual basis. Shortly after the smuggling
conspiracy involving Heathrow airport cleaning contractors another business
front was identified within a heroin conspiracy, it came after a petrol bomb
attack in July 1984 in which one man died. The business in question was the
newspaper offices of the ‘Sandesh Weekly’ paper in Dilloway Yard, Southall. The
conspiracy began when 62-year-old Arnold Futerman, who served four years for
conspiring to forge $50million, put Sandesh
Weekly proprietor Ajit Singh Sat-Bhambra, 51, in contact with an Irishman
from Finsbury Park who was eager to obtain a consignment of heroin. The
Irishman had intended to distribute the heroin to the street level and turn a
profit, but needed a connected source who could deliver the goods. Sat-Bhambra
then went about arranging the smuggling of over £300,000 worth of heroin,
four-and-a-half kilos, which arrived at Heathrow on May 30 1984. Drug courier
Hans Raj Sharma was recruited to carry the heroin by Delhi travel agent Satish
Gupta, it would be the first time Sharma had ever travelled outside of India.
Gupta’s brother Babu Lal was a London-based Indian envoy working at the Indian
High Commisson, he would meet Sharma to collect the heroin. For reasons
undisclosed, Customs officers had begun their observations a few months before
the smuggling operation which centred on Sat-Bhambra, Futerman and the Irishman.
Customs officer Daniel Curry told Isleworth Crown Court that during their
operation “the three men were seen to
meet at various West End hotels, including the Cumberland, the Churchill and
the Waldorf, and once at a Sikh temple in Woolwich. We captured snatches of
their conversations which indicated that the defendant [Sat-Bhambra] was being
pressed to come up with the goods. He was arranging to bring in heroin and
[Irishman] was very keen to get hold of this heroin. Then at one meeting which
took place in a pub only days before the importation, there was a mention of
four-and-a-half kilos” – almost the exact quantity that finally came
through. On May 30 1984 Customs officers observed Hans Raj Sharma with a
suitcase of heroin being met at Heathrow airport by Babu Lal Gupta, Sharma was
arrested and Gupta was spoken to. Gupta claimed immunity and refused to talk to
police, with diplomatic privilege nothing could be done about him and he was
released. Customs officers continued to observe the movements of Gupta,
Sat-Bhambra and the Irishman.
When Sat-Bhambra was arrested in March the following
year, he was questioned about the importation of drugs, telling Customs
officers: “I’m a person working against
such people.” Ironically, Sat-Bhambra’s Sandesh
Weekly paper had been running a high profile anti-drugs campaign and at one
point his defence claimed that his meetings with Futerman and the Irishman was
solely an information collating exercise as part of this campaign. He also
claimed to have neither met nor known Babu Lal Gupta and Hans Raj Sharma,
oblivious to the fact he had been under surveillance. On May 22 1984 Customs
observed a meeting between Gupta and Sat-Bhambra in the foyer of the Palm Beach
Casino, Berkeley Street – Gupta had arrived using his official car bearing a
diplomatic number plate. Following Babu Lal Gupta’s release on May 30 he was
observed by Customs officers again meeting up with Sat-Bhambra, furthermore a
visiting card with the name Satish Gupta was also found at Sat-Bhambra’s home
address in Burns Avenue, Southall. Observations continued in June 1984 during
which a number of meetings between Sat-Bhambra and the Irishman took place at
the Master Brewer motel in Hillingdon. They had conversations about money owed
to the Irishman in lieu of the drugs, there were problems for Sat-Bhambra who
had not been able to do what was asked. Meanwhile Babu Lal Gupta was in the
process of using his diplomatic immunity to escape justice, going back to India
on June 10 1984. Then in July 1984 a petrol bomb was thrown into the offices of
the Sandesh Weekly premises in
Dilloway Yard, Southall. Kartar Singh, the sub-editor, died as a result of the
fire leading police to launch a murder inquiry. The offices were burned to the
ground although Sat-Bhambra continued to run the paper from his home address.
Sat-Bhambra, despite becoming involved in the heroin conspiracy, ran a highly
regarded newspaper. He used this paper to take a stand against the Khalistan
movement[vi],
claiming that he had acted as a paid informer for the Indian government on the
activities of extremists seeking an independent Khalistan. He believed these
extremists to be responsible for the firebombing of the newspaper office.
Arnold Futerman turned Queens Evidence in the heroin trial, telling the court
how he had been a go-between for Sat-Bhambra and the Irishman, undergoing
rigorous cross-examination for four hours during which time Nigel Milne QC,
defending, suggested that he should be in the dock instead of his client. Whilst
it was not alleged that Sat-Bhambra physically brought the heroin into the
country, he was a person who played a part in bringing it in. Sentencing him to
nine years in prison Judge Derek Holden said: “it gives me no pleasure to sentence a man like you because you are
clearly well-educated, intelligent and running a good newspaper.” Sharma
who’d never been out of India before was sentenced to six-and-a-half years for
his part in the operation. The Irishman had his charges dropped at the
committal stage.
The spectre of the Southall gangs was raised again over
another drugs trial at Isleworth Crown Court in 1986 whereby four men were
jailed for heroin trafficking. One of the men, who was said to have held sway
over the others, was reputed to be a member of the Toots. However, the jury
went on to reject this assertion and concluded that two brothers who ran stalls
in Brentford arcade were the wholesalers. Brothers Manohar and Prempal Desour,
of Chiswick, and Simon Dean, also of Chiswick, were all found guilty of
conspiring together with others to supply heroin in December and January
1985-86. The brothers were convicted of possessing 99.6g of heroin and
supplying it to Jhalmal Dhillon of Southall. Dhillon was acquitted on the
conspiracy charge and one of possession and discharged. The men had been
subjects of a Customs and Excise operation which involved months’ observations
centred on the Brentford Arcade where the Desour brothers had two stalls,
selling Indian ornaments and jewellery, but very few customers. Prempal Desour
was observed carrying boxes which would later be picked up by Dhillon and Dean.
On January 16 1986 customs officers raided the arcade having arrested Dhillon
as he left with approximately £10,000 worth of heroin. The search of the arcade
revealed more than 30g of heroin concealed in ornamental candle holders.
Meanwhile other officers visited Dean’s flat where they found scales, wrappers,
heroin and cannabis. They also found lists of names with apparent calculations
beside them. Dean was a self-confessed heroin addict at the time but denied
supplying others to fund his habit. Manohar Desour claimed that he was a user who
was supplied by Toots’ Dhillon. He told the court he owed Dhillon a lot of
money and was under pressure from the Tooti Nungs to repay it, whilst Prempal
said he merely did as he was told. Dhillon, who was discharged, claimed he did
not know what was in the boxes he collected from the arcade and said he was
simply doing a delivery job. Shortly after the trial there was a resurgence and
escalation in violent gang-related activity in the Southall area, it would lead
to the uncovering of what police referred to as the “Asian Mafia”.
In February 1988 fears of street warfare led to extra
police being drafted to the Southall area of west London after a series of 16
incidents including assaults, between the Holy Smokes and Tooti Nungs, took
place over a 10 day period[vii].
One series of exchanges was sparked off by an attack on a boy of 15 with ties
to the Holy Smokes. He was slashed by a group of Tooti Nungs wielding Stanley knives
and hammers. In a revenge attack the Holy Smokes assaulted a member of their
rivals by piercing his lungs with a sword. It was followed by petrol bombings
at the homes of two alleged gang leaders[viii].
Nine people were arrested and charged as swords, meat clevers, rice fails,
knives and a ceremonial pike called a khanda,
were seized by police in the previous few days. A total of 25 arrests were made
during the 10 day conflicts, prompting police and Asian community leaders to
meet in west London. They made appeals to parents to help them to control the
youngsters taking part in these conflicts[ix].
The participants of the violence tended to be the youngest members, composed of
teenagers and sometimes even children, recruited by siblings and friends and
encouraged to gain status through street battles and petty crime. According to
a former police informer, and associate of the Holy Smokes, Nasir explained to
author Tony Thompson that there was no shortage of willing recruits. “In Southall, everyone wants to prove
themselves…but if they are not good academically or have a talent for some
sport, the only way they can become the bigger man is to join one of the gangs.
The older ones go up to the little ones in the school playgrounds and pat them
on the back. They tell them they are big men and that they respect them. The
kids love to hear that. Once you’ve told them, they will do whatever you want.
Rob someone, stab someone, burgle a house, steal a car or get involved in a big
ruck…If you live in Southall, you simply have to get involved with the gangs.
You have no choice. If you have a friend who is in one gang and you’re seen
walking with him or talking to him, you’re immediately put into a pigeon-hole.
People will assume you’re on one side or another and then the next time there’s
any trouble, you become a target. So you have to join in order to prevent
yourself from becoming a victim.[x]”
It was later alleged that the violence had been
encouraged by more senior members of the Southall gangs in a bid to distract
police attention away from organised activity, however, the violence had the
opposite effect, later leading to the launch of Operation Shampoo. By August
1988 police had round up 53 alleged members of the Holy Smokes and Tooti Nungs,
however, it was reported that their leaders formed a truce and many witnesses
began retracting their statements. Others had been intimidated and many charges
against those arrested were dropped. Police became hampered by the reluctance
of the community to talk about the gangs, whilst local solicitor Harold Persaud
said “No one will admit to being a gang
member. People are seldom convicted because witnesses are unreliable.”[xi]
A few months later in October 1988 a confidential report from Scotland Yard was
shared with the Sunday Times, detailing a special intelligence section on Sikh ‘godfathers’
controlling organised crime networks in Britain, shielded by strong community
ties. It stated that officers had evidenced and observed key figures behind the
gangs, including alleged godfathers, having a series of secret meetings in
London, Birmingham, Cardiff and Glasgow to agree heroin trafficking deals.
Furthermore they believed that the organisation were also involved in a
£4million life insurance fraud, selling policies to bogus clients and stealing
commission from large insurance companies. Operation Shampoo went on to explore
concerns that the older criminals had formed connections with their
counterparts in other cities across Britain with large Indian communities, such
as Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Leicester, and were participating in organised
crimes such as human trafficking and drug smuggling. The operation was composed
jointly by Scotland Yard and Customs and Excise targeting the Asian Mafia – a term given by the police
and media. The investigation that was Operation Shampoo was led by Detective
Superintendent Roy Herridge and involved 14 detectives based at Ruislip police station
in Middlesex. They were backed by police officers, the territorial support
group, regional crime squad, flying squad, central drugs squad, customs,
immigration, passport office and Post Office investigators[xii].
The investigation began in January 1989 and extended to the rest of Britain.
Furthermore, during the course of Operation Shampoo links were traced even
further afield to the US, Canada, West Germany, Belgium, Sweden, Norway, India
and Pakistan.
After several months of work, in August 1989, 152 people linked
to the Holy Smokes and Tooti Nungs were arrested for a range of crimes
including insurance and building society fraud, a £200,000 credit card fraud
and an international network for smuggling illegal immigrants into Britain and
elsewhere. Other aspects of the investigation were focusing on activities
ranging from armed robbery, drug trafficking and blackmail. The operation
recovered £500,000 worth of heroin, stolen cars, forged documents and stolen
credit cards. The investigation took place across three continents and also
involved police from West Germany and Belgium. A number of the arrests took in
older figures, some of whom were wealthy businessmen, however, despite the
offences and individuals being linked, there was no suggestion of an overall
controlling figure. Roy Herridge at the beginning of the operation was not
convinced that organised crime existed in Southall, however, the level of
organisation matched and some say even exceeded that of well-known organisations
such as the Triads[xiii][xiv].
Detectives unfolded a pattern of offences involving illegal immigrants from the
Indian sub-continent being smuggled into Britain with forged passports and
being provided with more documentation to help them obtain employment. Using
false documents, some gained employment as postmen and allegedly stole credit
cards which were used to buy goods around the country. They bought travellers
cheques to trade for drugs in other countries. The highly sophisticated
organisation was believed to have more than 2,000 members across all tiers,
predominantly ‘soldiers’ with dozens at higher ranks. Whilst at the highest
level the leaders, who were highly respected businessmen, conspired together
running their own parts of the conspiracy, but at the lowest level the street
gangs were visible rivals in the community of Southall. Operating on a less
sophisticated level, the local gangs in Southall were alleged to run protection
rackets against legitimate Asian businesses unrelated to the conspiracy. Whilst
the police suspected this was occurring, few businesses were willing to
substantiate the claims. However, as part of Operation Shampoo, police
detectives watching members of the Tooti Nungs witnessed the beginning of a
protection racket at the shop of Mohinder Parmar, Tottenham Wines, in
Greenford.
Mr Parmar’s ordeal began when Jhalmal Dhillon, Amarjit
Sandhu and two others bundled him into the back of a BMW. Sandhu was alleged to
have told Parmar that “We delivered
£40,000 worth of alcohol to you and we agreed you would pay half the price. You
have not paid our money”[xv].
Parmar protested that he knew nothing about it at which point it was alleged
that Sandhu opened a bag at his feet, showing inside what appeared to be a gun,
saying “If I have to open the zip again
you will find yourself a dead man”[xvi].
Other threats were made, including one to blow up the shop with his family in
it if Parmar did not find the cash. Mohinder Parmar was extremely frightened.
There was no truth at all in what the men had said about the drinks delivery.
The next day Dhillon saw Parmar at the shop and warned him that he had five
days to get the cash. And the following day he called again. Mr Parmar asked
what would happen if he paid the money and was allegedly told “This shop will be ours. No-one will come
here and cause any trouble.”[xvii]
This was a protection racket, if the money was handed over then the shop
would be in the protection of the gang. Mohinder Parmar decided to pay the
money and when Dhillon came the next day he handed over a bag stuffed full of
notes in the car outside. He was also made to incriminate himself by saying
into a tape recorder that he knew the money was for buying stolen gold. Outside
unbeknown to the Toots members detectives were watching and a month later
Dhillon and Sandhu were arrested. Both remained silent whilst questioned - their
two accomplices were never identified. Jhalmal Dhillon and Armarjit Sandhu were
each jailed for four years. Operation Shampoo was disbanded after its short
lived success in 1989 whilst the Holy Smokes and Tooti Nungs continued to
profit from crime for a number of years to come. The Toots and Holies would
later take on new monikers with the young men of this period going on to become
the senior figures of Southall and its surrounds in the 1990’s. They would also
go on to forge links with criminals from a wide ranging backgrounds including
the Turkish heroin godfathers and the ruthless Yardies.
Click Here for Part Five: Brixton Bwoy
[i] A government ethnic category
to describe those from the Indian sub-continent, including Bengalis, Indians
and Pakistanis.
[ii] It was not until
April 2010 that full details surrounding the circumstances of Blair Peach’s
death were unveiled by Sir Paul Stephenson, then Metropolitan Police
commissioner. He unequivocally accepted the finding that a Metropolitan Police
officer was likely to have been responsible for the killing of Blair Peach. Blair
Peach’s family had campaigned for 30-years to see the report. Suspicions
centred on the Special Patrol Group (SPG) carrier U.11, the first vehicle to
arrive at Beechcroft Avenue, Southall, where Peach was found staggering around
concussed. One officer in particular (Officer E) was believed responsible for
the killing. SPG officers hampered the investigation by lying to cover up the
actions of their colleagues and attempting to conceal the presence of carrier
U.11. No-one from the Metropolitan Police has ever been brought to justice for
murder or for conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.
[iii] Thompson, T. (1995).
Gangland Britain. London: Hodder & Stoughton. P.123-124.
[iv] ibid
[v] Crime Reporter (1984).
‘Heathrow drug ring gaoled for 30 years’, The Guardian, 16 November.
[vi] Khalistan movement refers to a global
political secessionist movement
which seeks to create a separate Sikh country, called Khālistān in the Punjab region of South Asia.
[vii] Crime Reporter (1988).
‘Gang war alert’, The Times, 19 February.
[viii] Leppard, D. and
Mahmood, M. (1988). ‘Asian mafia linked to heroin empires’, The Sunday Times, 9
October.
[ix] Crime Reporter
(1988). ‘Weapons displayed’, The Times, 20 February.
[x] Thompson, T. (1995).
Gangland Britain. London: Hodder & Stoughton. P.126-127.
[xi] Leppard, D. and
Mahmood, M. (1988). ‘Asian mafia linked to heroin empires’, The Sunday Times, 9
October.
[xii] Crime Reporter
(1989). ‘Police hold 152 after six-month operation to smash crime gangs’, The
Guardian, 3 August.
[xiii] Kirby, T. (1989). ‘Asian
crime network smashed, Yard says’, The Independent, 3 August.
[xiv] Tendler, S. (1989). ‘Police
tackle Asian gangs’, The Times, 3 August.
[xv] Court Report from the
Old Bailey, May 10 1990.
[xvi] ibid.
No comments:
Post a Comment