Undercover Police v London Drug Family: Sukie Madahar

we get a call we've now got an axe murderer in fcy park yellow anarak raincoat gu's walking over towards us with an axe in his hand and he's dragging it along it's like a scene out of a horror film what sort of stuff did you recognize was happening around East London North London at that time robbers burglars drug dealers South to is wife of crack you get people going and stabbing people in the leg in the back I've had kids D my arms man stuff like this happened all the time this doesn't make the newspapers why did you leave the old bill I stopped believing in it you see it in the news now how many people are being investigated you got people coming in that should never have been in the job there is stuff that gets rushed under the carpet there is you know some of the stuff that I've seen you can only dream of you got kids dying your arm people dying in your arms you know you're trying to keep people alive that's not just one off that's happened so much I look at the state I met now very different I personally blame more the government in this because [Music] sui welcome to the show mate yeah thanks for having me mate yeah really uh really looking for this one this a different one for us so um what I want to do is roll all the way back where did you grow up and how did you end up becoming one of the top detectives in The Drug Squad in London well I grew up in hatney so hatney East London uh having um sort of B and Bread dlon St Newton and what have you so I went to school there lived my parents and what have you but then I also grew up on uh the front line in dlon so again it was just a case of living around that basic you know well for me it was Basics really but for everyone else it was like you know it was drug havav and whatever you criminals villains and that's it really especially down east then M had a couple of uh the shops in the in the market and you know it was just a case of everyone that W past you it was normal to me yeah you know but yeah just um spent 22 years in hatney grew up there family there you know before um I joined the police and then it was probably about a year after when I'm jumping on the bus to go to Tottenham from hatney on the old 253 and I'm saying seeing people people looking at me I'm thinking I nicked you last week right and then I had to sort of think about moving out yeah so then that's uh so we talking are we talking you were growing up in the ' 80s right yeah what was life like in the 80s and heck HCK a real tough part of East London right what was that feeling like growing up going through school and the naughtiness happening around there in the 80s stroke 90s yeah hatney was uh well the way I see it I loved it you know I loved the way it was I didn't know any different yeah yeah you know obviously you meet people now when they talk about growing up in in other parts London you know a little bit more posure whereas of us it was it was just the case hatney hatney you know it was you just had to learn to sort of look after yourself very very early you're at school I remember there was two schools there there was either Kingsland which one I went or hatne Downs you went to hatne Downs and that was it you were done for you know so it was always a case of hoping to get to Kings and we got you know again it was it was a case of growing up and then having a Choice there was always a choice there was a pathway you had to take now I chose one pathway I know a lot of people that went the other way yeah what made you choose that pathway where a high percentage might have chosen the other way to earn a quick pound note do you know what so I grew up with first generation Indians yeah all right so my my dad my granddad they will push me they wanted to be me to be a doctor a lawyer a scientist or something you know but there was a part of me that was always going to be a little bit different to what they wanted and um you know this one day I tell you actually how it happened uh I got really really drunk one day and I was at home and my dad was away my mom and dad were away and um my sister came and woke me up she goes we got burglar downstairs I think someone's in the house so I remember undoing my dumbbells walking downstairs and as I walk downstairs my alarms going and I see this guy he walks out the living room he's got uh my VCR stroke new DVD player in his hand he's got the Sky Box Spurs are playing that day and I just looked at him he looked at me and he just dropped it and for me it was just no he's done he's bolted I've chased him down and I've grabbed him in the um uh in the kitchen as he's trying to get out my sister found the old bill and literally I was scrapping with him in the um in the um uh in the kitchen and um at which point I hear a big bang at the door and suddenly the old Bill come running in there's me with you know I've got a uh I've got a a dumbbell bar in my hand I've got a guy just literally looks around he jumps through I don't know how he did it but he jumped through the smallest window and I've just literally dropped everything they've just turned I've just said I live here he's gone out the back they've let the dogs out and they've caught him in the back and it was just there that one guy came and sat with me and he goes you're right I goes no he brought my sky box cuz I was supposed to watching a football yeah and it was all new then yeah of course you know if you think about it you know back then it was a commodity yeah no one had that sort of earlys yeah exactly Spurs were playing and I'm thinking I'll get to watch I get to watch a game live yeah but it wasn't and then he sat with me and he went what you mean that you actually were fighting with this guy for like 3 four minutes I went yeah what have you thought we joining the police and it just he's sort of like SE the seed in my head you know it was it was just there and then over over a period of a few weeks it was like there was signs everywhere I opened the paper up and it was like join the police you know what I mean so I thought why not give it a go now I was young you know I about 20 at the time I thought myself yeah let's uh let's see where this goes and to be honest with you I did tell my dad did tell my mom because I knew the reaction I'll get they would't want me to do it because then then you know my dad just told me story used to tell me that you know that every time he used to you get chased down you know police never done anything because we were Indians they're racist and all this sort of stuff that's that that's the sort of in you know that's the information I was bought up on you know the sort of memories that were bought you know that were instilled in my brain so as we uh as we were growing up um that was it you know Dad just tell me he used to get chased by Teddy Boys all the time yeah you know he was like bullied by these people so I thought to myself you know what I'm going to change it so I applied and took me a year to get in and um it was there when I got in I think my dad was quite disappointed in me he was disappointed he disappointed in me yeah okay yeah cuz he was expecting me to be a scientist I've just you got to remember is that I've just finished College I've got um I've got the C frea levels in um in Sciences um chemistry physics biology maths uh I went to University sort of done a a couple of years what union were you at uh North London Okay so did uh did that and then I just couldn't go back because uh couldn't get a grun okay so I thought you know I weighed it all up and I thought what am I going to do I got all my mates around there you know we meet up in uh in the pub in St Newton every Friday yeah the yakon down in St Newton just just by the uh by the police station and all you ever heard was you know what I mean oh they're corrupt they're corrupt they're corrupt every time you see them you know always something bad to say so I couldn't tell anyone I couldn't tell anyone well actually you know what I'm going into that well yeah and yeah so you know was very young um did you get did you get bullied growing up being half Indian were you half Indian no I'm full full Indian did you get bully growing up in school or anything was there any kind of racism growing up no you see I didn't face any racism going growing up in hatney why it's because hatney was such a multicultural area do you know what I mean it was like it was whites it was black people it was Asians it was everyone so we all sort of lived together there was none of that you know there was never you know I grew up knowing that you know I had mates that were black I had mates that were Indians they will come into my house you know I mean we'll sit there you know remember boxing days they'll come over we'll just sit there listen to music and whatever you my um my mom's shop was next to a um Record Shop so I grew up over on SOA and reggae and all that we'd be playing the music the finals and all that so for us it was it was just normal you know we didn't see people for what what the color what you know for their color we didn't see we just see people forever you're an assle or you're not do you see what I mean and that's the way we grew up that's nice and you know it was it was just it was just normal for us it was normal yeah hatney was normal yeah you know people get stabbed people get shot it was normal for us that's what it was I used to get up in the morning I used to go up and just I used to live in Clapton they called just up top of my road lower Clapton Road they called Murder M yeah well I don't have to explain why they called it murder M but that was it you know I go to work in the mornings and uh you had the pubs up there yeah two cops at the at the door everything um everything had been um uh C anded off and whatever you some it's happened but that's part of life that was life yeah I agree do you know what I mean so it wasn't for me it wasn't any different what was the feeling like when you had to tell your PO on going into the old bill that was tough that was quite tough because in all honesty like I said before we would we we will be sitting on a a we'll be sitting in the pub on a Friday and that's what it was for us we go in the pub have a few pints play uh play pool that was it all of us back 10 12 of us there was family there was friends it was a we had a really big crew that used to just hang around there and then suddenly gone no one want to speak to me that was it so I had to change my life so I had to literally rebuild my life because none of my mates wanted to speak to me my family were a little bit cold towards me because of what I was doing and the reason being is obviously being from St Newton uh well being around St Newton uh you had all this uh you had all the stories about what happened at police stations at Stone police station especially so they would look at everyone being corrupt you know and whatever you I didn't see it like that cuz I didn't see it see for me I need to see something happen for your own mind yeah to make up my own mind yeah and that's what that's the way I've been my whole life and it was then you know when I joined the the police I literally had to I had to sort of change my whole life I changed I changed friends so my Friday nights are gone start to rebuild my whole life even even my social scene yeah I didn't have one and you know it was and then been thrust into topam at the age of the deep end in IT 20 at 20 yeah yeah so like you know you've gone in there and then suddenly you know the first time you walk out at the station you remember walking out we're on green Lanes and I look into the uh look into the window and there's me wearing a uniform and you think oh my God that's me you know I so who's that cop looking at me it was me but again you know we had at to Tottenham I loved it at Tottenham Tottenham was brilliant um it was just again Multicultural yeah diversity crime was crazy violence you know it was all and as a 20-year-old you know going to Tottenham I think the first time I tried arrest someone they try to run me over I remember trying to stop a car and the guy just drove at me and I jump out of the way and I thought myself well this is what I'm going to live yeah for the next 30 Years CU that's what it was we signed a contract for 30 years I said this is what it's going to be like but yeah no it's um it was crazy can you remember what sort of money you were getting paid yeah when I first when I went to henden I was on like 700 quid a month and then I came out of henden I was on about 950 a month to a grand a month and roughly what year is this uh this is uh 97 okay it's a 97 that's what the sort of uh the issue was uh there but again you know I had to sort of we up okay I had issues with the family but I was living my best life I was living the dream I was living on the edge as I say you know when adrenaline was kicking in every time and you know and it was it was just it was meant we would you you never realize what evil is until you look at it in the eye and when you're looking at people and what they're doing at 20 21 years old that's when you start thinking to yourself the life that I've lived is is effectively being very sheltered yeah you know until you start seeing that sort of stuff what sort of stuff did you recognize was happening around East London North London at that time well East London was always like there was there was three different thing right you got the drugs yeah uh you got the you got the proper villains you know you're talking about uh you're talking about the the proper East End gangsters okay when I went to Tottenham we had various different gangs you had you know you had the gangs the yardis you had the Turks from um the green Lanes uh you had uh you had burglar uh and you know what it was just there was just so much and it was different things there was never really a m the only Wars that we actually came across were petty little things but between a couple of dealers you know but seem they seem to sort of stay within their own sort of areas do you see what I mean and like I you know my first year at Tottenham um I remember I was in uniform and I we got down to Green Lanes after there was a massive shootout there's a driveby and they literally driven driven down Green lanes and they must have they were you know not just talking knives I'm talking guns I'm talking everything you know I think uh in the end um we had detectives from uh special units come in they found loads of stuff you know they found dungeons down there they found everything you know people were being tortured down there and whatever but this is the sort of world that I literally just entered but not yeah but in the other the other side of it do you see what I mean so I end I end the world and I thought myself Jesus you know people actually do this to to each other but as you know as time went on um obviously growing into the growing into the role you know realizing actually this is what I do for a living you know this is my job you know that's effectively why I joined you know like I said I go back to when I said I I've got a burglar here but it was to sort of help people do you know what I mean that's what I wanted to do I wanted to help people and at the same time um you know it it put hair on my chest is the best way to describe it it actually it genely put here on my chest how does it how does it work then are you just booting around in a car waiting for something to happen waiting for reaction waiting for a call to come in reacting straight away well when I when I first started uh the people that I work with were quite proactive so they know they knew all the dealers they knew do you know what I mean so they would introduce me to the proactive side of things rather than being reactive and just sitting there waiting for for a call to come in we'll be driving around you know you'll spot people you know who people were and straight away it will be right stop this person or we know where this per we know you know what this person's up to and whatever you you know whether it as robbers burglars drug dealers you know whatever you but yeah again it was it was just everything Dodge it was everything you know we had what we had at Tottenham um but for us it was normal yeah you know first two years at Tottenham was crazy I remember turning up on a night Duty we get a call we're around the corner to saying there's been a gunshot on janson's Road in Tottenham so I turn up I'm first there and I'm looking around and right there right by my car there's a guy lying there with a hole in his head so I'm like oh [ __ ] you know what do we do it I'm like 21 years old so the guy with me at the time my mate just turned around went he looks at and he's he's got a pulse but I didn't know then that you know the even though the brain's gone on they still have a pulse yeah and then everyone's out looking at us and everything like that so I remember look thinking I God I got try try to help this guy you know and I want to try and keep the guy alive even though he had a big gaping hole in his head so just literally my mate was doing the compressions I had actually found this mouth shield and I was blown into the guy and it got to the point that every time I was blowing it was coming out of his head Jesus and yeah it was just horrendous you know and and this is me this is what six months on the street I was literally basically on the street for about six months and then and this happened um but yeah again it was just that was stuff like this happened all the time you don't hear it in the newspapers just doesn't make the newspapers you know I remember coming back and um I was at henden that week CU once you join you do six months training and then every three or four months you go back and do uh um an extra week there you know just to top up on that learning and what have you because you got two-year prepation period um I get a call from my sergeant says you better come back why well you better come back that Mur that murder you dealt with yeah you better come back so I went back there thinking okay got there and uh they said well one of the murder squads um they found a uh they found a wallet in the wallet it said uh that it had the guy's details in it and he had a card in it game men with AIDS you've been blown into this guy he's got blood everywhere when you need to shoot off to the hospital so we there three of us there or four of us there ended up at the hospital uh down at Northwick Park so we're getting blood test done now you don't know yeah yeah yeah what if do you know what I mean but that was it and again you know looking back on it that was just a start yeah you know that was just a start welcome but yeah exactly you know it was you know we worked we worked on uh we worked on criminals you know we're not talking about these days these days you're talking about kids yeah we're talking about we're talking about adults yeah we're talking about you know a hierarchy in that sort of world yeah these are these are the elders as they say yeah these are the boys that might have been around when a broadw farm rights kicked off they were still banging around yeah do you know what I mean these are the ones that are running things around Tottenham so we were dealing with them had to be very careful because look do you know what they didn't care yeah I mean it's very easy for them to take one of us out yeah so again I think that for my family that was very difficult you know cuz they knew they you know they've lived in haty for years yeah they've seen what's happened and what have you and then obviously I remember my dad saying well they killed that cop in Tottenham or uh Keith Blake yeah I say yeah but if we look at it how many cops have died M you know and we got sort of w up but yeah he was um my dad was got quite worried and um yeah he was uh I would say for me it wasn't worrying I loved going out there I loved sticking my uniform on I love getting out on the street I love getting amongst people yeah it was never a time and I've said this time because people have asked me the question in that sort of time was anyone ever racist here I could turn right now and say not once in my life as a as a cop has anyone ever said anything who I work with anything that was derogatory yeah or racist at all who you work with who I work with what about the some of the public oh all the time okay all the time give me give me an example of some of the public the obviously you're working around some tough areas right yeah really really tough and rough back then you must have been a Target they must have clock to you every time you're coming into the the estate or the wagon turns up there must have been that Fear Factor on you every time you're going into that well being me yeah the way I looked I was a little bit different to all the other guys because you know predominantly in that sort of time it was predominantly white male yeah wasn't it you know your six foot white male sort of c and then you got this 5'9 5' 10 inch Asian guy with a goatey yeah yeah so yeah it was I did stick out like a sore F sometimes but it wasn't with the people I work with they treat me like one of their own yeah I was you know that was my family these are the people that were going to protect me yeah but when I went out there yeah you know I've had it all Packy go back to where you're from I was like only live down the road in hady yeah you know and that's what it was but people don't see that what people see is the color of your skin yeah and yeah I used to get a lot of that and but the thing is is anytime somebody said that I'll be with a I be with a colleague as a white guy yeah arrest him for racially aggravated defenses so you can arrest them straight away for that yeah it's racially aggravate defense public order offense yeah I never did it yeah yeah look you know that's people are uneducated is they yeah so it was that was a case and yeah the first few years I was um yeah I spent I think it was about two years that I was in uniform and then um I got an opportunity to uh to sort of uh G have a go at uh sort of the the crime Squad should we say and uh it started off as a operation Predator operation Eagle Eye they used to have that in um uh in the late 90s it was just targeting robbers okay and burglars do you see robers no these are these are just these a lot of these were Street robbers Street okay violent Street robbers so we'd actually identified who these guys were and we had a load of targets it just the case of just taking them off the the streets building cases up against them yeah getting the evidence building case up let's take these guys off the streets because what were they doing they were causing nothing but mayhem out there you know there was people out there that walking down the street that get jumped four or five people yeah will jump them they'll beat them take what what a phone yeah a bag yeah you know it doesn't make a difference if somebody just handed it over to them they will still lash out these people why because it was a way as you know I don't know it was a power thing wasn't it so so yeah I went on that and then um I stayed on The Drug Squad sorry not Drug Squad on the crime Squad at the time that was around 2000 so I was on the um I was on the uh I was on the old um uh crime Squad and you know again when I talk about evil you know what people don't get people don't get what we see all people get is that 2 minute or 10c clip they see on Twitter yeah they don't see what happens and how that's actually you know come about so yeah we had um we had so much of that where suddenly phones are starting to come out yeah and people are starting to you know do recordings and everything else and it was it was just getting it was getting crazy you had to be very careful in what you can say and what you can do not that we were doing anything wrong but at the same time now people have start to record stuff and did it become harder and harder to be a copper on the street and become a detective of everything been going on like you say with social media people filming twisting the story yeah it's always to be honest with you it's always been hard yeah because of the perception you can't change that perception but that perception must have got changed in some era some decade because my old man always talks about when he grew up the cop would give you a whack round wack round of chops and you'd carry on and you'd have respect when did that respect started to get lost when I was young yeah I wouldn't dare say anything back to a copper same yeah yeah when I was walk I remember from school I dropped a crunchy packet I just a tap on my turn around pick it up yeah all right sir that changed that changed as you got into the '90s late '90s okay things start changing People start Ming off a little bit more you know and it became very difficult but yeah no it's just um and I think it was that sort of time where you had like those youngsters that's where you know you started to get more and more stabbings you had people trying to uh trying to in well they were trying to make their way up a ladder in a game yeah what does that mean initiation so you get loads of stabbings you get people going stabbing people in the leg and the back backside yeah I've had kids D in my arms man do you know what I mean why because somebody wanted to you know take the next step up yeah yeah soldiers as they call themselves yeah and this is it you sit there you walk back to the police station you're covered in covered in blood you know this one time M was uh I remember this is like happened yesterday we around the uh the wood green area we just Amalgamated so we went from being Tottenham to being Haring gate yeah so we've just and I we I was with a couple of uh couple of my mates and uh we were on the same team on the crime Squad and uh we get a call well we get a call on the radio not we personally but a call comes out on the radio saying that uh this stabbing I said well we're around the corner and being an ex uniform cop I sort of knew it like a back of my hand I knew you all the little rat runs and you see what I mean and as we're going over there I remember saying to uh Toby used my driver so don't go that way go this way it'll come out this way and literally as we've gone around that corner yeah we've seen the guy lying there and you know so the boys sort of jump out I turn around and I see in the distance somebody running sort of matches description so I just literally bolted after him I know look the guy that's been stabbed turns out he was off duty fireman but he'd been stabbed so I'm tearing off after this guy he's running towards the train station I thought if he gets in the train station he's gone yeah don't know who he is did a think chased him down and actually grabbed him just as he got to the barriers and I remember grabbing him basically telling him my mobile I could see he's got two handles sticking out of his um out of his pockets so I remember dragging him up he's ain't going go you are coming and I remember dragging him upstairs and then we had a full-blown street fight it was a street fight outside turn fight Lane station yeah I wasn't just fighting this guy you know I was fighting for my life but not only that we had a massive crowd and the crowd obviously thought I'm the bad guy here not realizing what had happened but this guy's trying to get into his knives now he's got a meat cleaver in one in one arm in one hand and he's got a massive must have been about 12 12 to 14 inch knife in the other and you can see the blood in his jacket so I've got hold of him and I'm not letting him go if I let him go I'm dead yeah you know and it was probably the longest four or five minutes of my life but it wasn't just that it's just that you had little old women that were getting involved telling me to leave him alone I had I had a kind of beans thrown at me do you know what I mean but you know when you're your chemical cocktails all over all over the place and uh your adrenaline's going and you're literally trying to hold this guy down thinking to yourself look this guy he just stabbed someone I didn't know the extent of what it actually really happened at the time and then suddenly in the distance I could see my mate running towards me and I'm thinking thank God hurry up yeah exactly but if you've ever you know someone who's uh you know don't know if you've ever done any martial arts or anything like that you know I used to box but 3 minutes in the ring is a long time was a long time yeah yeah 3 minute street fight is a long time and then not just that yeah when this guy is trying to get to his knife it was it was absolutely crazy and um luckily my mate turned up he's jumped over the barriers because I've got this guy literally over a barrier this the only way I could secure him you know and you know I had to fight for my life and then my mate jumped over he's grabbed the other arm and he goes don't let go he's got a knife I went really no [ __ ] yeah so we didn't I didn't have any cuffs on me I I had nothing what would you carry on you normally uh we'll have uh one of the extended batter and ASP they used to call it yeah uh I see a spray uh handcuffs and effectively that's it yeah and a radio and I left my uh I just literally jumped out the car I left everything in the car didn't I couldn't have handcuffed the guy so yeah it was uh it was crazy and it turns out that you know this guy he'd only just come out of uh he'd only just come out of prison he'd been in there for rape he come out and uh the victim at the time was just sitting in the car and um he come over and hit the guy's car open the door because the victim asked him what he doing and uh stabbed in front of his little daughter yeah yeah yeah but that's the sort of life that we you know that for us was normal yeah you know so for some for something like that though that fell there you've clobbered D got him nexted what would he would he get put away for that yeah yeah what' he get do you know what he got for that yeah I know exactly what he got for it because he went in and again you got to talk about what their intentions are you know it's very difficult when you're trying to prove a case against someone it's very difficult because when it comes to things when it comes to things like um uh you know Murder and everything out you know you got to prove intention you know what is their intention so he pleaded get to gbh because he sing was I it was gbh of intent because he wanted to commit gbh and he intended to commit GB he didn't want to kill the guy so but gbh is still including knife or stabbing yeah yeah yeah wow okay I thought I thought that' been another level yeah no no no so he stabbed him so he got uh he got 10 years he got 10 he got 10 years for attempted murder he well no he got charged of attempted murder he got 10 years for gbh of intent because that's what he pleaded guilty to right so all these guys you see you see it all the time on like you know the TV shows they ple out sort of thing but it doesn't over here what it is the CPS will look at that and think okay well we'll get here and we'll get he'll get 10 years yeah whereas we've we have now got to show some form of intention yeah yeah uh and yeah it was um it was crazy because I remember watching I remember watching that um that back on the CCTV uh about 2 3 days later and then literally my legs went just s in there just legs just went cuzz I realized you know the sort of situation I was in yeah legs just went and um and I remember then we went to um and it's actually that it was actually that where we got a commendation from the assistant commissioner for that and went up to Scotland Yard and took my dad with me took my mom with me nice and yeah and it was the first time my dad looked at my dad's in tears yeah my dad's in tears he's listening to he's listening to the superintendent reading out what actually happened my dad's in tears my mom's looking at him thinking come on you know hold yourself together and like he turned around it was one time he turned around and said to me yeah you did good stuff yeah you know how'd that make you feel yeah it was it was the it was the first time I actually felt he's acknowledge what I do or he's proud of what you exactly okay so yeah that was that was big for me and what was that then you just mentioned a word then I just didn't get it what was the word you said you got that was like an award yeah it was a commendation a commendation okay what does that mean well it's it's a recognition should we say you know of an act of Bravery so yeah so that was for bravery quick thinking and whatever you but you know at the time you don't think about that course I mean cracking on think about staying alive yeah but having dealt with that that's where you know I went back uh I went I went back into uniform for about a year and then I realized you know what I preferred the other side of this yeah and that's when things really changeed for me yeah you know tell me about that Journey when it really changed so I'd like I went onto a vice unit and um it was uh in Tottenham itself tottenham's got Seven Sisters Road it's a designated red light area it's a red light district because of the amount of prostitution on there said if there are like let's say two or three convictions within that area for prostitution it would then be designated a red light district do you see what I mean so the local Authority were having loads of complaints coming in but what people don't realize is people look at it as prostitution right so you might have you know you might have your Toms or your prostitutes as they are yeah all out there but that's not the issue yeah the issue is why are they there and then you got South Tottenham South Tottenham is R of EST States South Tottenham is R of crack yeah heroin crack what people don't get or weren't sort of getting was that prostitution is synonymous with a drug trade yeah this is what FS it these girls out there every one of them was addicted either a heroin addict crack okay everyone has a story yeah you know we had one that um that had been out on the street for like 20 years and you know it just surprises you some of the stories that you know you hear but it was very different for us because the sort of people we were now you know you hear it all the time you got uniform cops that turn up and they'll arrest them straight away with us it was different it's about building relationships with these girls why because these are the girls are going to take us to the biggest stuff you know we want to know who your dealers are yeah who your pimp is who you yeah look after these people yeah and then they will come over to you and they will give you that information and it turned out that we were doing quite well you know these girls are feeding us information you know this is before everything changed uh we started getting like dedicated Source units coming in because there like certain changes in law but before that we will get information coming in and literally we will action that we were taking massive amounts of drugs off the streets and then what happened was that was sort of recognized and a couple of us were sort of pinched should we say from there I went up on the sort of the drugs sort of unit and uh it was then really that you know the way I worked as a cop changed you know gone are the right it was the old gung-ho let's proactive sort of now we have to start thinking yeah okay you need to start thinking now yeah you're G to a whole new level now is it yeah all right you canick that guy you can Nick this guy but now you need to think when you Nick that guy that guy needs to go a CT you need to build a case against this person so you need to think about what you need yeah so The Drug Squad when I went to the that sort of that unit there there was four of us there's L four of us okay but they wrote a book about it uh called crack house yeah um I'm trying to think of uh I think his name was um keble I think he's name yeah it was yeah yeah I think he was a DS but I remember my boss coming he goes they're writing a book about that sort of thing and do you want to sort of you know he's going to put my name in it and I remember we just turned around and went no don't want our name on it I was on that I was on that unit for three years imagine I would have been burnt straight away sort of thing yeah but even when you read the synopsis on that book it just says one thing you know we were there to Target and it was it what people people don't get it people just will never get what we were dealing with every day when I got up in the morning at 5:00 you know my kids I look at my kids I don't know if I'm coming back home do you know what I mean these are the sort of people that I was dealing with you know these like you're kicking doors in you don't know who's on the other side of that door yeah you don't know if somebody's going to start spraying you yeah with bullets do you know what I mean you just don't know and it got to that point where you know it just became the norm you kiss your kids goodbye thinking am I going to come home yeah but yeah it just um what was that feeling like knowing you're going into a crack house what were you carrying on you knowing that you're going to a crack house try to close it down nothing it was just I had my vest I had my asp asp that's my uh my B you your cush yeah yeah and that was it really but again you know for us is about going there securing securing it now when I first went up there the I remember the DCI at the time come up to me and he said look he goes there some new legislation come out and I think we'll be out to try and close these places down I'm going to try and close as many down as possible so I started looking at it and what have you and this is where I said things changed for me I started thinking outside the box a little bit more do know what I mean so now we got you know on this squad that we got there four of us what we dealing with we're dealing with dealers yeah we're dealing with crack houses yeah you got you got people who live in that area whose lives are absolute misery yeah they're constantly calling the council you know needles you know imagine your kids walking through going yeah and there's needles everywhere you know little Martel bottles where using his crack pipes everywhere you know and then at the same time we've got Intel coming in saying that there's stuff coming over from South America you know we were dealing with all of that stuff wow yeah yeah so you know if you break it down we were going to an address and once we go in there we secure it and we just and I then came to me right let's gather evidence against these people let's take pictures let's video the whole thing and then we'll take statements off the um all the neighbors they're the ones that are complaining I could say what I want yeah but who who what do the judges want what do the judge want judge wants to hear what how it's affecting the people yeah so then I sort of put this you know we started working off uh off off this legislation and ended up developing this protocol do you know what I mean we ended up sort of training other other police uh units across the uh thing and in all at the end of it I think I closed down close in the region of about 88 crack houses just in North London just in Tottenham just in Tottenham well in Harring har yeah yeah so I closed I closed all them down you know I remember going in and uh I lost one case one case I lost but I went back and got it because he carried on so I was able to get the evidence against them go back in but then I learned from that I learned how the defense work yeah how the lawyers work yeah try to think like them do you know yeah so yeah it was uh it was just a case of you know trying to uh try to get that trying to get that down to a te you know the judge called me into his Chambers just said what are you doing for these people is amazing yeah you know cuz quality of life is rubbish yeah we literally reduce crime in a space of about 16 months by about 30 35% H yeah that's huge that's amazing yeah yeah fair play but not only that again I said you you're improving everyone else's lives around there but it's not just them it's not just them you know we're talking about these guys that are there these these guys ain't dealers look everyone everyone's got issues yeah these crack users they're human beings as well so what we did was we developed a program for them and we just we were just very open and honest with them look we're going to close you we're going to close your address down if you go and get clean use this program here NHS we were in with the NHS and everything we will send them out to get clean you come back and demonstrate that you're clean you get your house back you can't have any more incentive than that yeah yeah that was our incentive and that's hard when you look at someone who needs to go cold turkey on crack that's not an easy that's not an easy absolutely not but that wasn't it you know we're talking about crack was RI crack was R around Tottenham yeah you know every Everybody you stopped had a crack pipe in there in their pocket what's the difference between cocaine and crack cracks B Like Cocaine you get cocaine comes in powdered format yeah cracks cooked up yeah it comes into like a rock format yeah and to be honest with you everything that comes over you know we was looking at this you just looking at where it was coming from there were no heroin right heroin was coming over from the w yeah sorry it's on the east east Afghan and stuff Afghanistan we had Afghanistan it's going through Afghanistan Pakistan over to Turkey over on the uh over the ground you know it wasn't coming over on the on the on the plains it was coming in Lor's yeah yeah they can get it they can get it to through Europe they can get heroin overa and then the Americans went in started burning all the poppy fields in Afghanistan yeah that killed it the Taliban well suddenly now thinking okay we're losing a lot we're losing a lot here because the Americans have come in now and have' killed their poppy fields yeah so we found crack was coming coming into it more and more so we had a lot more stuff coming in from South America you know we'll give you one example we got uh we get a call saying there's um uh there's a load of stuff coming in from um uh it was Columbia yeah and it was all it was coming in to centry airport so we spoke to the airport they had actually identified the actual the package itself and it was cream so you opened up the cream so you got the it looks like cream and then you clip open the top and underneath it was cakes of pure cocaine yeah now think about pure cocaine okay if you are out on the street and you buy a wrap or two how much cocaine do you think is in that 20% less you're looking at 5 to 6% 20% is going to kill you yeah yeah okay but there was like literally There is five or 6% cocaine it's been the rest of it chopped up so many times this is why it's such big business so we were we had you know between 35 and 40 Grand you had dealers paying 30 between 35 40 Grand they bring it over they cut it up four or five times they then sell it they now that's now four times the money that they're making on that yeah or cut it eight times or with you know you got finding agents like benane yeah yeah so they mix it with that you've now got 8 kilos and suddenly by the time it hits a street there is about five or 6% yeah because anything over that it's going to you OD you die yeah but you know that's the sort of that's the sort of stuff that we had going on but did you find at the age you were at cuz we're talking what this must be late 90s early 2000s was like mid 20s yeah okay but you know cocaine is r in this country right now and around the world right but back then it must have been a whole new wave of cocaine coming through right then do you remember do you remember when it really kicked off coming into this country see I only speak look when I was when I was in hatney there was still a load of cocaine but cocaine was for rich people that's right rock stars and DJs and footballers whatever it was yeah yeah it wasn't for your yeah yeah you don't see you don't see you know your man living on an State doing a line yeah it just didn't Happ it wer happening yeah it was all crack yeah yeah oh it was all crack crack this is crack this is not this is not people going off buying a load of uh you know buying a load of uh White and uh you know going into the toilets in um in like Ministry of sand or something and just literally rolling up A1 note this is different this is them now putting it onto a you know putting it onto a onto a bit of wire wire mesh and smoking it you know literally burning it and smoking it yeah and that's what it is and it was cheaper for them wow you know you're still you know again it's it's different now because I think look at cocaine cocaine is there's a lot more yeah lot more users of cocaine now compared to what it would have been back then Builders doctors everyone nurses you name it lawyers you name it you name it Sports person it's everywhere absolutely there's not many people who I don't know who don't take it compared to the you know years ago there not many people you knew who did take it yeah the thing is every you know years ago you know you would think of it was more of a a thing that you probably find in in the city yeah that's right City Boys yeah the city boys are all on it yeah you know you see that after after a night out you know you might stop someone because they've had a bit of a fight and they've got they got a rap orall too on them you know that's what it was like nowadays it's R it's everywhere students yeah everyone Madness is it yeah it's crazy and it is it's just it's one of them things now where you know it's it's an endemic mate it's just everywhere you know the problem they're having at this moment in time is fent yeah it's stuff being laced with fent from fent fentin on what's that yeah and that is well it's a very very strong should we say medication yeah yeah very addictive very similar to you know it's daer Pam things like that you know but fentol is a lot more stronger more potent but what they're doing is if they're mixing it up with things like cocaine or or you know other other drugs you're getting batches there now that are laced with something else and that's really dangerous okay so yeah you do get um you get it's it's quite rif in America yeah and it's happening down here now you know people are is more and more you hear of uh you hear of bad batches that are coming through but again like I said we were we were literally racing up to the airports we were taking we were taking large amounts bringing them back and then having to wait for the assistant commissioner to give us permission to take that out and replace it with um with normal flour or sugar right so we have to film everything you got to be very very careful because there's also tracking numbers as well I can't give you too much information yeah what was key for you is your key to find the the big player at the top and would you know that if there were dealers out of there would you let them go would you let them go or would you get them to Grass would you work on them to Grass up to then get to the big time right so the thing is is that it's one time I stopped a guy he had like had loads of cash on him knew he was up to something he had a little he had a little bit of gear on him but he worked for the Adams no you ain't going to you ain't going to Gras him upy you ain't going to go in there you ain't going to give us any information so it's just a case of building a case against that guy you're never going to get someone like that grass up the guys at the top you know so yeah when you know it's not like America where you know you wire people up doesn't work like that yeah the other thing is you got to be very careful because then in this country we've got something where codefendants can't uh give evidence against codefendants do you see what I mean so it's very very difficult say that again codefendant cants codefendants evidence against another codefendant yeah it's not seen as you know because it's like it's somebody saying I didn't do it he did it yeah tucking him up yeah exactly just trying to get off it yourself you know but as a copper though surely you'd pull him aside and say well I don't know cuz I've never been down this Ro but if you pull him aside and say hold on a minute if you give us that information you're going to get a lesser sentence right so there was a different way of doing it the only so we used to we jump forward was was on the robbery Squad we used to do that yeah when it was on a Drug Squad it was different because what we had to do was deal with informance yeah so informants were they were regulated now you know you didn't have that snout you didn't have that you didn't have that guy that's going to turn around and say all um you know you speak to him and say right give us a bit of intel on this guy no now you have to have them registered yeah there's new laws that you have to go by you know what I mean you've had to you know they've got to be given pseudonyms and you know I mean everything's got to be tested you got to be they got to be handled by two people yeah so the whole thing changed while you were there did you know so all of this started changing so you couldn't go to some and so give us give us the ears up on that it every time if I knew that there was someone there we had to then take him over or give his name or her name especially with the girls on the vice vice teams let to give their names to our um our our source our source guys yeah and they would then have to sort of work with them and go through a process and they will go through the process and we won't have any more dealings with that person okay you see what I mean so yeah it was like that and you know we'll get info coming in and we were we had a really good relationship with our with our guys in the Intel unit and they'll be feeding it through to us it's all is all is all through informance you know cuz they get a decent pack they get a decent bit of money out of that what the informant Yeah Yeah from the old bill yeah is that right absolutely wow didn't know that yeah yeah so you know they'll give information if it led to a conviction they'll get a decent amount some people live off that what sort of what sort of way would they be getting roughly it depends on what you got you know you're talking tens of thousands yeah you can be yeah okay yeah you can be oh God depending on how much how much we get out of it if we you know if you're taking out somebody who's literally um pillaging the streets of Tottenham or or haringay with you know let's say hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of uh of drugs and that guy is going to get a small slice of that because it's down to him that we've got him but the beauty of it all was was that this guy's an informant yeah we couldn't give these name out to anyone why because if you give his name out to someone he's going to get it'll be s he sleep with the fishes as say would they yeah yeah yeah yeah and that was it so they'll get payment for it as well but again you know just working on that it was more about you know for us yeah all right we want to take these guys off the street I didn't I didn't join the police to go and Nick someone with a bag of weed yeah that's not me yeah you want to you want to actually go and target people that really hurt people yeah you know you're rapists you know the kids that hurt children guys that hurt children you know you're also looking at these guys here class A drugs massive you know for us that's the sort of stuff people are oding on yeah you know you know we we would come across that we would come across that quite a lot you always get bad batches you always get a bad batch you get you get a dealer that sells a bad batch and you might get a couple of O ODS yeah yeah and that will come back to us cuz now the pressure is on us to find out where it's come from okay yeah so that's where we would actually speak to try and get you know information in that that way but yeah I did that for like you know literally about 3 years we was there and then uh did you enjoy that part loved it did you loved it okay you know my boy was born my boy was born it was like happened you know like happened yesterday but my son uh we hit an a dress in South Tottenham that morning uh my ex-wife at the time said to me oh that she was wasn't feeling great and whatever and she's having a few pains I said to her you know what we were at the hospital last week it's probably Brax and Hicks so there's me going to work so 6:00 3 21 uh bang bang at the front uh I was at the back so I remember jumping over knowing there was people going to be coming around the back you know and it was gear there was loads of gear at the place so they've come running out the back door I've jumped on them and it was it was literally handcuffing them as quickly as possible to a um to a pole in the middle of the uh um in the middle of the garden yeah and I looked over to my boss and he turned around he goes do you need have handcuffs he goes I goes to him you coming over he go I got a new jacket on he got a new jacket on I was for real he goes you got this it's cool yeah and then my phone rings and it was uh it was my ex-wife and she's she's found me I said I think I'm in labor I go nah no it's probably bra Nicks and I've got these guys here shaking my hand go oh congratulations offic and I was like settle down I'm on the phone you know I mean and he's like they maybe you should just let us go you a get anywhere mate well anyway so we've taken them off they've all been arrested we've got some gear uh and get back to uh to the police station and my boss says look go he misses having a baby I got it's probably nothing so uh literally went out into the back backyard just about walk out and then one of the other uh one of the other sergeant said oh great job today come to buy you a cup of tea said all right fine you know I have a cup of tea with him again in my head you know she's still got two weeks to go yeah so I went had a cup of tea and then I drove home when I get home her waters are broken so to rush her to the hospital and uh within about 15 minutes my little one was born you know and those sort of things they they sort of stick but then you still remember what you were doing that day yeah but you not think that your job was overtaking your mind yeah yeah it still does yeah okay I I've been out of that role for seven years yeah I still wake up in the middle of the night some of the stuff that you know you see so when you're banging the mix right in Tottenham nicking people taking down crack houses getting dealers d d you're not laying at night laying in your bed looking up the ceiling going [ __ ] me I could be next to be to be honest no never thought like that okay yeah but there was one time where um I'm being at cult now I just gone on to the robbery Squad so I just decided cuz I just done my sence exams it's for promotion so I passed them and uh I thought myself right I can go back and be a uniform Sergeant or I can go down a detective route you know and there's more opportunities as a detective than it would be as a uniform Sergeant okay that's what am I going to do as a uniform Sergeant I can go on sit on a bus with seven or eight other BLS you know on a rowy bus or I can go and get a gun go stand the airports or become an armed response officer as a detective W to W to my ooster so I had to think about it and then I decided to do the detectives exams so I did the detectives exams uh went on to the robbery Squad and again loved it but it was then that I went to C and I met a guy at Colt who I'd known obviously people sort of get to know you when when you've been when you've been in one place so long and you're always out there people get to know your face people get to know who you are they get to know your name you know I walked across the road one day and uh one guy turned around and said to me Mr Madar how you doing where you right mate I'm not going to name any names but he goes right he goes yeah he goes um because I took your advice because I want a uni because fantastic he now produces music for a rapper yeah yeah but goes it's not you know but that's what it's about it's about trying to educate these Lads yeah it's not about your odd Rock here and there selling the odd Rock here and there on an estate it's about looking at the bigger picture and this is what happened when I was at Co I was sitting at C and this guy come and sat next to me what were you in cult for no no I was obviously there one of my cases one one of my cases one of my cases was there it was a it was a robbery case and um this lad he come over and you know we always have a little bit of banner cuz I've known him since he was like 11 12 years old he was always a little wrong do you know what I mean he's just one of them kids just knew popping up all the time yeah yeah and he's obviously we know you know we know what what he's been up to okay so with us people tell us we know stuff you know and this guy comes and sits next to me and he goes to me you know what he goes you know what officer goes what's up mate and he goes you better watch your back I goes why he goes cuz a lot of people unhappy with what you've been doing what I've been doing he goes you're taking out a few sort of people he goes um he goes yeah you better watch your back I goes do you know what mate I goes I think you better watch your back yeah because you know the likelihood is the sort of life that you're living you're probably going to be in trouble where I am yeah and it's weird that happens because a week later the guy was driving down uh Tottenham Ira uh no it was a roundway in Tottenham just off the just by the A10 um and a um a motorbike pulls up beside him sprays his car kills him you know but this is and you're just thinking there and there that's another one gone yeah but he gets replaced yeah that's it you know but yeah that's uh that's what it was um so going back then was there any other times when you feared for your life that you knew someone was on your case no never never feared like probably because I didn't get so deep into into people yeah okay yeah the bigger picture rather than okay yeah so what I will I was never in that place where I actually actually feared for my life and the other reason was I always it's weird to say this but I always gotten really well with them yeah yeah why is I don't know the way I look at is I grew up around the same sort of same sort of stuff I grew up around same sort of areas you know I could sort of relate to people and I think that's why I found it really easy talking to them yeah you know the only difference was was when the [ __ ] at the fan we'll be running towards the [ __ ] and people were running away from it do you know what I mean but at the same time I get where they were coming from I understand that you know circumstances etc for some of them like the girls on the on the vice squad yeah it was like that you know so yeah just literally started it was there and you got to be you got to be you got to be fair to people yeah you sound you sound like a fair fell like if there's a problem you you talk them through it oh yeah absolutely and then say this is the reasons why the the and I think this the only on their wavelength even though they're looking at you going I don't like you but that's it but the thing is is that you know I could sit there somebody could be shouting at me I then start shouting at them they'll get louder I'm going to have to get louder so I stood there and just reacted sort of calmly to them yeah eventually brings everything down they will bring themselves down yeah what was your route like then you went in to become a detective you said you were allowed to carry you allowed to carry a gun with you no no no I didn't never carried a gun never no no never carried a gun never carried a gun um you mentioned a gun earlier or was that no that was the armed response oh no no yeah that was one you know could have actually gone in certain ways and whatever but yeah so I became a detective so I've worked across the robbery burglary violent crime you name it you know I've worked across all those units I've dealt with some real real horrible people and I remember you know I was night Duty I was you know no one like doing night Duty it's the thing is like I love doing night Duty it was like that's when everything happened so we get a call to finsy park so got we've now got an axe murderer in FY Park so I go over there and literally as I'm standing there you could see it it's like a scene out of a horror film so the Mist has just started setting in so me and um other detective his name's Tommy Tommy was there so me and Tommy there and he's Jordie fell and he's like he's looking at me and he's like [ __ ] hell mate he goes uh we're going to have to call in the whole the whole park off so we're going to have to stop everyone coming in and as he says that and obviously the guy's just been cuted off to hospital he's he's been attacked with an axe and we've still got parts of his head is still on the ground and then I look into the distance and have you ever seen that film I Know What You Did Last Summer yellow anarak raincoat guys walking over towards us with an axe in his hand and he's dragging it along and I turned around I looked at him went is that a joke yeah this is a guy generally but the guy had come back and he'd come back I think I don't know if he'd come back to finish the job off don't know why he came back but this is it you know and this is this this sort of stuff people don't hear about yeah I could you know I went to work let's say seven days on night Duty seven days something bad happened yeah how many times did it make the paper never how many times it stick into my head it's ingrained in there yeah it's like my DNA now do you know what I mean and this the sort of stuff sometimes where you know when you make that Journey you know what you're getting you know you know what you're seeing but there's never that there was never with us we we we were men you know it was never going to be case of I go and see someone or anything like that it was just a case and was that the era then because now we talking about mental health you got to go and see someone PTSD have you dealt with anything like that since you left the old bill yeah so you know for me it's you know some of the stuff that I've seen you can only dream of do you know what I mean I literally I've had it where I've woken up in the middle of the night you know you see stuff like I said to you before when you got kids dying your arm people dying in your arms you know you're trying to keep people alive try to blow into a guy with a hole in his head you know that's not just one off that's happened so much do you see what I mean but then there's other there's other funny stories that go with it as well that sort of balance it out do you know what I mean so in a weird sort of way it is it is it's like it's dark it is dark but you know the way at that time we used to deal with it was humor and it weren't humor towards people it was humor towards each other you know and it was with the police so when I left in I left in 2014 2015 2015 I left and I lost my dad in 2016 and that's the hardest thing I've had to deal with yeah yeah losing my dad cuz he was my best mate yeah so I literally I come out of there and having lost my dad now that was very sudden and I just could not sort of I couldn't comprehend what had actually happened why he's gone I couldn't deal with it and then eventually I was convinced to go and see a bement counselor so having spoken to the bement counselor she turned around and you know I remember her talking to me and it was the old I had a brick wall there was a massive wall up and then she started chipping away started chipping away and then I remember the tears started flowing and whatever you you know and then she just turned around and said to me she goes throughout your life you've had a switch it's like a kill switch in your head yeah every time you've walked into something you've turned it off you've turned that emotional attachment to anyone there you've turned it off and that's why you've been able to do that and that and you've probably done that with your dad yeah and then she turned it back on yeah and Jesus Christ it's just it's you know it is it's it's horrendous you know I read you know people won't admit it but I've read on Facebook I you know I'm part of a few groups when I saw on Facebook a few weeks ago somebody goes does anyone else have this sort of issue and there was loads of people that turn around and said yeah well actually I do yeah and I do you know and I was like I do it but we try and deal with that and try and get on with it what people don't realize is that when you're in let's say the Armed Forces you come back they call it PTSD yeah different levels isn't there yeah you know we don't see the sort of the sort of stuff like you know some of these guys that are around the front line there see you know I've had a number of them on the podcast it's heroin yeah yeah so you know you get that but there's no decompression so like for you there's no decompression decompression you're in war one day killing people and I've had them on here SAS and SBS people yeah yeah next day they FL straight back in they walking around s buying baked beans and bacon yeah absolutely with no decompression they got to play Mind Games yeah yeah yeah and again well you around were you around in that or in 95 you're seeing it on sky at the moment about the Essex murders what we as a detective and one of the best detectives and you're very well respected across the country I know that as a detective would you you've been reading something of you I just as a detective what would you have done in that situation with eics murders and do you feel that those two people committed the crime see that is well before my time it was you know something that I I yeah I I didn't deal with anything like that uh but again you know you look at as as an investigator right because that's what I do yeah I look at stuff and as a detective Sergeant when I was promoted I had to review cases and I I'll be looking at those cases and try and figure out where there may be anomalies where you need to you know where you might actually anything that you might have that might undermine your case yeah but having looked at that case you know and watched the documentaries you know over the years and whatever you I think you know I haven't seen I think there's something on sky at the moment isn't it I haven't seen it three part series at the moment yeah I haven't I haven't seen that but but for my understanding is they prosecuted off one particular witness I find it very difficult in this day and age to sort of think that the CPS would run with one one person's word against the others if you know what I mean yeah um especially someone that's actually involved at the sort of level I believe the guy was maybe a he was either I think he might have actually been a driver of some sort yeah so I find it difficult because if you know if I had reviewed that I probably would have looked for other evidence against them but like you know I can't comment on that because I've not I haven't had I I haven't had eyeball on what the investigation was I don't know what's actually happened so I can't really say because obviously they would have have other evidence against these guys so they might have had you know phone stuff and whatever you cuz still um mobile phon here mobile phones here there was yeah yeah yeah so you know it's it's difficult for me to actually turn around and say yeah uh this has happened that's happened because I don't know the case I don't know what's actually happened so it'd be wrong for me to comment however again it's something that you know if they felt they had the evidence things changed after that CU I Su [Music] they what happened was that 95 was it 95 95 yeah right so were they not convicted around 97 98 is that right yeah well law change there's changes in um in the way things were actually disclosed then so now I do that now is that I pass on my knowledge that's you know that's my job now I pass on my knowledge uh to investigators I train investigators now and that's the way I do it and you know the biggest thing here is having a look at stuff like you know things like disclosure how is this going to undermine your case yeah I I can't comment on that other than other than you know AG when you look in as one of the very best and your mates who have been the very best in the police force do you look in and see that that may not be they' done it the right way again I don't know okay because that's not something that you had privy to I yeah you know again it's you know people say it to me I read it and you know I read it in there uh but it's something I just can't comment on I can't I can't turn around and say x1z would have done it or you know yeah it's cuz this story's been floating around now for 28 years 30 years coming up to yeah coming up to 30 years and everyone's got their own stories and what's happening what have you um why did you leave the old bill I stopped believing in it so basically at 18 years in I 12 to do uh they changed my pension so rather than the 12 I would have had 24 to do I was going through personal sort of uh issues myself with my health so IID actually um I actually got really sick and i' gone down to about eight stone and they thought I had bow cancer and it was just then that you sort of reflect and that's what I did um turns out that I was a Celiac and it's the same sort of um the same uh sort of uh whatam I call it symptoms but yeah it's I just really focused on what was happening really and I sort of I'm a chess player I look 10 I look 10 moves ahead and I looked at the job and I saw stuff and I thought look 10 moves ahead and I thought this is going to go this is not going to go way that I want it to go you know my my boss at the time turned around and said to me he goes look cuz I would act in the uh the detective inspector role and he turned around and said to me go goes you do an exam I went yeah cuz I was looking for promotion go Di and he goes I won't do it here they won't support you at Edmonton I said why he goes because you don't say yes to them and that was that was he was being honest with me yeah people and I saw this you know I was asked to go off and do stuff by DC there detective Chief inspectors there that I've had like seven eight years in have no idea what it's like being out on out in the real world and then having explained to him that you know what we can't do that because one it's not ethical yeah and two just because you want your figures yeah doesn't mean we ain't breaching certain human rights yeah do you know what I mean and I could see that happening and I could see it more and more with the sort of people that were coming in you know and you look at you look at the Met itself there was there is no other police force in this world that I will turn around and say Beats met really okay from when I was there okay yeah fantastic place I loved it I lived my dream there you know I did 18 years I had a great time okay I made friends for life but I look at the state of the Met now yeah very different and it's all based around the fact that and I you know I it's not the Mets fault I personally blame more the government in this because we have issues so they have people on the streets turn around saying well we need more police officers well we're you know crime's gone up so we need more cops but you've just got rid of all those cops because you're trying to save money so what do we do we try and get as many cops as quickly as possible as Boris said we're going to get 20,000 10,000 20,000 extra cops where you going to get them from yeah so those people that weren't good enough 5 10 years ago they're suddenly good enough now yeah yeah you got people coming in that should never been in the job you see it in the news now how many people are being investigated yeah how many people are being investigated I do a lot of training you know my company now it's all based around training I train investigators yeah and it's from everything evidence Gathering I've been out to Jamaica I was out in Jamaica a year and a half ago trained up their major organized crime and anticorruption teams is that right yeah yeah but again I get out there and it's all about train them the right way yeah teach them how to do it properly you don't teach them how to do it properly these days it seems to be that they get given a book yeah read that and then go out and please the streets yeah and it was never like that when I joined have you ever come across bent coppers in your time bank coppers I would say that I've come across people that have done wrong things uh and when you say Bank coppers I suspect you're talking about people on on the take yeah uh no okay not on to take but I've come across people that have done stupid things and end up getting arrested for it example uh stealing uniform stupidity stuff um arm robbery what a copper do in arm robbery Y is that right y tell me about that well uh what year is this R this is probably around 2005 2006 I think it was and I think the guy just had uh a really bad cocaine issue so uh he ended up going into a uh a bookies without a mask on got captured on CCTV and then obviously what happens is they put that image around all the police stations and obviously he worked at my police station so yeah you would think you talk about that's busy in it yeah yeah yeah so there was that yeah so what'd he get for that did he get more would he got more than the normal bod probably because they obviously look at sending a message out don't they and the fact that look you're supposed to be upholding the lawmate yeah you know and that's effectively what uh what the issue was there but yeah you know when it comes to when you're talking about corruption and that sort of level no I and I'm being genuinely honest here okay I have not come across that you read about it yeah but listen it's just like every organization you could you can go and work uh you know one of the uh the big five or the big four yeah they got thousands and thousands of people you're always going to get one or two people that are bad yeah and it's the same as the met you know these guys here go out they try and do a job listen I said to you before I have never faced anything since you know when I was in the police but then I moved out of London and I moved to hartfordshire and it's been the total opposite yeah do you know what I mean it's been the total opposite I turn around and I'm just thinking to myself I sort of get what public talking about now yeah I've had to call the police and I've had to say to them in hartfordshire would you come out if I phoned up again and said my name was Dave Smith and it's silence I've got somebody going crazy yeah trying to break in nothing why because you're surname I got no idea no okay but let's put it this way when you've made 10 calls M and they haven't turned up or they've told you to phone you local counsil and whatever you and I'm telling them look I've got video of who's actually done it this guy is there now I sometimes I have to work away yeah I've got my family at home yeah you know got my wife got my kids or whatever you and it's very very difficult but yeah when I was in London never had that issue I I drive down the street now and every time I drive past the cop car seem like literally rubb inck I got stopped in um in chant driving down the road but I've got my kid in the car I got a suit on and I see the guy turn around and look at me clocked him he goes around the corner and suddenly within about two minutes I'm surrounded by three cars why cuz a car matching my description he says to me is a car matching your description and that's what they can use and I turned around and said you're giving me the car matching the description you're giving me that line you know what I mean where you know it is just the most ridiculous line that you can use so then you turn around you say okay fine well how about that car there and that car there and that car there do you see what I mean but then they get you know you just got to play the game with them yeah you know one thing really really want to make my blood boil is the grooming gangs how they seem to get away with everything is that because the old Bill aren't putting the evidence through or they don't want their headache what what's going on there and when you say the groom gangs you're talking about the young girls the exploitation right so when I left the police and I you know fell into training ASP what I did was I also spent two years as the uh the manager for an invest investigations manager shall I say for a child service provider a private child care provider shall I say and a lot of my investigations were based around kids that had been trafficked or you know and what have you now the issue here is either and I spoke to a couple of cops is education some of them don't know how to deal with stuff yeah especially when you're talking about the counties yeah because it's not RI when you go into London you go to Birmingham you go Manchester that sort of stuff is quite rif it's also it comes up now we you know it is it's it's evident now because you get to see it um you know everybody that goes out especially for government organizations they're looking out for exploitation they're looking out for you know um uh uh not just the exploitation aspect of it but the um uh uh The Grooming they're looking for um uh what's it called God Jesus they just gone completely blank now I'm just trying to think of what it was [Music] um modern slavery modern day slavery yeah yeah yeah so you all of that and all of that fits into it so you got exploitation you got these kids that are being exploited you got human beings being trafficked you got modern slavery all of this is quite rif now yeah okay and you've got you've got units all over the country you've got government departments that ain't cops are are now getting trained to pick up on that but why the old Bill take so long to Nick these people because because of evidence they need evidence to ni people but it seems to be that one area in this country which is really poorly done so if you let's say I can go I can go over and Nick anyone just because you told me that this person is involved in this but for me to prosecute that person I'm going to need the evidence to do so okay yeah if I haven't got the evidence it's very difficult for me to then go in and take that person you know what am I going to do if I haven't got evidence against him there's ways that I can actually get that isn't there if I then go straight in I've spooked them yeah okay yeah are they going to go ground yeah are they going to stop their activities am I going to lose everything yeah anything they might have on their computers on their phones wiped gone yeah do you see what I mean so you just got to be very careful okay so like you said an hour ago you got to be using that your head working it out getting all the evidence and then going in for the kill going in to grab them absolutely you got you know you've got to be very smart about you got to be very very smart about this and when I say you got to be very smart about this you've got you can't just look at the quick win you got to look at the bigger picture okay you got to think time you got to think outside the box and that does take time because what will happen is if there is uh a case of let's say somebody being involved in the exploitation of kids yeah yeah well we need to put as much evidence against this person yeah to that person and also to the CPS so the prosecutors need to look at it and they need to what they would do is they will look at a case to see if there's a realistic Prospect of a conviction yeah is there a high probability here that we're going to convict this person because in a criminal case you know the burden of proof is beyond Reasonable Doubt yeah we've got to be 99.9% sure because you're taking this person's Liberties but there is old bill out there who have gone against the system fought against the system and then been booted out of the police and they're now the whistleblowers giving evidence of everything that wasn't done in the police while they were there and people do and again a lot of organizations do have that you know I've seen it I've seen it with the sort of work that I do now do you know Maggie Oliver no no okay there's a few people and John wedger are they from round no they're they're from up North and whever you but they were pushed out by the police because they were whistle blown said this is not right those grooming gangs need to be nicked now because of this this this and this and they're now saying they' come out and open say stuff was thrown under the carpet under the carpet the whole time and that doesn't that doesn't surprise me yeah okay that doesn't surprise me one bit yeah because you got to remember is a lot of these a lot of these um people you got to think of the reputation of that organization if you haven't acted when something's come up it's too late you now got to remember especially when it's the old bill it's you can get dragged through the you're going to get dragged through the media mud yeah that's what's going to happen there's going to be a media circus out there and then there'll be some sort of review uh you know it'll be a review on what's happened Etc all of this is all you all your dirty washing is going to come out and that's how it works you know but yeah I listen when you've got people that are coming out saying this has happened that's happened that's happened with proof you can't really argue against it yeah you know I have like I said the sort of work I do now yeah I investigate allegations a lot of it is in the workpl harassment sexual sexual assaults etc etc they come to me and say well you know somebody's whistle blown because they've made an allegation against this particular person and their bosses literally swept it under the carpet yeah I've had it I've had it where You' I've heard of rapes being uh brushed under the carpet of kids yeah yeah why it's because it's damaging to that organization and they will try and find a way to sort of bury it yeah so what you're saying is it's not just the old bill it's many organization from your experience in your new work I've I've worked in the private sector I've worked in the public sector okay now I I found the last seven years especially is that to save the reputation of that organization and for the sake of a bit of money there is stuff that gets um that literally does get and I'm not talking about the police here yeah there is stuff here that gets um brushed under the carpet there is and I can I can understand exactly what you're saying but when it comes to whistleblowing people can't get sacked because they've whistleblowing because that whistleblowing legislation protects them but they get pressure put on them so much that they they get squeezed they have to leave but then there's laws out there for I'm dismissal yeah so it's stuff that they have to they normally get whacked on the pension and go whack on the pension shut up there's your pension for the next 30 Years 20 years or whatever it may be yeah but the thing is is um but that's down to the person isn't it like we had this um not long ago uh in relation in America where you had um where you had the defamation case against uh Fox News yeah and they were saying we ain't taking the money we ain't taking the money we're we're making a point a day later they've taken the money yeah money talks yeah that's what happens doesn't matter what line of work you're in Money talks and this is why it was very difficult you know when you sort you do the sort of jobs that we do yeah do the sort of jobs that we do especially when I was in the police you'll be looked at you'll be looked at why because they want to know if you if you are that fallible person are you going to be the person that cracks yeah is this dealer going to pay you 50 Grand to you know to look the other way have you got problems like that and they'll look at that do you see what I mean they'll do all that sort of are those checks done now I don't know do you know anyone who's taken a bung in the old Bill no and that's and that's honest okay I've never I've never actually come across anyone that's done that so at the moment then you've been out for seven years what is your work today sui so at this moment in time a lot of my work is based around passing on my own knowledge really so I train I train investigators uh a lot of them work for government departments uh I do various different forces for private sector as well uh a lot of problems in the private sector when it comes to HR and you've got a lot of allegations that are being made against colleagues uh by colleagues not being dealt with properly so I've designed develop courses that go out to um to organizations so that they know how to deal with those people whether it's a grievance whether it's a um an allegation made against that particular organization or the person itself just how to deal with them because at the end of the day the problem that I found is people are not dealing with people properly yeah yeah and like you said the easiest thing is to try and drill into them drill into them drill into them get them out but they need to think like I think well what happens 10 steps down the line when they're at a tribunal and you're paying out hundreds of thousands of pounds yeah dealing with something that should be dealt with them so yeah so I sort of do a lot of training for private uh sector organizations uh when it comes to things like um interviewing people uh evidence Gathering investigation itself in the private sector and then uh government departments that are involved in enforcement so you got government departments are involved in enforcement uh criminal offenses and then I train them in various different uh subjects includes things like uh evidence Gathering uh interviewing as per the College of policing um disclosure very important most important uh sort thing in the um the crimin justice system if you don't complete disclosure properly you lose your cases but yeah various different things and my my whole uh the business itself is based around that and I've just literally become accredited uh as an organization we are now able to train trainers so people can come in uh they can get qualification off off me and uh that makes uh gives them an opportunity to go off and uh and train in any this sounds what be stra what's that training trainers how to do all of this after 20 years of what you're doing yeah absolutely what's the name what's the name of the company so people can go and find it if they're listening it's uh it's Swift it's uh Swift investigation management or Swift edification uh edification aspect of it is uh it's my it's my training it's my learning side of things and any investigation side of any investigation processes I uh on Swift uh it's swift.com actually it's the easiest what I say it rather than investigation management but yeah that's uh that's that's where we're at and um yeah we again we're just there to to help out anyone that needs help ready Su it I've really really enjoyed this episode I I'm grateful for you having me yeah no amazing I've uh I'm actually blown away what you've had to go through and what you've been right in the mix for those 20 years and I really do appreciate your honesty because I could tell in your eyes these are proper honest conversations yeah no uh just to to walk my way through it again has been uh it just brings it back you know it's been a great I had a great time I I've had a great time and uh a long mate continue man yeah you're a gentleman thank you very much I really appreciate you coming down here cheers thank you very much [Music] good

Channel: Dodge Woodall

Views: 103,917

Keywords: jon wedger, dodge woodall, james english, true goride, ksi, logan paul, IFL TV, boxing, boxing social, MET, police, crime, crime drama, sukie madahar, detective, Investigation, crime documentary, eventful lives, eventful lives podcast, dodge woodall podcast

Id: UBTVN2dwM8Y

Length: 91min 47sec (5507 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 18 2023