Welcome to the Crime & Punishment 2024 Story Event. Note: my story this year is in the Gay Male category. It’s a stand-alone police procedural story, but for fans of the characters, this story takes place shortly after Sex Swing Shenanigans (which has much more sex in it!). See end notes for more info.

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Interviewed about Indecency

We cut through some side streets on our way home from east London. “That renovation you’re leading on is round here, isn’t it? How’s it doing?”

It’s Dan’s first role as site manager. Once he got his architectural-related degree, and more importantly, the confidence that came with it, his career rose fast: from technical drawing and odd bits of materials-ordering, to being in charge of increasing amounts of building restoration projects and change-of-use schemes. This one’s an old factory, being turned into yet more posh flats. Sorry, ‘apartments’. At least under Dan and colleagues, they’ll be solid and practical.

Dan’s solid and practical too. Tall, lean, short blond curls, cheeky grin. My rock.

“The project’s going well,” he says. “The façade of the building held up, even after the interior was demolished. And the new shell’s nearly had the first fix done.”

Dan leads me down a narrow street with Victorian red-brick warehouses on each side, then a cobbled alleyway between two of them. There’s clapboard hoardings in front of the factory railings. He rummages in his coat pocket, holds up a bunch of keys. “Wanna come see?”

We give ourselves a tour. It looks great. I check some details from my field of expertise; he promises to ensure it’s all good. As we put our hard hats back in the lockers, I’m so proud of him. He deserves a reward.

Once we’re outside in the alley, all in shadow because the sun’s now behind the buildings, and Dan’s locking the site up again, I tell him that.

He knows how I like rewarding him, since the day we first met. He’d responded to an ad, to find a small sandy-haired Irish guy – that’s me – who passed him a beer; I was on the floor, sucking him off, within a minute. Only today, Dan’s convinced that actually I’ve been the one supporting his career all this time, so today it’s him who drops to his knees and insists on doing the honours.

I’ve learned to resist many things in my life, but my man with his hand on my cock? I’ve never even tried!

It turns out, that wasn’t such a great idea.

_____

“You’re nicked, mate.” So much for our privacy.

“Run,” I tell Dan. It’s only two police who’ve magically appeared, so I act all obliging and helpful, letting one handcuff me, but ‘accidentally’ trip up the other cop before he can give chase. The plod comes back from the entrance to the alleyway, having lost Dan already. Result. He glares at me, but just recites the caution and puts his hand on my head to shove me into the back of their car. We drive to their nick – police station – in silence.

After the routine photoshoot – much more high-tech than in my day – and the now-routine biometrics – which is all new to me, with the fingerprint scanner as well as DNA swabbing – my charm is rewarded. They let me make the phone call myself, to arrange for a brief. A lawyer, for those of you who don’t follow UK cop shows.

“Sam? Hi. All right, big man? Good, good. Me? Ah. Sorry to bother you on a Saturday night, but I’ve been arrested and need a brief.” I turn to the sergeant. “What was it you’re doing me for?” Back to Sam, I tell him, “‘Indecent exposure’, and ‘outraging public indecency’. Aye. Sex in public, basically. Allegedly. You’ll send someone? Grand. Can you call Dan and let him know you’re on it? Thanks, mate. I owe you one.”

Sam comments drily in my ear. I chuckle, causing the custody sergeant to raise an eyebrow. “I very much hope I’ll be back in the office by Monday morning! Sure. I’ll go see if I can get some kip before the Saturday night regulars turn up. Ta.”

I hang up and pass the phone back. “Was that your boss?” the guy asks.

“Aye, Sam. Owns the company. He’s a good man. He’s always said, if any of us get into any bother, call him – he knows good lawyers. So now, I guess we wait. Where do you want me?”

Being polite and friendly to custody sergeants is always vital if you want a reasonably comfortable cell lock-up experience. They’ll give you a paperback to read, extra blanket, double up other prisoners first, that kind of thing. And let you out promptly for a piss, which believe you me makes things much more civilised than when they don’t! It’s much easier to convince them to give you leeway when you can sound middle-class and sober. Especially the sober, I’m finding. I’ve never done that part before.

“Number two, please, sir, once you give me your belt and shoelaces.”

“Really?” Tedious.

“Really, sir. I’m sure you’re low risk, but if you want to keep the shoes then I want the laces.” I know from experience I don’t want cold feet. I’ve passed him my belt already, so I oblige and give him them. “Thank you. Adding them to your other possessions. Books there, if you want. It may be a few hours until your brief shows up, though I could get the duty one to pop down? May be quicker.”

“Please.” It’ll be someone to talk to. I grab a Stephen King sans cover. Though once I’m banged up – the modern cell is reasonably clean, smells only of disinfectant, even has a toilet, though no bog roll – I just lie on the plinth on the crap thin cushion, under the blanket. It’s relaxing, in a way. Same old institutional cream paint from when I got nicked a lot when I was younger; more cheerful new blue doors.

I’m almost nostalgic. I don’t know how many times I’ve been arrested. A couple dozen, for sure. Maybe twice that? But none since I got properly together with Diane. Twenty years ago, the last time, probably. What can I say? I had a drug and alcohol problem, the problem being not enough of either of them. Thus getting into misunderstandings and fights and being beaten up and everything else that goes with that.

At least I’ve given up smoking, a good ten years back now. At the end of the Nineties, when various police forces decided to ban smoking in cells, it made all the arrests after that truly hellish. But it was encouraged in the interview rooms, still. More for the filth’s safety than for being kind to the prisoner! I bet even that’s not allowed, now.

It feels like I’ve just dozed off, when the custody sergeant bangs on the door, then opens it.

“It’s your lucky day, mate. Not one, but two briefs have turned up! You decide which one you want.”

I blink, sit up, and straighten my clothes. A small Asian guy with little beard, and a round white woman with hair a bright red not found in nature, both enter the cell.

“Adrian Cullinane?” the woman asks.

“Aye, that’s me. Pleased to meet you. I would give you my business card, but the chap out there has them.”

The young chap interrupts. “I’m Kamran Shokar, tonight’s duty solicitor. I was asked to come to you after my previous client. But it turned out that Tanya was also coming down to see you.”

“Hello.” She puts out her hand. “Tanya Jeffries, of DPK Legal. Your manager Sam called us. Actually, my friend Gareth Davies also called me, so I could reassure him I was already on my way.”

Oh, ye gods, how did sodding Gareth find out? Gareth’s one of my best mates from uni, stuck by me through everything for thirty years now. He’s a lawyer. But he lives in Manchester. More importantly, he’s the biggest fucking gossip this side of the Irish Sea. No, the Atlantic…

“Gareth? How did he know I needed a brief?”

“Daniel…” She’s got the name written down.

Dan. Of course. He’d have panicked, wanted to ensure I got a good lawyer, would call Gareth. Hopefully he also told Gareth what would happen to his balls, if he spread this about…

“Ah, right. Yes, Dan would have. And I called Sam. Looks like your firm is the go-to for such cases, then.” She grins, presumably knowing they’re the top criminal defenders around.

The duty brief guy looks between us. “Right, are you saying you don’t need me, then?”

Poor lad, he’s intimidated. Which is the opposite of what I need. “I need a good brief. Which of you has more experience at defending public indecency?”

“Her. Definitely her!”

She smiles. “I might do more sex-criminal defence than anyone else in the country. No, that’s not ‘getting rapists off’, thank you. Ensuring everyone has an appropriate defence, based on the facts, is my job. The odd bit of defence of kinksters – I work with Kashminder Singh. Lots of doggers, not as in private as they hoped – or more arrested, rather.” Dogging seems to be trendy nowadays – having sex in vehicles in the woods, for other people to watch. Never seen the attraction, myself.

“Right, thanks for coming down,” I tell Shokar, “but I’ll let you get on to your next client.” I shake his hand – I may need him later.

“So,” Tanya coos, taking a seat on the plinth and getting out an iPad, “let’s chat here rather than waiting for a custody room. Tell me what happened.”

I take a deep breath.

“I’ve not been arrested in twenty years,” I tell her. “Before that, I’ve got a long rap sheet of drunk-and-disorderly, breach of the peace… Simple drunk, disorderly behaviour: three months suspended sentence.”

“That was in Northern Ireland?” Those last two offences don’t exist in England, so she can tell. Also, my accent makes it pretty obvious where I grew up, still. “Were you over eighteen by then?” Juvenile records have to be ignored when looking at your history. Mostly.

“Aye. If you add the under-eighteen, well. Height of the Troubles; my family were… known to the police. A few uncles claimed to be in the IRA; I don’t know how much of that was bollocks. Me, I got lifted regularly. Common assault, vandalism, disorderly. All sorts of stuff that was their word against mine, nothing very interesting.”

“Fine. Once you were of age, then? And over here, by the looks of it.” She studies her paperwork. “A bunch of D&D, assault, breach of the peace, possession. More possession. Arrests for intent to supply, no charges, so basically possession of large quantities.” She stares at me, not voicing her question, which is ‘Could you have been any more obvious you had a fucking huge drug and booze addiction?’

“Ah, aye. My twenties weren’t good. I lost half a dozen jobs thanks to the drink. And the rest. But, and you’ll note this, from age twenty-eight, there’s nothing.”

“Yes. The last is one common assault, for which you were bound over for six months.” Basically, I had to be a good boy or else.

“Don’t get wasted and ask a cop to phone a taxi for you, and trip over onto them, in other words.”

“Mm. And since then?”

“I got sober. With the help of a good woman.” I sigh.

“And?”

“Married her. Then she died. Familial cancer.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Anyway, I held it together. I was already working for Sam a bit, and joined his small specialist firm. They were great, my friends. Including Gareth. They were great. Stayed single, though. Until about eleven years ago, when my friend thought a bloke would help me stop smoking.”

“How?”

“Something long and round to put in my mouth…”

She laughs. “Seriously?”

“It seriously worked! Anyway, Dan answered this ad, and next thing you know – OK, five years on, we’re married. And still very happy about that. So… Tonight…”

“In your own words.”

“Yeah. Right. You won’t mention anyone else I mention, will you?”

“Only if you want me to, as part of your defence.”

“No. Never. I’d rather be found guilty than have him accused of anything.”

“Even if it means you end up on the Sex Offenders Register?”

I shrug. “I’ve got no children, don’t work with any. Sam wouldn’t fire me; Dan wouldn’t leave me. It would be what, max five years on the Register anyway, right?”

She checks her paperwork. “For public indecency, yes. Even if indecent exposure was made out, which I doubt they could prove a mens rea for.”

“A what, now?”

“Sorry. Intent. Did you intend to ‘shock, alarm or distress’ any of the public, when you got your dick out?”

“No! We thought we were completely private. The CCTV looked at the gate, not four feet in front of it. That’s a good question, actually. Who did see it and take the photo the cops mentioned? Other police?”

“I’m not sure. Do you have a stalker, by any chance? Or your partner?”

“Not as far as I know. I can’t imagine Dan does. Oh, fuck.”

She laughs again. “You and your husband, then? Married for years, then decide to have at in an alleyway? That’s actually kinda adorable.”

“I can neither confirm nor deny it was him I was with.”

“Noted. We’ll leave that as an open question. Let them work to prove it. So don’t tell me! I can’t push a defence that I know to be false…” She clings to the implausible deniability I’ve given her. “Would I be right in assuming your Dan doesn’t have a record, or a less-understanding boss than yours?”

“You would. But I’m not saying that’s at all relevant, because I’m not saying he was there.”

“You’re sweet when you’re disingenuous. Go on.”

I roll my eyes. “OK. We were wandering back from Hackney to London Bridge and then Bermondsey, coming home after a day out. We nearly passed that building site. Dan’s the project manager of the renovation of the warehouse. It’s his first really big project. He’s really proud of it.” I smile. “So he offered to show me round and get my opinion on some of it. I’m a fire engineer, so that’s my bread and butter, turning old buildings into flats. Assessing plans and improving them.

“So. We toddled around, wore our hard hats and all, looking inside. It’s a good piece of work, if you’re looking for a decent quality flat?”

She shakes her head.

“So we came out, locked up. Dan’s so tired, but he was so happy and proud. And I thought I could make his day even happier, you get me? Or, as it might have been, I might have packed him off home and dialled up some other guy. Stranger things have happened.”

“I’m afraid I do need you to give me all the personal details. About what you did with your mystery gentleman companion.”

“You know, normally I at least take a lady for a drink, before doing this much sexy talk.”

“Let’s see if Mike will do us cups of tea. One moment.” She steps out, has a word. “Oh, and can you bring his business cards? In the wallet.”

Mike the custody sergeant yells at someone to put the kettle on, then brings me my entire bag of possessions so I can’t accuse him of losing anything. I pull a few business cards out, hand over one for Tanya, one for Mike, because even the filth don’t deserve to burn alive in fires. There was a huge tower block fire a few years ago now, where over seventy people died. I’m going to have to give evidence when it finally comes to court, because I rejected part of the initial plans, with some of the materials that someone else eventually signed off. Anyone creating flats, or a workplace, really needs an expert fire assessment to ensure all the modern complex materials work together.

Mike is impressed by my credentials and job title. I tell him, “Put it on your break room wall. Anyone buying a new flat, or a conversion, get in touch and ensure it’s been signed off by someone like us.” Excellent, he now thinks I’m probably OK. Probably a wee misunderstanding led to my arrest, is all. Good. He can relay that to the others. Not that that’s sufficient, of course. The man’s not stupid: he knows plenty of criminals look totally innocent but turn out to have done terrible things. But what I’m not is one of their tedious pisshead regulars.

Any more.

Tanya pushes the door to again, clearly feeling safe with both me and my plastic mug of tea. “Right. You were about to tell me what happened. You and your husband, sorry, mystery man, had just exited the building site and he’d locked up.”

“I said I didn’t want him mentioned! Could say, ‘I had the keys and looked round’. Or maybe ‘I was alone and looked through the gates’?”

“I can’t state as fact anything where you’ve told me the opposite. But I can confirm you were in the alleyway, so you had a look because your spouse is working on that project.”

“Husband.”

“I know, you said. But we don’t want to let any homophobia kick in before we have to. So you were there. It’s up to them to prove anyone was with you. I can no-comment just as well as you can.”

“Nice. Anyway. As you said, I was there, can’t really deny it. That’s where they found me.”

“Yes. I’ve got questions as to how that happened.”

“Mm. Me too. As far as I was concerned – having magically found a passer-by, perhaps – that alleyway was private. The streets were deserted. No-one goes to work round there on a Saturday night, no-one lives on that street, yet.”

“Except for the one person you happened to have picked up. I mean, they saw you with someone.”

“Mm. But I’m not stupid. I looked round to check no-one was coming along the road, and the alley’s a bit bent. It was nearly dusk, too. Figured we were in the shadows, anyone who did walk past would have to be really looking…”

“Good point. Let me get Streetview up. Pretend this is the interview. So you’d come down this street here. Were you alone?”

“No comment.”

“Did you find a man on the street?”

“No comment.”

“Had you arranged to meet a man by this building site?”

“No comment.”

“What’s the longest you’ve gone ‘no comment’ for?”

“No comment.”

She laughs. “That was a serious question! We can probably get this down to being NFA’d – no further action, not worth anyone’s time to pursue. Or at least not more than a fine, and ideally not on the SOR – the Register – but if someone wants to push this, it could take a while in interview.”

I’m fine with that. “I’ve had a fair few rounds of being held in custody for the full 48 hours before being charged. Or released. Always released, I think.”

“What was the alleged crime?” She’s curious.

I quote, “‘Being a fookin’ stoodent.’ And probably drunk-and-disorderly. I mean, that summed up most of my weekends when I was at college! When I actually got charged with something, like when they thought I’d assaulted an officer, or when I ended up in a fight and we both got done, those tended to be quicker. Interview, charge, then get told to fuck off on bail. Though that last one, the one when I wanted a cab, that went on a while. Like, hours. The original charge was GBH…” Grievous Bodily Harm, which should mean life-changing injuries. The cop barely bled from a cut when I knocked him over, but the witnesses were four other police, and let’s say I hadn’t made a good impression.

“And your brief got that down to common assault, not even aggravated? Impressive. Who did you have?”

I give the name of the barrister. “A friend suggested he’d be worth it. Kept my job, sorted my life out, so I reckon he was.”

“I’ll say! Right, sounds like you know the drill. Stay quiet or no comment, please don’t piss them off. Saturday night investigating officers are probably delighted with something a bit different to the usual, so they might put a tad more effort in, if you know what I mean. Also, I want to know what evidence they’ve got on you! You mentioned a photo, but how did that happen? Something doesn’t add up.”

She drags her hand through the scarlet hair. “OK, I need to know. Let’s say you’ve found a man, or turned up with him, and you’re outside the gate. Then what happened?” She smiles sternly, which looks even more out of place under the unprofessional hair. “I should point out that I’m quite unshockable! Certainly some gay sex won’t do it. It’ll be a relief to hear about something consensual for a change! Assuming this was?”