Statement Number: Y21 Date of interview: 22/01/2007 Time commenced: 1200 Time concluded: 1637 Det Sgt My name is Detective Sergeant Douglas CLARKE. The other person present is. Det Cons Detective Constable Ben HALL. Det Sgt We're interviewing, can I have your full name please? POULTON Derek Gordon POULTON. Det Sgt We're at a convert location and what we're attempting to do is to take a significant statement from Derek. During this time I'll remind Derek that if any time he wants to stop the interview if you can just just let me know. If you want to seek legal advice also let me know. The date is the 22nd of January. The time is now midday by my, my watch. To start off with Derek what I'd like to do is, you don't mind me calling you Derek? POULTON No. Det Sgt I should get that out the way to start with. If you can just tell me a little bit about yourself, when you joined the police force and that sort of stuff and a bit of background information and then we'll work on from there. POULTON I joined the Met Police in, on August 6th 1973 and after my initial training at Hendon I was posted to Croydon where I served for approximately two years, until my probationary period was finished and then I went straight on as, through a board to TDC. Det Sgt Uh hum. POULTON And worked on a Crime Squad at Wallington and then from Wallington I was then posted to (INAUDIBLE). I then did, well I did my initial CID course in 1976 I believe. Det Sgt Uh hum. POULTON At Hendon and then I was posted to Tooting where I remained for till 1978 and then I was, went back to uniform and was posted to Addington Police Station was their division and then I stayed there, I worked on the Crime Squad and Beat Crimes until 1985, 86. Det Sgt Okay. POULTON When I was then transferred onto the Divisional Drugs Squad and then as a result of a job I was working on I was then seconded to the Serious Crime Squad at Tottenham Court Road. Det Sgt Yeah. POULTON That was in relation to drugs and manufacture. Anything else. Det Sgt What happened after… POULTON Ah after that, during the course of that job it… Det Sgt How long were you on that for? POULTON About a, I should, that around for about six months, but the object was I was working with a DS then I'd known before, Bill BURNET. Det Sgt Uh hum. POULTON And another PC Gerry LUNIS and what the object of the job was that the, I had one drugs informant who was very reliable and he let it in passing that a person was being sought for a drugs related murder on Catford's ground, whereby a drugs guy had come to do a meet, a handover and he had been ripped off of the drugs and the money and kicked out a mini and caught his foot in a seat belt and the car then continued up the road. Det Sgt Uh huh. POULTON And he was decapitated on a bollard about 150 yards up the road and that murder had been outstanding for about 18 months and the suspect for that murder was a guy by the name of HUMPHREYS who was also a known drugs… Det Sgt Uh huh. POULTON Guy. So part of the job really was to secure the arrest of him. Then the other parts… Det Sgt Do you remember what that operation was called? POULTON Don't know if it had an operational name. Det Sgt Okay. POULTON Basically what it was, what it's also surrounding was a manufacture of amphetamine. There was a firm we thought was East End based, was setting up two or three amphetamine factories to manufacture amphetamine and then to get the other, to get the inroad into that company or that firm, needed to arrest this other person by the name of GRAY, Raymond GRAY who was also actively engaged in drugs lower down the food chain and he was an associate of a guy by the name of John CRITTENDEN. Det Sgt Uh hum. POULTON And John CRITTENDEN was a sort of millionaire pikey that then had a caravan sales showroom in West Wycombe. He also had numerous business interests, he owned a dog track and a large house at Farnborough in Kent. So we knew Raymond GRAY was involved in it so it was done very low budget because I was working with the Divisional Drugs Squad at Croydon who didn't really… Det Sgt Yeah, okay. POULTON I wasn't, I wasn't, they're having to put up with me but that weren't really part and parcel to it. Det Sgt Right. POULTON And that resulted in the arrest of Raymond GRAY and another guy and three and a half kilos of uncut amphetamine. Det Sgt Right. POULTON Well that amphetamine because it came up so pure it had to be close to source of manufacture. Det Sgt Uh hum. POULTON So managed to turn GRAY round as an informant and he didn't know the other informant. So I then had a position where I had two people in the same organisation that were act as informants, so you're getting a bigger picture. He then as a test to show that he was genuine he actually helped orchestrate and let us know when we could arrest HUMPHREYS. So Bill BURNET and myself we got the information but we didn't wanna be upfront with that because of the other part of the job that was going on. So we got the Catford, Lewisham Crime Squad which I think included Sid FILLARY, to make the arrest of HUMPHREYS. Det Sgt Uh hum. POULTON HUMPHREYS eventual got tried and then I think he got off on appeal and I think it got reduced to manslaughter and I think he wriggled from that one as well. Then the job went on, we were, I was then in debriefing GRAY, we did it on tape. There was five tapes in all 'cause he was so connected. He had good quantity of information on the RICHARDSON's. There was an operation at that time going called the Collection Plan and the thrust and basis of that was, was to identify organised crime in London especially in relation to drugs. Det Sgt Uh hum. POULTON Bleed them dry financially by intercepting their drugs shipments and then effectively make them bankrupt and then arrest them I believe for conspiracy. So he was able to give a lot of information on the RICHARDSON's and the RICHARDSON's weren't significant at that time in as much that they were heavily involved in organised crime, but they were a magnet for up and coming and other criminals who saw them as sort of like mini sort of godfathers 'cause of their reputation, Frankie FRASER and people like that. So in the course of debriefing GRAY he said, I forget which tape it was… Det Sgt Yeah tomorrow we'll give you your statements… POULTON Yeah. Det Sgt And we'll be able to go through them all. POULTON But he actually said, well one he identify, he didn't identify but he made us aware of an officer he thought was a Detective Chief Inspector who mixed with CRITTENDEN and was corrupt and he had actually been at a dog track when this guy was present and he was like all this, he said he was high up, he thought he was a DCI. He said 'cause he had his millions with him and all sort of jumping around and putting bets. CRITTENDEN was giving him the betting money. He was then giving it to his DC's, DS's and they were running off and putting these bets on allegedly and then he went on and he also named Ray ADAMS, Commander Ray ADAMS who then was head of, what was then C11 and he said that he was corrupt and then when he had been on the Regional Crime Squad they'd had a plan to do a bank robbery in the Purley, Coulsdon area and it was all mapped up, there was obviously an informant in on it and they'd been disrupted before the robbery took place and it was then dealt with a conspiracy to steal scrap metal, but in actually fact it was a robbery that had been planned and he then went onto say that ADAMS was corrupt and he knew he was corrupt and things like that. So I was left with these tapes and I was (INAUDIBLE) between because I had, although I was seconded to Tottenham Court Road I was also, Bernie DAVIES I think was the Detective Chief Superintendent and I had to go and see him and I had to say in the course of debriefing this informant he's named two senior police officers. One I know the name of and I know of and one I can't identify and what's he saying, what's he saying. Det Sgt Yeah. POULTON And I said we were just sort of talking about police corruption so he said and this was, this was most unusual but he was a type of old Detective Chief Superintendent who never left his office without his jacket and his tie done up and he actually flew out of that desk, down to the holding cell where this guy was and sort of really uncomfortable looking, tell me, tell me, 'cause he listened to part of the tape and he interrupted me.