by Kevin Gordon
I knew a bent cop once. His name was Derek Ridgewell who was a British Transport Police (BTP) Detective Sergeant. He seemed to have a haughty arrogance about him and certainly looked down on me, a mere uniform PC. Ridgewell was the head of the ‘Dip Squad’ responsible for arresting travelling pickpockets, particularly on the underground. The team had a good record but this was partially down to Ridgewell framing innocent black people. When his actions received the attention of the media, particularly after he arrested two black trainee Jesuit priests, he was moved to the ‘Mailbag Squad’ and later to Bricklayers Arms Goods Depot. At this post, he turned his M.O. to straightforward theft and, when eventually arrested, had over a million pounds in several bank accounts (the equivalent of about £20 million today). He received seven years imprisonment and died aged 37 at Ford Open Prison in Sussex in 1982.
I heard of some more bent cops when I visited the Police Cells Museum in Brighton a few years ago. I was intrigued when I was told that the case involved some ‘bent railway police’. I decided to find out the facts and found that the information given was far from correct.
The story starts early in August 1957 when dozens of crates of cigarettes to the value of £15,000 (about £350,000 today) were stolen from a railway warehouse at Bishopsgate Goods Depot in east London.
Within two days, the cigarettes found their way down to Brighton where some were being fenced by a greengrocer, Ernest Waite. During the War he ran an illegal business selling black-market meat. He was never convicted however as one of his customers was the Brighton Police Chief Constable!
One of the tobacconists Waite contacted to buy the stolen cigarettes, was honest enough to write a letter to the Superintendent of the Brighton Police. The superintendent forwarded the message to his own CID office but also sent a message to Superintendent Edwin Moody of the British Transport Commission Police in London. Moody sent two of his officers down to Brighton to liaise with the local CID. The railway officers were D/Inspector Leonard Wright and D/Constable Bill Cook both stationed at Bishopsgate where the crime had been committed. The two detectives however became suspicious when local officers seemed reluctant to assist them. They kept a watch on Waite’s premises and observed the stolen cigarettes being taken by Waite to a tobacconist and as a result applied for search warrants for Waites premises. When the Railway Police CID raided the shop they were accompanied by D/Sgt Trevor Heath of the Brighton CID. Waite knew D/Sgt Heath and his boss D/Insp John Hammersley very well. During the war both detectives had also regularly visited his premises and were given about £250 worth of free meat in order not to be investigated. (About £10,000 today). Whilst the railway police were searching his premises Waite was told by D/Sgt Heath how to react and what to say. Waite’s story was that he was not the thief and had not realised the cigarettes were stolen.
Waite had been previously been arrested for handling stolen coffee but the Brighton CID had given him a false alibi to get him off the charge. He was later to tell the court that he had an ‘arrangement’ with D/Insp Hammersley and D/Sgt Heath who also wanted a cut of the proceeds of the sale of stolen goods in return for immunity from investigation.
Detective Sergeant Trevor Ernest Heath was born in 1922 and lived in Bramble Rise, Withdean. Detective Inspector John Richard Hammersley was born in 1917 in Eastbourne and had joined the Brighton Police in 1937 and after serving in the Royal Military Police during the war rejoined the force as a detective. He lived in Glen Rise, Withdean.
The railway police detectives returned to London and told Superintendent Moody of their suspicions and, as a result, he travelled down to Brighton himself on 14th August. He was frustrated when he met D/Insp Hammersley who told him that they knew who the thieves were but refused to give him any details. He was also told that the bulk of the stolen cigarettes were still in London but again the Brighton CID refused to give him any details. He later told the court that in his 35 years of being a detective, he had never before encountered such behaviour by fellow police officers. He then sent two detectives, D/Sgt George Spiers and D/Con Albert Spring (stationed at Broad Street) to Brighton to make their own enquiries but with strict instructions not to tell the local police what they were doing. As a result of their enquiries, search warrants were obtained and raids were made on premises in New England Road and Preston Road, Brighton and the bulk of the stolen cigarettes were recovered.
Superintendent Moody was now convinced that the Brighton CID were corrupt, and trusting no-one, he took his complaint directly to the HM Inspector of Constabulary Sir William Johnson who in turn appointed Commander George Hatherill, the Head of the Metropolitan Police CID to investigate the Brighton Police.
Detectives from Scotland Yard found that corruption appeared to be centred around three men – D/Insp Hammersley, D/Sgt Heath and the Chief Constable Charles Ridge.
Charles Feild Williams Ridge had been Chief Constable of the Brighton Police for just over a year. He was born in Portmadoc, Wales on 7th May 1899 and after serving in the Royal Army Medical Corps in the Great War joined the Burnley Police in Lancashire as a constable in 1924, transferring to Brighton a year later. He had steadily made his way up the ranks becoming a Detective-Sergeant in 1935 and Detective-Inspector in 1948. He was made Detective Superintendent and the boss of all Brighton’s CID in 1950 and became Deputy Chief Constable in 1954. He lived in Bavant Road, Brighton.
The Chief Constable, D/Insp Hammersley and D/Sgt Heath were arrested by Detective Superintendent Forbes-Heath of Scotland Yard on 25th October 1957. The charge was ‘Conspiracy to Defeat the Cause of Justice”. On arrest Ridge said “I would like to say this is absolutely preposterous” Hammersley said “Sir, I deny the allegations”.
Also arrested were publican Anthony Lyons and petty criminal Samuel Bellson said to be the ‘go-between’s for the corrupt officers and Brighton’s criminal underworld.
Underworld go-between Samuel Bellson
Later there were remarkable scenes at Brighton Town Hall where the men who had been arrested earlier in the day, appeared at Court. Over 500 people including the press blocked the streets in an effort to get a glimpse of the accused. The three police officers stood in the dock with two civilian suspects. The Chief Constable was described as ‘haggard and careworn’. An application was made for bail but D/Supt Forbes-Leath said that an important witness and her children had been directly threatened and bail was denied. Lyons and Bellson were trundled off to Lewes in a prison van whilst the arrested officers were allowed to have lunch in the police canteen and were later taken to Lewes Prison in a police car.
The case made headlines across the country. It should be remembered that a few years previously the hugely popular film ‘Brighton Rock’ based on Graham Greene’s novel had exposed the seedier side of the Sussex resort to a world-wide audience.
The Brighton Watch Committee suspended the Chief Constable and Deputy Chief Constable T.R. Hill took over the force until Albert Rowell, the Chief Constable of the Exeter Police was temporary appointed. He had joined the Exeter Police a Constable in 1919 and worked his way up to Chief Constable by 1944. He had been awarded the Military Medal during the Great War. Rumours that the Metropolitan Police had ‘taken over ‘ the Brighton Police Force had to be denied in the press.
The suspects again met in the dock at Brighton Magistrates on 25th November. All pleaded Not Guilty. During the next ten days, sixty-four witnesses were called but the suspects said little. Chief Constable Ridge maintained that the evidence was ‘flimsy, uncorroborated and made by vindictive gaolbirds.’ D/Insp Hammersley said that he had been given no opportunity to explain the allegations and D/Sgt Heath said nothing. All reserved their defence until the trial. A request was made for the trial to be held at the Sussex Assizes in Lewes but the Magistrates rules that the case should be held at the Old Bailey in London.
The trial opened on 3rd February 1959 and was clearly of interest as it again made headline news across the country and people started queuing six hours before the trial to get seats in the public gallery. The defence was led by Geoffrey Lawrence QC who was well known to people in Sussex as, in the previous year, he had successfully represented Doctor John Bodkin Adams from charges of murdering many old ladies in Eastbourne.
Ridge (left) with his lawyer. (Source: Kevin Gordon collection)
An attempt to nullify the trial was rejected and evidence began to be given by many witnesses, although many of them were clearly crooks themselves. One of them was the previous owner of the Astor Club in the basement of the Astor Hotel. The licensee, a sharp-suited Alan Brown (alias Bennett) told the Court that he paid the Brighton Chief Constable £20 a week in order to serve drinks after hours. He also alleged that he had paid D/Sgt Heath on two occasions to be dropped from investigations that were being made by other police forces. He also said that Heath had sold him a ring for £70 which he had suspected had been stolen. Another witness, a Mrs Cherryman told the court that she worked at the Astor Club and was worried about sharp practices there. She went to the Police Station and asked to speak to the Chief Constable as ‘she did not trust the Brighton CID’. Chief Constable Ridge told her that the police would investigate. When she got back to the club she received a telephone call for her boss from ‘Charlie’ who she believed was the Chief Constable she had only just spoken to!!. Needless to say the club was raided by the police that night but no offences were disclosed.
Alan Brown (alias Bennett)
Brown told the court that he paid the Chief Constable £20 to keep the club immune from investigation. Chief Constable Ridge visited the club in person and he handed the money over however when he was away on holiday in Spain, D/Sgt Heath collected the money. He said that he had the ‘freedom of the city’ and despite the law, could open and close his club when he wanted. Brown looked smart in a ‘new pin-stripe suite, spotless white shirt and dark tie’ He admitted that he had been in “quite a bit of trouble” but had “not been convicted of any crime since 1949”. (Although that comment appears to show that he may have been committing crime but had not been caught!)
The next witness was a Mrs Mason who had taken over the Astor Bar from Brown who had told her about the ‘arrangements’ he had with the local police. When she refused to hand over any money her club was raided and closed down by the police.
Other witness included two women who performed illegal ‘back-street’ abortions in Brighton. One of them told the court that D/Sgt Heath had told her that it would cost £100 (About £2,300 today) for the police to take a blind eye. She had been paying Heath £5 a week to carry on her illegal business. When she failed to keep up with the instalments she had been arrested and had received 15 month’s imprisonment.
The Court were told that D/Insp Hammersley was not only good friends with one notorious Brighton criminal but had even gone away on holidays with him!
It was clear that most of the evidence against the officers had been by criminals however the next person certainly was not. Detective Constable Knight told the Court that when he joined the Brighton CID, D/Insp Hammersley and D/Sgt Heath had offered him £10 a week to assist with their scheme of taking bribes from publicans. He told the court that he was an honest police officer and had refused. He had been told that his two senior officers ‘had plenty of fiddles’. Detectives from the Dorset and Kent police also gave evidence that the Brighton CID had thwarted their enquiries in much the same way as they did with the Transport Police investigation.
In respect of Bellson the court heard how he was a ‘go-between’ between Brighton thieves and the Brighton CID. Petty Criminal John Leach, a local fish merchant told the Court that he was visited by the two detectives in the dock when he had fenced some stolen jewellery. He had told them that the thief was Micky Roberts and the officers had taken a statement to that effect. He was later visited by Bellson who told him that would cost him £250 for the evidence to be ‘thrown into the sea’. Leach’s father had only paid £100 of the bribe so he had been arrested. (however the case was dismissed at court). He said that the negotiations for the arrangement had been made by a fellow licensee Anthony Lyons.
In defence the Chief Constable absolutely denied any wrong doing. He denied accepting bribes and even knowing many of the people who gave evidence against him. He said he was not party to anything done by Hammersley and Heath.
The defence for the detectives told the court that Brighton was ‘a small but crook-infested area where plain-clothes police officers carry on a ceaseless war against criminals and could not always follow the Queensbury Rules. ‘
(Source: Kevin Gordon Collection)
In summing up Mr Justice Donovan ended trial on Friday 28th February 1958 by saying “The ordinary criminal is problem enough for society but, if those who are paid to protect us against them instead join forces with them, then a much more deadly enemy appears on the scene.”
Chief Constable Ridge and Lyons were acquitted. Hammersley and Heath were sentenced to Five Years Imprisonment each. However in sentencing them said words that were to end the career of Ridge. He told the convicted officers that they would have got longer sentences however “It has been made clear that the professional and moral leadership which you were entitled to receive from your Chief Constable was lacking.”
The judge praised several Brighton Police Officers who had ‘courageously come forward’ to give evidence against their senior officers’, to The Metropolitan Police for their efficiency and integrity and also to Superintendent Moody and other British Transport Commission Police for instigating the investigation and ‘defeating the discreditable obstructions counted at the hands of the Brighton C.I.D.’
Despite the evidence that had been given against him in court and his obvious lack of supervision, it is clear that shamed Chief Constable Ridge thought he should get his job back and wrote to the Watch Committee to ask when he would be reinstated. The Watch Committee met on 7th March 1958 and issued a statement. ‘It has been decided that Mr Charles Feild Williams Ridge has been negligent in the discharge of his duty and is unfit for office. We hereby dismiss him from his office as the Chief Constable of the Brighton Police forthwith’ The Watch Committee refused to provide him with his police pension however paid him the contributions he would have made throughout his service.
The disgraced Charles Ridge returned to Wales where he died in 1978. John Hammersley died in Brighton in 1996. Trevor Heath died in Devon in 2006.
This item was written using contemporary newspapers reports and an item in the 1958 British Transport Commission Police Journal. I have since discovered that Dick Kirby has written a book about this matter ‘The Brighton Police Scandal’ which gives a much more comprehensive account of the matter.
Unless stated, all photographs accessed from the National Newspaper Archives.
Note that the spelling of Ridge’s middle name is correct ‘Feild’ not ‘Field’.
Originally published on the blog: Sussex History by Kevin Gordon
Reproduced with permission of the author.
Kevin Gordon is a BTP History Writer