Tangled Web UK Review September 2009
Hoods by
Carl Fellstrom
hbk out September 09
Published by Milo Books
at £16.99
Nottingham never had it so bad, as this study of organised crime in the city delineates. By 2002, shootings were occurring at a rate of one a week. Sinister cartels, Yardies and corrupt police officers left mayhem in their wake, as did territorial gangs.
This book isn’t just about the lawless, but about the innocents who got caught up in the all-too-common violence. John and Joan Stirland, for example, were a retired couple living a quiet life. But Joan’s son from a previous marriage had murdered a man who had powerful enemies, enemies who retaliated by shooting the couple to death.
Similarly, Tommy Lau was an intelligent young student who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. The twenty-three-year-old was newly married and coming to the end of his degree course when he visited a friend and was shot by an unknown gunman who fired at him through the window pane. It was a case of mistaken identity that left him paralysed from the waist down.
Kevin Musgrove was also a victim of circumstance. He rented a flat to an acquaintance who turned out to be a very successful drugs dealer. The police assumed that Kevin was part of the operation and he was charged alongside the dealer and sentenced to eight years in jail. He tried to clear his name in prison by asking questions about the real culprits and his wife put `Kevin is Innocent’ posters up in the locality. She was visited by hoods and severely beaten up alongside her teenage son. By the time that her husband was released, he was a broken and impoverished man: he surely deserves to feature in a Rough Justice style programme, assuming that these are still made in these celebrity-obsessed times.
(
Carol Anne Davis
Author of Children Who Kill)
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