24 September 2050
Report
by Severiano Delgado
Detective, La Manga Police Service
Subject: incident 30-08-2050, 24 Camino del Ancla, La Manga
At 8.30pm I was on patrol in car 9 with Officer P. Martinez. We received a call from the control centre asking us to attend an incident in Camino del Ancla. SRA Garcia who lives there had reported that she was concerned about one of her neighbours, Mr Harry Tresham. Mr Tresham lived opposite SRA Garcia. We arrived at the house of SRA Garcia at 8.45pm. She outlined the reasons she had made the call. She did not know Mr Tresham very well but she did sometimes talk to him and she was familiar with his habits. She had become concerned when she had not seen Mr Tresham for a couple of days and there appeared to be no sigh of life at the house. Mr Tresham, according to SRA Garcia, was usually quite predictable in his movements. I asked SRA Garcia when was the last time she had seen Mr Tresham. She said about three days ago. She had been sitting in her garden at about 11.30pm when she saw Mr Tresham arrive on foot at his house. The house is about 100 metres away. She was certain it was Mr Tresham. He had looked over and waved to her. She thought he seemed a bit intoxicated, which he often was. SRA Garcia said that Mr Tresham regularly arrived home drunk late at night. He usually drank at the PInk Flamingo. SRA Garcia’s niece worked at the Pink Flamingo as a bar maid. Mr Tresham went inside. I asked SRA Garcia if this was the last time she had seen Mr Tresham and she said that she had seen Mr Tresham later on that evening. She had been sitting in her garden drinking iced tea when around 12.30am she thought she heard a sound that she thought was being made by an animal. It sounded like a cat mewing quite loudly, as if in distress. The sound appeared to be coming from near Mr Tresham’s house. About ten minutes later Mr Tresham came out of the house and looked around the garden. He appeared to be looking for something in the garden.
SRA Garcia thought that whatever it was he was looking for he found because he knelt down and she heard Mr Tresham talking. After a couple of minutes he went back into the house. He reappeared carrying a small bowl. SRA Garcia saw Mr Tresham put the bowl down on the ground. At that point SRA Garcia went inside. She never saw Mr Tresham again. SRA Garcia usually saw Mr Tresham a couple of times a day, in the early afternoon and in the evening. She became concerned when not only did she not see Mr Tresham but there appeared to be no movement in the house. Eventually she rang the police station in La Manga to express her concern.
After talking to SRA Garcia we walked over to Mr Tresham’s house to investigate. Near the front door there was a small bowl on the ground which I assumed was the bowl referred to by SRA Garcia. The house was locked and the shutters were closed. We did not see anything of note and there was nothing suspicious. However, at this point something happened that made us decide that it was appropriate to make a forced entry. A young woman, later identified as Rosa Alonso, came up the path and spoke to us. She lived not far away and just happened to be walking past. She was Mr Tresham’s cleaner. She had been due to clean the house yesterday but not been able to get in. Her key had not worked. She had been a bit concerned about this and now was even more convinced that there was something wrong. We now had enough grounds to justify a forced entry to investigate further. We decided to effect an entry by the back door of the house. Using a small battering ram we pushed the door in and were able to gain access.
The house was in complete darkness when we entered. We put the lights on and began to look through the house room by room. The kitchen and bedrooms were empty. However, the scene was very different when we got to the living room. There were items strewn around and the scene was typical of a burglary. We also found the body of Mr Tresham. It looked like he had died sitting in a chair. He had obviously been dead for some time. We examined the body and noticed that Mr Tresham had scratch marks on his face. I thought at the time that these might indicate that Mr Tresham had been involved in a struggle. We had to assume that this was a crime scene so we took the appropriate actions, beginning by securing the scene.
I tried to build up a picture of the last couple of days of Mr Tresham’s life. I took a statement from SRA Garcia and also interviewed staff at the Pink Flamingo where Mr Tresham regularly drank. I took a statement from David Hunt the barman who regularly served Mr Tresham. I asked him to outline Mr Tresham’s habits and if he had noticed any recent incidents involving Mr Tresham, particularly if anyone had argued with him or threatened him.
Appendix 1
Statement by David Hunt (transcription from taped interview)
Sure I knew Harry, that’s Mr Tresham, quite well. Everybody knew Harry. A real character. He was a regular in the Pink Flamingo. He would come in most evenings. He liked to have a few drinks, or more, and watch sports on TV. He was a very good customer. He usually drank Aztec Warriors, Margaritas and the occasional Orange Bill. He’d usually be by himself and if he wasn’t watching sports on TV he’d sit at the bar. Quite often he would drink quite a lot but he always seemed to be able to stagger home by himself. We get a lot of tourists and ex-Pats in here, so he would sometimes chat to those. Usually he wasn’t any trouble. We kept an eye on him. At times he would pester young girls and we had to get him to back off a bit. But in general he was OK. Once he was pestering a group of young English girls when their boyfriends arrived. We got him to back off otherwise it might have turned nasty. But stuff like that happens here all the time. Too much sun and tequila.
The only real incident I can think of happened maybe a couple of weeks ago. I started work at 8.00pm. At about 8.30 a group of young English lads came in. They were probably a stag party. Did you know that La Manga is now the number one destination for stag parties? The guys started into the Aztec Warriors and were joking around and playing pool. They had probably been drinking long before they got to the Pink Flamingo. So far no problem, just a normal night, no special problems of crowd control. Apart from the stag -do guys there were not many other people in. Harry came in around, let me think, 9.30pm. He took his usual seat at the bar and ordered an Aztec Warrior. We’ve got a jukebox in the Pink Flamingo and one of the guys put on Don’t She Know by the GM Men. Harry had quickly followed up his Aztec Warrior with a couple of Orange Bills and was starting to talk and sound a bit drunk.
At first everything was all right. Harry asked the guys where they were from and they said Warminster in Wiltshire, England. I think most of the guys were squaddies. They chatted for a while in a drunken kind of way. Then Harry said, “Hey, any of you guys remember Move Your Body, that great hit? Better than this stuff, this isn’t music.” One of them replied, “Better than this you’ve gotta be kiddin mate,” and they all started singing:
Move your Baddy
Baddy Baddy Baddy
Next thing they were all up doing the conga around the bar, singing:
Move it to the Left
Move it to the right
Move your Baddy
Move it All Night
Then they started doing a take-off of the little hamster star that used to sing the song. Remember him? One of them put on a little squeaky voice. Another one started pretending he was on one of those little wheels that hamsters have in their cages. It was all quite amusing really, but for some reason Harry didn’t like it. You could see it in his face. One of the guys said what was the other freak called and another one said Porky the Pig then they all started doing the conga singing: Porky the Pig goes oink oink oink
Oink oink oink
Oink oink oink
Oink oink oink
They then went back to singing Move your Baddy. Harry was getting a bit wound up. He said,
“Guys, that’s enough, have some respect.”
“Respect for what?” one of them said, “a couple of freaks?”
I could see that Harry was starting to get quite upset.
“A freak? Harry was a star! The biggest!”
Then the guys all started to sing Old Mac Donald had a farm, except the words were:
Old Mac Donald had a farm
e-i-e-i-oooo
And on that farm he had a…
(one of them chimed in with) HAMSTER
with ugh ugh here and a ugh ugh there
here an ugh
there an ugh
everywhere an ugh
and every time they said ugh they made hip thrusting movements. They were really enjoying themselves. Harry was just standing there looking at the conga guys. He looked kinda sad. Then he just walked over to the bar and sat down. He asked for another Orange Bill on ice. I said
“Harry, cheer up, it’s only kids messing around.”
“What do they know – nothing” he said, “there’s never been a star like Harry. Harry was the greatest ever.” There was a bit of banter between him and the stag do guys for the rest of the evening. The guys got into the Harry Says…thing and we had from Harry Says buy us a drink to Harry Says kiss my furry little ass and everything in between. I was going to be glad when this evening was over. We get stuff like that all the time but I felt kinda sorry for Harry. A bad atmosphere had developed, and I like a happy atmosphere. Harry was getting drunk and I could see that he was getting more and more, how shall I put it, morose.
The guys eventually decided to move on. On their way out they said something to Harry. I didn’t quite catch what it was. Harry just sat still for a minute then he swallowed the rest of his Orange Bill in one and went out after the guys. I could hear a heated exchange and then what sounded like the start of a scuffle. When I got to the door I could see Harry on the ground being kicked by four of the guys. When they saw me they ran off. I went over to help Harry. He didn’t look seriously hurt but he had taken a good kicking. Blood was oozing from his nose and mouth and he was lying kind of stiffly as if he was afraid to move. I asked him if he was ok and he said he was ok. He didn’t look ok as he was groaning with pain. I said I was going to ring the police but he said not to and not to get an ambulance either. He said if I could help him get home he would be ok. By now a few people had gathered around to help. We got him up and someone brought a chair from the bar and a glass of water. Another man came up and offered to take Harry home or take him to the hospital. He might have been seriously injured. He looked not too bad but then I’m not a doctor. You hear about people having head injuries, going home, going to sleep and not waking up. But Harry was clear he didn’t want to go to hospital. He just kept saying take me home and I’ll be all right.
Eventually I took Harry back to his place in my car. We got him into the front seat all right and he told us where to go. It took about five minutes to get to his house in Camino del Ancla. When we got to Harry’s house I helped him inside. We took him into the bedroom and set him down on the bed. I was a bit worried that Harry might have broken ribs or something but he kept saying he was ok. He asked me to get him a drink of water and stay until he had drunk it. He seemed ok as he sat up in bed and drank the water. I said I’d come back tomorrow to see how he was. He said not to bother as he’d be down at the Pink Flamingo again tomorrow night. Champions League semi-final, Hammers Real Madrid: wouldn’t miss it.
“Don’t worry,” he said “Harry always bounces back.” So I left him and went back to the bar. And he did turn up next day at the Pink Flamingo, just like he said he would. After that things seemed more or less as normal as far as Harry was concerned, at least as far as I could see.
End of statement.
The autopsy report confirmed that Mr Tresham had died of natural causes. He died of a heart attack. Apparently there was an underlying heart condition. The most likely chain of events leading to the death of Mr Tresham is as follows. He was suffering from an underlying heart condition, perhaps made worse by his unhealthy lifestyle. On the evening in question Mr Tresham had gone into the garden, perhaps to give some milk to a stray cat. While in the garden he had been taken ill and may have fallen into rose bushes just outside the front door. This would account for the scratches on his face. Mr Tresham had recovered and made it into the house where he had sat down in the living room. Soon afterwards he had died from a heart attack. The death of Mr Tresham is therefore no longer regarded as suspicious.
Mr Tresham appears to have had no living relatives. He was buried in Cartagena cemetery. There was one mourner at the funeral, his neighbour SRA Garcia.
House of Glass 