When I was seventeen, I was charged with wasting police time. In my opinion, the charge should have been reversed. As you will soon see, I was acting in favour of the local community. Now, of course, I have a criminal record—an indelible slur on an otherwise unblemished character. This ridiculous accusation was made after I had conducted surveillance at the gates of my local boy’s school.

Over a period of three days, as the pupils are leaving school, I have observed a strange character loitering by the gates of St Anthony’s C of E High School for Boys. I am confident he is not a parent, but he does seem to have a very unhealthy interest in the boys. In my opinion, this man may be a danger to the scholars of St Anthony’s and I would recommend that the man is apprehended for questioning immediately.

The man has a big red, warty, fat face, and a scar above his right eyebrow. He has bulging, angry blue twitchy eyes that seem to dart around the boys as if he were choosing a target.

His grotesque staring eyes were topped off by long scruffy eyebrows that added to his unkempt demeanour. Left incisor is chipped, teeth nicotine stained. 

He wears a dark blue tie with diagonal red stripes. The tie is shiny, clearly never cleaned or untied before bed and stained around its point. The second button is missing from his un-ironed shirt, the cuffs are frayed in places, no wedding ring, probably not married. He licks his lips repeatedly, and I detected dried spittle in the corners of his toad-like gaping mouth.

He was wearing light brown old leather brogues curled at the toes due to constant repairs at the cobblers and probably driving a manual car. He clearly suffers ugly bunions and corns too. The heel of his left shoe is worn down more than the right, accentuating his limp. 

The leather patches on the elbows of his jacket are not appropriately aligned, and the stitching is coming loose on the left patch. His greasy grey hair is combed over left to right to conceal a shiny crimson-red bald patch.

When he wasn’t feverishly wiping his sweaty forehead with a dirty grey handkerchief, he stood with his hands plunged in his trouser pockets. Occasionally he’d lift the pocket linings upwards inside his trousers, seemingly juggling something in his pockets. There is no doubt in my mind he was, in fact, playing with his genitals.

The pockets of his tatty tweed jacket are stuffed with what looked like his entire belongings. On passing, I noticed he stank of cigarettes, stale alcohol and wet dog. Judging by the animal hairs on his ill-fitting trousers, the dog is probably a golden retriever.

Many of the children ignored the man, but a few were stopped by him and appeared to be disturbed by his unsolicited attention.

I would strongly recommend immediate action on your behalf.

Naturally, many questions were asked, and the police did thoroughly investigate the matter. However, it turned out the man I’d seen loitering by the school gates was, in fact, the headmaster of St Anthony’s. He had wanted me charged with Defamation of Character. In the end, he was pacified by me receiving a caution and the charge of wasting police time.

My interest in crime started when I was quite young, shortly after my father had bought me a telescope as a birthday gift. My fascination with the solar system was soon overtaken by the goings-on in our neighbours’ houses.
The sexual antics were interesting for a while. There was the boy who smoked weed leaning out of his bedroom window, and the couple who hosted Satanic rituals every Saturday night. We moved to a house overlooking the park when I was eighteen.

Now I occupy the loft, my own self-contained surveillance hub. I’ve got all kinds of gadgets here—night vision cameras, three powerful telescopes. I’ve got a video camera permanently aimed at the bandstand in the park.

I’ve been recording three boys every night who hang out at the bandstand. They drink gallons of beer, then they inhale silver tubes of laughing gas and vast quantities of marijuana. I haven’t witnessed them shooting up yet, but it’s only a matter of time. I’ve sent the footage to the police.

I use social media for important news. I have thousands of loyal followers. Some responses are negative, but I’m sure they are written by the guilty. My newsletter is popular too. There’s a printed version I deliver locally and also an online version. My newsletter is called On The Chase. I came up with that name myself. Well, I thought it was appropriate, I do live in Wimbledon Chase, and I’m always chasing a juicy story.

It’s quite amusing the number of times our house is visited by the police. People get the wrong idea. They see me pointing my equipment at them late at night and assume I’m a pervert. It was two gay guys who reported me recently. Now let’s get this out of the way, I don’t have a problem with gay sex, a couple of guys from school were gay, no big deal.

The guys who reported me live in the house that backs on to mine, separated by our gardens. They often have sex parties at the weekend. Their spare room is kitted out like a medieval torture chamber. My concern was the bondage, it looked quite violent to me. I was genuinely worried recently when one guy was left overnight chained to a cross with no food or drink. So I sent the footage to the police.

All hell broke loose the next day, I was treated like a serial killer. Five policemen came to arrest me. There was a whole A4 sheet of complaints about me. Of course, I protested. I said, ‘Surely my position as President of the Wimbledon Chase Neighbourhood Watch Scheme accounts for something?’ The detective questioning me said, ‘Well, the problem is Mark, as far as we can tell, you are the only member of the scheme. So, you’ve got no defence mate.’

The police confiscated all my video recordings. Most of which granted were of people having sex. A six month suspended sentence for harassment, filming without consent and possession of violent, pornographic material was the verdict. Please note the gay guys got off scot-free. S&M is not a crime providing all parties are of legal age and consensual. I have to see a psychologist too. I like Liz, she understands me better than anyone I’ve met. We’re really good friends.

Sessions started with The Rorschach Test. You know the inkblots that are supposed to look like the Virgin Mary cradling Jesus? The first one she showed me looked like two men standing back-to-back being given a blowjob by someone kneeling at their feet. Liz’s expression was enough to confirm I was right. She set the offending blowjob inkblot to one side. I would like to have kept it, but I didn’t like to ask.

There is an irony to this story.

After applying for a job vacancy, with Liz as my mentor, I now work in traffic monitoring for the Greater London Police. It’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I get to work with more gadgets than any geek could dream of, and I get paid for it too. Apart from the telescope dad bought me and my laptop, I sold all my other gear on eBay.
After years of feeling isolated from society for once, I feel really happy.