Two cases, months apart, brought home to Charlie Hedges just how much police were failing when a person was reported missing. The first landed on his desk in October 1997 with a note from his inspector: “Can you sort this out please, Charlie?”
At the time, Hedges was a sergeant with Thames Valley police in Bletchley. The case involved a 19-year-old man – Hedges calls him Rob, which is not his real name – who had attended a rave in Milton Keynes and failed to return to the guesthouse where he was staying. As Hedges sorted through the scant paperwork, he could see that the police response had been “a bloody mess”.
