Bromley nick is, like Belgravia, a redbrick 1990’s build resembling an out-of-town Morrisons that was repurposed at the last moment and fitted with offices and a custody suite. A middle-aged PC from the local Case Progression Unit met me in the reception and walked me into the interview room where Aiden Burghley, wannabe suburban drug dealer, was waiting with his solicitor.

Aiden was a young white man, about my age, but smaller with a soft bland face, brown hair and watery blue eyes. He looked like he should be selling insurance or houses rather than drugs, but according to his nominal a sad second from Warwick University had landed him back in his parents’ semi in Bromley. No record of a job but he did own an ancient Vauxhall Vectra, so I could see he might be desperate enough to turn to crime.

You can understand the temptation – you pop over on the ferry to Holland, pick up some pills, drive around, visit a dope café, go clubbing, hop back on the ferry. It’s pills, so the dogs don’t smell them. You’re not buying in huge bulk, so your shipment’s not going to show up on police intelligence. Shit, you’re practically at personal use levels anyway, and the chances of a random search picking on you at customs are thousands to one, really hundreds of thousands to one.

Had Aiden Burghley been sensible enough to pop the pills himself or just share them with his friends he’d have been alright, but no – he had to try to flog them to a pair of surprised off-duty female police officers at Glitrrz, a club just off Bromley High Street. After weighing up whether an easy collar would be worth the stick they’d get for frequenting a notorious trouble spot, they went for the collar and now Aiden had spent a night in the cells and was looking at a long list of charges with words like ‘intent’ and ‘supply’ in the title.

He had an equally young and fresh-faced solicitor from the local Legal Aid specialist firm at his side. You always have to be careful around legal aid solicitors because not only do they spend more time in police interview rooms than you do, they’re also usually in a really bad mood because their clients are idiots and because the government is always cutting the legal aid budget. This one was a white woman with slate-grey eyes which she narrowed at me when I introduced myself.

One way or another Aiden was going up the steps. But, as a young white middle class first offender, if he pleaded guilty there was a good chance he’d walk away without a prison sentence. My strategy was simple – I threatened to add him to the suspect pool in the death of Christina Chorley.