A corrupt police officer is behind bars today for protecting an evil pimp in return for free sex with his prostitutes.
Beat bobby PC Graham Brown, 32, was locked up seven years after his double life was exposed.
On duty he patrolled the streets of Tyneside and appeared to colleagues to be a decent, hard-working policeman.
But he had a sordid dark side that lusted for sex with prostitutes and he satisfied his desires by providing sensitive information from Northumbria Police’s intelligence computer to pimp ‘Turbo’ Thomas Hay, 33.
In a two-month-long trial, Newcastle Crown Court heard how the officer who was based at Clifford Street station, Byker, in the city’s east end had a “morbid interest” in prostitutes.
On one occasion, Brown had a three-in-a-bed session then gave one of the women £20 to buy drugs.
He even slept with one at the home he shared with his girlfriend, a fellow PC in Kingston Park, Newcastle, without her knowledge.
Jeremy Goss QC, prosecuting, said the corrupt arrangement with Brown, who joined the police in 1992, and Hay started in 1999 and lasted until October 2002.
He said it effectively meant Brown was providing police protection for the pimp.
“Brown was a regular user of prostitutes and it was in this way he came into contact with, and became corruptly involved with, a man who ran brothels in the Newcastle area.
“That man was Thomas Hay, ‘Turbo Tommy’. Hay was a violent, vicious man engaged in a crude but lucrative business known as pimping.
“That corrupt relationship between Hay and Brown involved each doing the other a favour for reward or benefit,” he said.
In one shocking incident while on duty, Brown even ignored the screams of one young prostitute Hay was beating with a baseball bat in a house in Walker to avoid being exposed.
A 22-year-old woman, now living under police protection, said: “Brown would have known she was injured but it did not make any difference.
“I think the whole street would have known she was injured, she was screaming that loud and crying out and begging for him to stop.”
Mr Goss asked: “Did Graham Brown ever comment?”
The woman answered: “No. He knew we got beat. I have got scars on my body where I have been beaten off Tommy.”
Graham’s ex-fiancee was unknowingly pulled into his web of deceit when she thought the call to the baseball bat attack related to some youths in the street and innocently covered up for him.
He callously kept silent even when she was charged with corruption and misconduct. She was cleared of the charges.
The trial, which for legal reasons can only now be reported, heard how Brown resigned from the force before the case came to court, though his ex is still a serving officer.
The court heard how Brown abused his position to access the force computer and warn Hay of any investigation into his prostitution empire.
In a bid to get a lighter sentence, Hay decided to give evidence in the trial against Brown and revealed how the arrangement worked.
Hay explained: “If I wanted to know anything, I would just ring him or mention it the next time I saw him. He would tell me about what was on the computer about me or my associates.”
In February 2001, Brown provided information about a client who had mistreated one of Hay’s prostitutes in the Malmaison hotel on Newcastle’s Quayside.
After a phone call from Hay, Brown searched the police computer for information on the man that Hay was able to use to rack up a huge bill on the man’s credit card by calling sordid sex phone lines.
In September 2002, the policeman again accessed the police computer for information on a prostitute running a rival business.
Hay, who admitted rape and a string of other serious offences, had no idea who she was and was only able to make threatening calls to her mobile phone.
But Brown dipped into the computer and provided Hay with the woman’s name, address and home phone number, which Hay used to intimidate her.
Mr Goss said: “Not surprisingly, this scared her as he is the man who uttered these venomous threats and now she knew that this man had her name, her address, her telephone number.”
Brown, previously of good character and said to be a decent officer, admitted he used prostitutes but said he was threatened into providing information to Hay.
Brown was found guilty of two counts of corruption, misconduct in a public office between May 1999 and October 2002, misconduct in failing to fulfil his duty as a police officer and conspiracy to blackmail.
He was cleared of three further counts of corruption, aiding and abetting living off prostitution and aiding and abetting to pervert the course of justice.
Brown was finally brought down in a sting operation by colleagues who became suspicious at the number of times he accessed the police computer without adding any information to it.
They planted false information and, when he used it to inform Hay, he was secretly filmed and finally exposed.
Sentencing Brown, Judge John Milford said his ex partner was completely innocent, he added: “The jury was quick to clear her and I am satisfied that young woman was innocent of these charges.
“But it was your corruption which drew her into this and months of agonising worry and then another month’s trial which, I am satisfied, has done untold damage to her mental health.”
He also praised the police operation to prosecute Brown.
The judge said: “The police intelligence system, to retain public confidence, must remain sacrosanct, as must the integrity of the police.
“Northumbria Police did not hesitate to root you out and prosecute you with vigour.”
Vicious Pimp Who Made A Million
Vile Tommy Hay made at least £1million through his evil prostitution empire.
The shaven-headed Hartman, who craved to be Tyneside’s number one gangster, ensnared vulnerable young women, got them hooked on heroin and crack cocaine, before sending them to work in his brothels.
If they stepped out of line, Hay, who dressed in designer clothes and liked heavy gold jewellery, would brutally beat them.
But once he was caught up in a police investigation, Hay quickly turned Queen’s Evidence to reduce his sentence.
Hay also agreed to become a grass and give evidence against others after learning the weight of evidence against him, Roger Thorn QC said.
Six-footer Hay, the jury heard, cultivated a hardman image when running his vice ring. Then, he was almost five stones heavier, had a shaved head and loved the nickname ‘Turbo Tommy’.
He was tattooed with the names of the prostitutes he exploited, with ‘Turbo’ across his neck.
At his home in Gateshead, there were weapons including a samurai sword.
Mr Thorn said a threatening letter written to a prostitute from prison showed Hay to be a violent, evil man.
Mr Thorn told Hay: “The letter gives an insight into your real personality.
“It was your aim to be Newcastle’s villain number one, and you were in competition with others.”
Hay told the court his average earnings from prostitution were £500 to £1,000 a week.
But the jury heard during an 18-month period, Hay made 5,147 calls to his delivery man, Jimmy Wilson, of South Shields. Wilson admitted living off immoral earnings and would drive the prostitutes to meet punters.
Robin Patton QC said 15 to 20 girls worked for Hay, each paying him an average of £2,000 a week.
One girl enslaved into his sordid life, gave an insight into how he controlled his girls through violence.
She told how she witnessed Hay launch a hammer attack on a young prostitute – because she slightly damaged his TV remote control.
“Tommy chased her up the stairs. He was going to give her a beating. He picked up a hammer on the way and she was screaming blue murder. I could hear her shouting for him to stop but I could hear banging and loud thuds.
“Then the police knocked on the door. It was Graham Brown and there was another officer in the car.
“She was still screaming when I opened the door to talk to Brown. He said he wanted to talk to Tommy and said not to do it in the front bedroom as a neighbour had complained.
“He said he would just put it down as a malicious call and would tell Tommy who phoned the police. She was still screaming in pain when Brown was there but it didn’t make a difference as he turned a blind eye,” she said.
The girl told the court how Brown knew what had happened to the girls who worked for Hay and they regularly got a beating.