Twenty Years of Crime

Along London's Fleet Street, Sunday People Reporter Duncan Webb, 37, is sometimes called the "greatest crime reporter of our time." In almost 20 years of covering crime he has been slugged, kicked, lunged at with knives, shot at, knuckle-dusted and was once the target of a speeding automobile that raced onto the sidewalk of a narrow Soho street and tried to smash him against a building. Last week Webb was still wearing a plaster cast on his right wrist, broken two months ago when a London gangster known as "Jack Spot" objected to one of his stories by attacking Webb in a back alley of the city.

Arrest These Men. The People, a big (circ. 5,167,445) and sensational newspaper, appreciates Webb's talents. Under the headline WEBB ATTACKED IN LONDON BY TWO MEN IN TAXI, the paper once reported: "Readers are assured that despite the attack upon him, our investigator Duncan Webb will not be intimidated. His inquiries are continuing." One of his inquiries four years ago broke up a vice ring run by the Messina brothers, who had bossed London's pimps and prostitutes for 17 years. After the Home Secretary admitted in Parliament that Scotland Yard had insufficient evidence to break up the ring, Webb hammered away at the brothers in Page One stories under such headlines as: ARREST THESE FOUR MEN. THEY ARE THE EMPERORS OF A VICE EMPIRE IN THE HEART OF LONDON. Webb doggedly traced their careers through France and Italy, turned over his information to Scotland Yard, including evidence that some of the brothers had falsified records to get British citizenship.

Largely as a result of his efforts, their citizenship was revoked, and the ring broken up.

In the case of John George Haigh, who murdered nine people and dissolved their bodies in acid (TIME, Aug. 1, 1949), Webb scored another kind of beat. Haigh had sold the bylined story of his crime for 5,000 pounds to The People's competitor. News of the World. Webb went after Haigh's girl friend, who had adamantly refused all offers to tell her story.

Webb dated her twice a week for two months, recalls: "I detested every minute of it." But he got her story--for nothing. Last fall he scored another clear triumph by persuading Gangster Billy Hill, undisputed boss of London's vast underworld, to let him ghost Hill's life story ("I am the gangster who runs the underworld"). Shortly after, Gangster Hill vanished from the sight of London police, who want to talk to him about a $100,000 gold robbery.

Subway Interviewer. London-born Reporter Webb was a successful crime reporter from the day he took his first job as a copy boy on Lord Beaverbrook's Evening Standard. On his way to work the first day he overheard a woman in the subway describe an attempted robbery in which she was the victim, interviewed her on the spot and got a story in the afternoon paper. He has since worked on dailies all over Britain, during World War II found time while serving in the merchant marine to write crime stories whenever he docked in England.

Webb looks back with professional wistfulness on the crime wave after the war when London had 20,000 military deserters living at the end of their guns. Although London's underworld has quieted down considerably since then, Webb has still uncovered more than enough material to satisfy The People and to fill three books (The Verdict Is Mine, Crime Is My Business and Deadline for Crime).

He has no fear of his underworld sources drying up. Explains Crime Reporter Webb: "I don't tell police what the villains tell me, and I don't tell the villains what the police tell me."

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