FAWLTY POWERS
Torquay Cops Fail Vulnerable Man 'Abducted By Cocaine Gang'
The family of a man who went missing in mysterious circumstances exactly one year ago are turning to lie detector experts to determine if he was murdered or took his own life.
Richard Locker, 54, was last seen in the early hours of 5 January 2024 trying to get into Torquay police station in Devon.
He had spent months telling family and friends that he was being followed and wanted to spill the beans on a local cocaine trafficker.
Locker’s mental health had been in free fall ever since he received a visit in the dead of night from local cops claiming they were investigating an unrelated crime.
The visit made him paranoid, frightened for his life and feeling he was going to prison.
Local mental health services refused to section him when he was brought there by a school friend weeks before he disappeared.
When he vanished, failures by Devon & Cornwall police to seize CCTV, follow up leads about the Mr Big and examine Locker’s phone led his long-term partner to enlist the services of a private investigator.
A complaint has also been made to the police watchdog claiming the force’s response was “tardy, half hearted and lacking in any visible competence and expertise.”
The private investigator, a retired Met detective, has been looking into whether Locker, variously described as “simple, kind and vulnerable”, has been abducted and murdered by gangsters whose operation he was intent on exposing to the police.
Last week, on the first anniversary of the disappearance, Devon & Cornwall police made a renewed appeal for information.
However, the press release has infuriated family members further who say it is a “fabrication” to now claim the police did all it could and kept them informed.
They say the current action is to mask past inaction after the family went to the local media.
Locker’s body has not been found by fisherman or dog walkers around the coastal town where he grew up.
The inside story of the events leading to him going missing are revealed here and raise questions about the quality of the response of the police and mental health services.
The Upsetter approached the man who Locker claimed was the Mr Big behind the cocaine ring. He said the allegation was “hilarious” and believed Locker had taken his own life.
Was the missing man’s psychosis triggered by a poorly executed police visit in the middle of the night?
Would Locker still be alive if mental health services had properly engaged with him?
Were the police too quick to write off his disappearance as a suicide? Or had he fallen foul of a cocaine connection in Devon?
The disappearance of Richard Locker has left some family members feeling they could be next and suspecting those close to the missing man know more than they are letting on.
