Deep Cover by Shay Doyle with Scott Hasketh

Shay Doyle (not his real name) grew up on a rough housing estate in Manchester. He came from a family which was on the wrong side of the tracks - they weren’t criminals per se, but they weren’t strictly law-abiding either, and there was lots of fighting with other residents of the estate. His father was what might be called one of the estate’s “hard men”. He also physically abused Shay’s mother.

It was in part to escape his father that Shay joined the army. Here he was unruly, but dedicated, and quite the risk taker. He left the army and someone suggested he join the police. This he struggled with (most of his family and friends hated the police) but eventually did. Again, in the police, he was a risk taker and was never afraid to go toe to toe with criminals. This got the attention of the organised crime squad, who quickly recruited him (within just two or three years of joining the police, which is quite an achievement).

It was then suggested to Shay that he apply for Undercover Officer training, which he did. He got on the course and passed with flying colours. Soon, he became a Level 1 undercover operative. Level 2 operatives do buys of crack or heroin to build intelligence on street dealers, but level ones do long-term infiltrations. I’ve read a couple of biographies of Level 1 officers before, and most are only on assignment for a couple of months, and in between they’re in detective squads - such as CID. Shay appears to have been undercover for long periods of time and sent from one level 1 deployment to another, which makes him unique.

As someone so utilised, he was used against some major criminals, though most of his assignments seem to have been against wider criminal fraternities. So, for example, he worked undercover in the Moss Side in Manchester, building a picture of the criminal landscape there, and again later in Cambridge. What he never seems to have done is been deployed against a major criminal or crime family, such as the Adams crime family in London, or the Noonan crime family in Manchester. So, he never seems to have been deployed to infiltrate such an OCG and “bring them down”. This isn’t a criticism of Shay, or even the police. As a layperson, I don’t know. Perhaps that’s not how it’s done, or such an operation would be too risky. 

That said, some of his work (albeit not his undercover work so much, but his intermittent work in the organised crime unit) led him to take on Dale Cregan and the OCG he was part of, after Cregan murdered two police officers, and then later, to pursue Paul Massey’s killers.

Throughout the book, Shay Doyle talks of being a bit of a maverick who was not afraid to take on criminals. And he complains that his bosses often thought he was out of control. I’m in two minds what to make of that. As it’s his biography, it’s easy to take his side and assume his bosses didn’t - as Shay complains - understand what it took to be a successful Level 1 undercover operative. But equally, one could ask whether he did stray over the line occasionally. I have to stress. I’m not suggesting he did. I’m not making any accusation against the author. And certainly the police command seems to have had enough confidence in him to keep using him. But equally, as with any biography, this is a one sided account. Unfortunately, due to the operations he writes about being secret, we’re never likely to have a more neutral account written by a journalist (such as Michael Gillard’s book, Legacy, which looked at a Met police officer’s battle with a London based OCG), so all we have is Shay Doyle’s account, and obviously he tells things how he sees them.

This is a very good and very revealing account of undercover policing in the UK. I’m sure it’s been vetted by the police prior to publication and there are operational details he can’t divulge, and it will have inevitable limitations because of that, but it’s well worth a read.