Martin Brunt, long serving crime correspondent with Sky News, is “still a hack at heart”.
That was his metier as he told a Journalists’ Charity lunch at Edgbaston Golf Club in Birmingham how tricky it was to convert from newspapers to the world of television.
You faced “much more scrutiny”. Only a moment away from looking stupid.
Especially if, told by the bosses you appeared scruffy on air, somehow you “never got the grooming bit,” he joked.
That never mattered if you were good enough to break angles on appalling cases such as Fred and Rosemary West, the killing of Jill Dando, the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, the Soham murders … Martin covered them all in a career spanning 35 years.
Plus the police tip-off of a plot to kidnap Linda, the wife of Paul McCartney.
Virtually no security at the couple’s farm, parked up, knocked on the door and the great man opened up – literally!
Couldn’t stop him talking despite his denials.
Yet in an era before mobiles, the “splash” was not in the bag. Still the need to find a working phone box. Which meant negotiating with whoever was inside, a challenge in itself.
“But even McCartney’s PR agreed it was true … phew!”
Martin revealed how one of the perks of the job was to try and track down bad guys overseas. “British villains go to places I like to stay too – hot sun and cold beer.”
Yet all too often for them it ended up a struggle to eat, always looking over their shoulder, “trapped in paradise”.
And he jested how you should never be too keen to turn up the likes of Lord Lucan … because it meant jaunts to “exotic spots” like Cape Town, Macao and Hong Kong so long as the hunt continued!
Nevertheless, there was no such thing as a victimless crime, evinced by the £14 million Hatton Garden gems robbery of 2015 even though it was portrayed as a pensioners’ heist of the filthy rich. Actually, it hit a load of small time craft jewellers who couldn’t afford insurance. Journalists should be careful not to glamorise.
An insight too into on-going unsolved cases such as Madeleine McCann, and so-called suspect Christian Brückner.
There was no forensic evidence and he was not convinced that Bruckner was the ‘killer’.
As to baby murderer Lucy Letby, reporter friends who had attended the trials were “convinced she was guilty”.
Asked whether anyone had had a pop at him down the years, he said he had had two punches thrown – one connected and he managed to duck out of the way of the other. Now grey-haired and elderly, it deterred others from “taking a swing at me”.
Former PR and Journalists’ Charity supporter Lois Burley, who persuaded Martin to step into the hot seat, said: “It was quite a coup that we persuaded him to come to Birmingham. A wonderful, witty, self-deprecating speech.
“He is the doyen of crime correspondents and a legendary figure in the industry. His talk was both riveting and revealing.”
The event raised thousands of pounds for the Journalists’ Charity.
More pictures can be found on the West Midlands Facebook page HERE