# Nicola Wall

DCI Andy Redwood, the man who has led Scotland Yard's hunt for missing Madeleine McCann is stepping down and retiring from the Met. He is will retire later this month (22-Dec-2014) and will hand over to DCI Nicola Wall from the Homicide and Major Crime Command. DCI Redwood →said: “After careful consideration and a full and rewarding career in the Met the time is right for me to move on. The past three and a half years leading Operation Grange has been an extraordinary privilege, and I leave the investigation in the very capable hands of my experienced colleague Nicola.“

Extract from →May 2013 Vogue: True Crime:

Another grey day, this time in central London, and the aftershocks of the Met’s corruption scandals and Operations Weeting and Elveden are still rippling the walls of the meeting room at Scotland Yard, where I find DCI Nicola Wall. Wall has served 25 years at the Met, eight as a DCI, and heads up the Murder Investigation Team in west London. She’s also a trained hostage and crisis negotiator. Married two years ago, her husband does contract work in the Middle East and she sees him sporadically. “We don’t have children,” she says briskly. “I’ve got the greatest respect for women who balance both – because that’s fantastic – but I don’t have to. And I’ve got a house in Putney, and I have a really nice life.”

For Wall, there is no typical murder. No two jobs are the same. “We could end up with the Tia Sharp jobs of this world,” she says of the 12-year-old whose body was discovered at her grandmother’s house last August. “And then there are jobs that are equally as difficult as those, but that just somehow don’t get that media spark.” She usually has about six or seven live cases at any one time, and prides herself on her investigative speed; she is only partially joking when she attributes her low media profile to the fact “we solve cases so quickly nobody gets involved…”

A diminutive peroxide blonde, with fine cheekbones and a faint Derbyshire accent, she cuts an unusual figure. “I’m a bit different,” she admits. “The jury nearly fell over last time I was in the box!” She’s glad that the current crop of TV detectives are not “as mumsy” as their forebears and has a small fondness for Saga Noren “because she’s quite feminine, very glamorous, very pretty and very capable, too.” As plainclothes officers, the detectives are united in their determination to look good. Wall especially enjoys playing with her femininity, if only to shake up the stuffier factions of the Met that still exist. “I usually wear a heel, and I always paint my nails,” she says with a toss of her well-groomed head. “They usually brighten a day.”

It's a pitiable truth that some stories don't have happy endings. Or resolution. How is it possible to protect oneself from scenes such as these? Surely everyone has to become a hard-nosed cop in the end? Wall answers it best. “I don't think you harden to anything like that. Not at all,” she explains. “After every case, you have to self-reflect. I always think about the person that's lost their life, because that's really who we work for, somebody who's been killed. They haven't got a voice any more. It's dreadful and you do get upset. And that doesn't diminish with time.” But you keep doing it: “Because you're doing something good. Because it is commitment. Everything you've got, and every skill you've got, and everything you can muster to do is a very good thing to do. And when we get people, justice is done, but we can't bring the person back.”

See articles:

1. →Nicola Wall, welcome to the party!
2. →Madeleine: Redwood moves over for “painted” lady
3. →How NOT to Commit Career Suicide
4. →May 2013 Vogue: True Crime
5. →Crime and criminal justice news Tags Nicola Wall
6. →The Guardian: Met police appeal for information over murder in Notting Hill