Warfare at the shops


Looking back to 1962 and a spate of gangland violence in London


by Chris Pitt


members of the South London Betting Shop Federation.


I


premises were those of Danny Quastel Ltd, in Lower Road, Rotherhithe, Managing director Daniel Quastel, 41, told the Sporting Life that a few days before the fi re he had been visited by another bookmaker.


“He told me that the betting offi ce in another district of South London for which I was proposing to apply for a licence was ‘on his manor’,” said Quastel. “He advised me to withdraw my application and warned me that I would be foolish indeed to press the matter. “’I think you know what will happen to


you, Danny’, he said.” The burned-out premises had originally been opened as an S.P. offi ce by a member of the Quastel family in 1898. The fi re was spotted just after midnight by a police inspector passing the shop on his way home. “I was called from my home in Swiss Cottage at 1.00 a.m.,” said Quastel, “and it was apparent to me that intruders had forced an entry and had started the fi re in a corner of the shop near the door. “I have no doubt that the work was


done by hirelings of the bookmaker who visited me. This was his warning…his way of saying ‘Don’t trespass on my ground.’” Firemen fought the blaze for an hour and a half before bringing it under control. The extent of the damage was estimated to be in the region of £5,000. Quastel, who already had a dozen betting shops and was also a successful restaurateur, had applications for new shops pending in Clapham, Peckham, Southwark, Sydenham, Plumstead, Holborn, Chertsey and Lewes. The application in respect of Clapham was being opposed by 24 bookmaker-


26 July/August 2010 BOS Magazine


n July 1962, a betting shop was gutted by fi re, allegedly started by arsonists working for a rival bookmaker. The


He insisted that he intended to continue with his expansion programme. “I will not be intimidated by these vile threats by jealous, wicked individuals,” he said. “The bookmaker who called on me is not in any way connected with my application at Clapham. “Make no mistake about it, the man behind this Chicago-land gang is a rough customer,” he went on. “I mean to see that he is put behind bars for a long, long time.” Three months later, shortly after midnight on October 8, a gelignite bomb blasted the Major Collins betting shop in Percy Street, off Tottenham Court Road. The bomb was detonated with devastating effect, hurling a woman from her bed in a fl at upstairs. Within hours of the blast, an unexploded bomb was discovered at another Major Collins shop in nearby Greek Street. A female cleaner found it inside a polythene bag, wrapped in elastic bands. Believing it to contain “some bread rolls and smoked roe”, she placed the package on the manager’s desk, fi nished her cleaning and went home. When the manager arrived, he immediately recognised that it was gelignite. The package was quickly rendered


harmless by police and Home Offi ce offi cials. It contained about a pound of gelignite. Had it gone off, any passers-by would have been killed instantly. That afternoon, Moishe Cohen,


The boarded up Danny Quastel shop in Lower Road, Rotherhide


managing director of three-shop Major Collins Ltd, was still coming to terms with the devastation when he received a phone call. The caller said: “Sooner or later you’ll get it again,” then hung up. Visibly shaken, Cohen said he could offer no explanation as to the motive behind the attacks. He told the Sporting Life’s Gus Dalrymple that he was offering a £500 reward for information leading to the conviction of the person responsible. “As a life-long member of the


Bookmakers’ Protection Association, I am naturally hoping that they will put up a similar reward,” he said, adding that he had not been threatened by any protection racket gang, nor by any other bookmaker. Despite the explosion, Cohen insisted that it was “business as usual” at the Percy Street shop. Punters were diverted to a back room, and a pay-out window was quickly set up. Bookmaker Joe Coral arrived at the scene and inspected the damage from behind the wheel of his car. “Forty years ago bookmakers were threatened by racecourse gangs,” he told the Life’s reporter. “It was stamped out by the police and the BPA. This latest betting shop menace must be stamped out too.”■


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