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378 INTO THE THATCHER ERA
element, code-named 'Project Sambo', was efforts to track the
low-frequency radio transmissions of submarines when they
rose closer to the surface to communicate with their headquarters
in Moscow or with supply ships. This was an integrated
UKUSA effort, with NSA running twenty-one listening stations
and the allies running a further eight. 34 Prime revealed this
super-secret programme.
Prime was not caught as a result of his spying, but because
of his criminal paedophile activities. He had a long history of
making obscene phone calls, and during 1981 he became more
dangerous, and began to indulge his desire to perform sexual
acts in front of young girls, carrying out attacks on two occasions
and escaping undiscovered. However, later in the year he
attacked a third girl, a fourteen-year-old gymnast, in her own
home. When the girl screamed, Prime was frightened and ran
off. He fled the scene in his car, which he had parked in a lane
near a farm. One of the nearby farm workers knew a lot about
cars, and was able to give a detailed description of the vehicle
to the police, stating with certainty that it was an'S' reg brown
two-tone Mark IV Ford Cortina. Although there were 426 's'
reg Cortinas in the immediate surrounding area, only a dozen
were coloured 'Roman Bronze'.
The next day Geoffrey Prime opened the front door of his
home to two detectives from Hereford CID. Detective Sergeant
Wilkes and Detective Constable Miriam Rhodes asked him about
the two-tone 'S' reg Cortina parked in the drive outside. Wilkes
noticed that Prime bore an uncanny resemblance to the identikit
photo of the suspect, and was wearing the same style of
checked shirt. Prime must have realised that he was a prominent
suspect, and became very agitated when Wilkes asked him
for his fingerprints. Although he was not yet arrested, Prime
knew it was only a matter of time. That evening, he took his
wife Rhona out to Cleeve Hill, a local beauty spot, and after a
heavy silence blurted out, 'It's me they want.' He then told her
the truth about his sexual activities. Only that evening, over a
glass of brandy, did he finally confess that he had also been a