tr

More documents

Recommendations

Info

On the wall next to Denrpsey's portrait is a framed poemwhich Eileenwrote forhis funeral. The 6nal verse reads:'nVho knows whatwenton duringyour life's last ght? Butone thing's forsure we'llcontinue to fight. Your name won'tbe tarnished for long. Trust me son. we'll get to the filth and we'll seejustice done." It's clear, in hermind, that manyquestions remarn unanswered, notleastof them whether the unknown manshe claims was seen runningnear lhe scene of the incidentwas in any way connected to the events ofthat night. "There's something not right in his death," says Eileen, as she digs into her handbag and produces a cheapblue plastic wallet that was taken from Dempseyt body atthe morgue.Its contents are unremarkable: a video club membership;a laundry card; receipts fiom a May.fair club;three neatly folded (but inexplicably blood-stained) €20 notes and lotterytickets. As I inspectthe latter - 5,141218, 25,44 - Eileengoes through halfa dozen possible explarations as to whatcould have happened to Dempsey, some more plausible thanothers "I mean,look at these lotterynumbers," she says. "He put those on the nightbefore he died, yet people think he was maybe suicidal orgoingdaft or crackingup that weekend he died- Not a chance. He was the same as he always was," Eileen Dempsey's raft ling windows overlook a windswept communal garden in Glasgow's Maryhill district, to the north ofthe cit'r It's a tough area. Those that make it out are fighters, survivors. "David was very much a productofhis environment and upbringing," says one local pal, "buthe disreg€rded it. I don'tthink he saw himselfas beingworkingclass. He didn't put himselfin any particular category" Glasgow gives reputations out grudgingly. Nowhere on earth will you 6nd people harderto impress. Yet before David Dempseywas a successful chefhe'd already been 'tlocked" as someone to watch - albeit for the \,i,rong reasons. "David Dempseypulled agun - orwhatiooked like a gun - on me when he was about IT or l8," claims a doorman fiom a club in the city's centre. 'Yea$ later when I saw a TV programme about cooking, there was the same wee smilingface with cordonRamsay.I both couldn'tbutcould also wellbelieve it." THIS APPARENT CONTRADICTION MIGHT BE EXPLAII{ED BY THE PUBIIC'S CHANGING PERCEPflON OF CHEFS and the world in whichDempsey worked.Ifcordon Ramsay's ag$essive ravings - capnrred to perfection by a Channel 4 film crew in the infamous Boiling Pointseries killedthe m''th that cookingwas forsissies, then New York ChefAnthony Bourdain's best-sellingbook Kitchen Confrdentrhl epitomised the profession's new image, a sexy, ralish, spicy underworld of"mastercriminals, sexual athletes... highwayrnen, rogues, buccaneers, cut-throats" living "a life ofadventure, looting piilagingand rockingand rolling through life with a carefree disregard for allconventional morality". Yet the 2lst-century chef is more than a maverick bankrobber - he is also awhipsmartbusinessman. Jamie Oliver was credited with generating tl53m in profits forSainsbury's lastyear, and by the beginningofthis year the Naked Chefwas planning "world domination". "I've created an infiastructure that will grow naturally," he toid The Guadian,adding helpfu lly, "I'm also planningto getmore political." Behind the brio gnd the brand planning is an age-old buth: monet So who could blame a tough kid from Glasgow for taling his charces and claiminga piece of the action? "I think David always had high aspirations," says someone whoworked with Dempsey at Ra',rnond Blanc's Michelin two-star Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons.'You could tellthat in the way he dressed. He would think nothing ofspendingafomrne on clothes, whether he had the money or not. He's drivinginto work and there's a carpark fullofPorsches and Ferraris and all the rest, and Dempseydid aspire to that. He wanted to be famous." Like 116 Mast€. of all he surveF DemFsay (centE) watclrcs over his tean drring ftis rilt|e a5 h€ad chef at Ama.ylli! in his homc town ol Glalsow in Ap?il 2OOl almostallofthe people I spoke tq this man insisted that I protecthis identity. The restauraitbusiness in the UK is a small and unforgiving community. Andrev/ Fairlig a Michelin-starred chefwho runs an epongnous restaurant inThe Gleneagles Hotel, was one ofthe few people who were prepared to go on record to talk about David Dempsey's professional beginnings. When Dempsey literally appeared on his backdoorstep about I0 years ago, Fairlie was immediately impressed by the young chef's ambition and his hunger to learn. "He was absolutely certain aboutwhere he wanted to go," he says. "There are very fewpeople that you come across like that." Dempse.ywanted the experience of beingaround elite cooks, and offered to ' D.arr rJ f)omncpir \{ork at One Devonshire pLlilecr Gardens, Fairlie's restaurant at agun*or the time, on his only day off what looked llke fiom his other kitchen. Ifthere gun - on me when tg were wages forthis labour, it WASabout 17 or 18, wouldbe abonus. It was a tactic that clarTns a doorman Dempsey was to use many f r.,rn z a 2c.on\^/ al rh 'Years times. Later, vr'hen he was later when I workingl6-hour days at Le saw a TV programme Manoir, he would fly back to -f hn rf .nn[ Giasgow on his days offand go ' no thorp! a ' r i r v straight into One Devonshire was tne same wee Gardens to work for fiee. "I sm ling face wrth thought he was completelyberserk," Gordon Ramsay" says Fairlie, shaking his head. "I said to him on a number of occasions,'Listen, forget it..."' Yet, as anothertop cheftells me,'You need to go through a painbarrier gettingto this level.There's no fast-track - there's lots ofsacrifice involved and it's very disciplined. It's definitelyavocation." Or, as another industry source putit, "It's the differencebetween drivinga Lada and a Ferrari." Dempsey wasn't simply a workaholic; he was setting himself the 4 toughestpossible targets in order to securchis objective: Gordon Ramsay. Hejoined the chef's London-based operation in 1992 after a day's trial at Ramsay's eponlmous flagship restaurant in Royal Hospital Road. It was an - experience he told his closestftiends had been'tompletely mind-blowing". =
Ramsay lived up to his reputation in every way. Dempseytold one ofhis slepton a couch more suitable for a child than a top chefearningt70,000 friends that he would'tome up and kick him on the shins and nip him and a year. Her eyes water with anger at his living conditions. push him andjostle himout oftheway artd jrllthe restofit. The verbal abuse Dempseytold friends hewasn't happy, but when his mothersawhim went on right up and until the last," says the fiiend "I mean, itwas legendary over the Easterholidays he seemed calm and looked well -so well, in fact, - Gordon comingup to Glasgow and takingDavid out theback and that they evenjoked about him getting fat when his mother asked him why completely trashing him, screaming at the top ofhis voice " he had leftAmaryllis, Dempsey answered, "I had io go otherwise,I Ramsayinspires mixed feelings Some have nothingbut admiration for wouldn't have had a job." him;others literally fear him. One cheftold me thatwhile he was "sharpened TWo months before David's death, top French ChefBernard Loiseau' one up" workingfor thetriple-Michelin-starred chei he did feel that "it's almost ofthe most famous chefs in France, took his own life after slipping in national like being indoctrinated. It's likejoiningthe Marines or something " This is restaurant ratings. People have wondered whether either David's stalled what David Dempseywillingly signed up f or career, or news about tests linked to cancer he had in the week he died, led "I think David wajtted to prove that there was nothing he couldn't take," himto commitsuicide. Eileen is dismissive ofboth suggestions: "He told me says the chef. "I have never seen a guy with so many burns and scars up lus the tests were fine. Everyone but David worried about his health " Dempsey's family have seen a police video that recreated his 6nal hands and rightup his forearms. movements on the night he died, but it raised as many questions as it He once said he was tired lffi:*,r'r-.1 answered. His movements certainly didn t represent dle nomal because he was working until modus operandi of acatburglar. He entered the building fiom the rear, 2am,butthenwenthome todo went into a couple's apa.rtment on the ground flool smashed out their a lweights] workouL" froot window, hopped ledges; re-entered the building after smashing Ex-colleagues who met a dool raced upstairs towards the rear, exited a window, gripped a Dempsey after he'd worked for each other's drainpipe, then fell to his death. witnesses also stated tha! far from Rarnsay for a while were taken company, although his "mmpaging", they'd actually felt a bit sorry for David. It was very odd aback by how much he had Dempsey's penchant behaviour, to say the least - even for someone who was allegedly also changed: "His demeanour, the way he would speal, the things stoned outofhis head. for flashing about when the toxicology report was made public at the official inquest he'd say were right out of expensive molllle on 9 July, it revealed that David Dempsey had l.3mg ofcocaine per liue Gordon'smouth'Anactive phones drd allegedlY in his system, a potentially fatal quantity His family, who insist that body is an active mind', 'Donleys David was once drive RamsaY 'hfiaid ofheights and totally anti- drugs", immediately stated use theirbacks, chefs that they planned tocommission their owl toxicology report. No one I use their brains', all ofthat " to grab one and spoke to ever saw David Dempsey touch drugs. Indeed, the reverse was Eileen Dempsey readilY drop lt into a pot of tme - he regularly cited his dislike ofthem and where they led users. admits that her son didn't Chinese tea" His friends said that if oempsey had been taling drugs, then it would simply like or admire the have been in his nature to have indulged in public To their knowledgg charismatic Ramsay: "No, You must understand that David this never occurred. But Dempsey was always good at comparBnental ising his life. Paul idolised Gordon." Despite the boot-camp hisnionics, people who knew the two chefs said Carroll, acheffromGordon Ramsay's resrauranL told police thathe had they werc exffemely easy in each other's company, although Dempsey's penchant for flashing about expensive mobile phones did allegedly once ddve Ramsay to grab one ard drop it into a pot ofchinese tea in a Glasgow restaurant. Yet some people I spoke to thought Dempsey's own percephon oftheir relationship might have been skewed. He took both Ramsay's praise and cdticism to hearl "He would get upse!" one source told mg "and I am takingtlis from somebody who said to me that David had turned up at tlteir door at two otlock in the morning crying and all the rest of il" Gordon Ramsay broke his silence on the subject ofDavid Dempsey3 death only once before the inquest. In an intervi ew :-j]'The Obset'ler,he equated Dempsey's death with his brother's long-term heroin addiction' Ramsay said he felt pain and sorrow over both issues, ard said drat he was planning to implement drugs tests for employees. Dempsey's family were appalled. "1'm sorry" says Eileen, "but I think there's a big difference between David and his brother David doesn't have a habit..." or didn'L BY THE EEGINNII{G OF 2OO'. DAVID SEEI'ED IO BE RDNG HIGH W|rH GoRDON RAftsAY. He was even cited in the press as the "inspiration 'behind the fiIst restaumnt Ramsay opened outside London. Amaryllis was located in Glasgpv/s smart west End - at one Devonshire Gardens, in fact, the site that Fairlie had vacated on moving into Gleneagles. David was coming home' Despite critical plaudits, Amaryllis didn t attract diners in droves. At the end ofApril this year, Ramsay admitted the market had been tough and amounced a "slight revamp" in the hope ofattracting the mid-market audience. There was talk ofDempsey heading a .Iew restaurant in Edinburgh butintheinte m he left behind his parmer, his three children, his sister Yasmin ald his mother, and moved into a tiny flat near Royal Hospital Road, where he was to work under Ramsay's head chef, MaJk Askew When Eileen came down to London to pick up his possessions, she discovered that her son 118 been out with Dempsey on the night he died, and that Dempsey had said that he had rakencocainearlier in the evening. Later that night, caroll left an anxious message on David Dempsey's answerphone, although what prompted the call rcmains a mystery to the fanily. ca.rroll spoke to the police, though not until over a week after the incident His account apparendy satisfied the police. But the Dempsey familysrill feelthar pans ofthe puzzle are missing GMng evidence at the inques! Cordon Ramsay said $at duringt]rcir last meeting,24 hours befote the chef's death, Dempsey seemed agitated "lt wasn't the normal David," he said. "It was a guy that was, for me, looking as though he was under pressure." Perhaps it had something to do with the nature ofthe conveNation they had over dinner at the Harvey Nichols restaurant that night. Ramsay told t}|e hearing that they had discussed the resignatrons ofseveral femele staffmembers, and that DemPsey had accepted responsibility for the altercations that had led to them handing in their notice. He also said that Dempsey had asked to borrow t3,000, claiming that he was under financial pressure following his purchase ofhis London flat Whatever happened that nighg Dempsey appeared upbeat after the meeting telling fiiends that his future with Itamsay was secure and that he'd be '.Gordonb man IOO per cent ulrtil he was 65". His family aren't so sure. They tell me he was planring to cut his ties witi Ramsay and was intent on opening his own restaurant iD Glas8ow. Given his track record, he was probably working both sides ofthe street simultaneously Out ofcuriosity, I check out the location his family tell me Dempsey had in mind for his new restaurant. Sure enough, on a bustling Glasgow streeg a "Saler4-easd'sign hangs above a vacant doorway. It\ a pdme location. lfthose lottery numbers had come up, could David Dempsey have been in there right now, cooking up astorm? lt s an impossible question to answer. Becauseonly one person truly knew David Dempsey, and he isn t around any morc' @
Page 1 and 2: .**!f*#4t'4,': tr. --":"-l ::::
Page 5: THELAST-] STEPSOF I DAIID DEMPSEY F

tr

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?