Sergeant Tom Penny
played by Roger
Leach
First
appearance Funny
Ol’ Business – Cops and Robbers (16/10/84)
Last appearance
Start with the Whistle (13/12/90)
Call Sign
54
Sergeant
Tom Penny was a quiet sort of bloke who had more going on under the surface than
most people realised. He upset a few people when he tried to impose a ban on
smoking at Sun Hill, and Bob Cryer realised he was under some strain when his
wife turned up and asked for help: Tom was beating her. At the end of 1987,
Penny was shot in the stomach after investigating a complaint about a crazy
woman who kept cats.
He
survived, but when he returned to work he was constantly swallowing painkillers
washed down with alcohol to deaden the pain of the wound. He confessed to Cryer
that he did have a drink problem, and Cryer tried to help. But when Penny was
working in an overheated CAD room, being irritated by a chattering electrician,
he spilled his coffee over the computer, put it out of action and blew his top.
It became clear that Tom needed more convalescence. He was the hero of the
Canley Fields child-murders investigation, bringing the killer in and slowly
working through the confession. But the details played on his mind. Driving home
from the party to mark Cryer's 20 years' service, he was stopped, breathalysed and
found to be over the legal limit. His reputation ruined, he decided that the
best course was to resign on medical grounds, citing the old gunshot wound. It was a frame-up, but he was out
of the force.
He
returned to Sun Hill in 1991 when he was working as a security officer, still
claiming to be a police officer.