An assistant of his took the laptop into PC World as Glitter had casually mentioned it being faulty, it was booked in under her name & there was nothing to ID it as belonging to Glitter. He knew what was on that laptop & there's no way he would've dropped it off for repair without scrubbing it, so off he trots to the store to get it back. Glitter is an instantly identifiable character.
It had already been overnighted to the PCW repair workshop, where it was sat on a shelf when the call came in from the store that it was Gary Glitters laptop & he wanted it back ASAP even if unrepaired. So, of course, the young chap who took the call instantly booted it up & took a look inside . . . .
Finding porn or 'other' things illegal, grossly offensive or indecent on customers HDD's was not at all unusual in that environment & there was an unwritten rule to not get involved, to move on & ignore it as best you can. There are VERY important business reasons for this so breaking that "unwritten" rule was seriously frowned upon.
What he saw in those photo's deeply troubled him so he called over his supervisor who happened to be an ex-copper. Quite by accident I just happened to be visiting the location that day & this supervisor came to find me, specifically bypassing the several layers of management at that location, he knew all about the unwritten rule but reckoned this needed special attention. He took me to view the photo's & I immediately said "if you don't make the call I will".
Things then kicked off. Glitter was 'invited' to collect his laptop from the store a few days later & most of the rest is history.
I could still get into a lot of trouble for this all these years later, but I was told discreetly that the 2x chaps in the workshop were to be 'managed out'. I made it my business that they weren't & that they couldn't be without serious consequences.
So you see, I really was quite senior in PCW, working for & employed directly under Sir Stanley Kalms. or 'Stan' as no one ever called him.