Gregory Mantel

Gregory Mantel made his first appearance on 16 June 1988. He is portrayed by Pavel Douglas.

Storylines
Gregory is a well-spoken, sharp-suited gangster, an employee of The Firm.

He is introduced in June 1988, as a character claiming to be from "Walford Investments", who tries to persuade James Willmott-Brown to let him buy into The Dagmar. When Willmott-Brown refuses, he soon finds that his suppliers are refusing to do business with him. The bar's business suffers dramatically as a result. The Firm financially ruin The Dagmar for the purpose of drawing in its custom for their own wine bar, Strokes, which is in fact a front for illegal gambling reluctantly run by Den Watts. Den later uses his Firm connections to arrange for The Dagmar to be firebombed in retaliation to Wilmott-Brown raping Kathy Beale, which angers Mantel and The Firm's bosses, the unseen Mr. Vinnicombe and Jack Dalton. Mantel and Vinnicombe are good friends, and Mantel reports directly to him.Mantel later establishes the Portakabin office on Albert Square as a base of operations for "Walford Investments".

Mantel is also responsible for leading the operation to kill Den, after it is thought that he had grassed up The Firm for the Dagmar fire. Gregory is an intelligent man, and is able to work out the connection between Den and Michelle Fowler, and that she might be the key to finding him. He orders that Michelle be tailed, and she was followed to the Walford canal. Mantel then co-ordinates the assassination via a walkie-talkie. Mantel gives the order to shoot Den, but 14 years later it is revealed that his attempt to kill Den was unsuccessful and he promptly returns to Walford in September 2003, and that the body found in the canal in May 1990 was that of Mr Vinnicombe, who had been killed on the orders of Jack Dalton after discovering that Den had survived.