Sociopolitical Documentary with no narration published by A&E in 2017 - English language
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When there's a murder with no suspect, no leads and perhaps not even a body, that's when investigators face their toughest test. Evidence must be gathered. Evidence must be analysed. But evidence is worthless if it can't be pinned to a suspect... Most murder victims knew the person that killed them. That's why homicide, in many cases, is a straightforward crime to solve. Yet 20 percent of UK homicides are classified as "circumstances unknown".
Hosted by Robbie Coltrane, Critical Evidence is based on real-life crime stories. In the series, Scottish star actor Robbie Coltrane deals with Britain's most extraordinary murder cases and their investigation. And who's better to host a British investigative true crime series? Coltrane's father worked as a police pathologist and the boy devoured his father's medical and crime literature at a young age. And many of us remember legendary crime drama Cracker and Coltrane as a heavy drinking, chain-smoking detective Fitz.
In this second season of Critical Evidence, Robbie Coltrane reveals eight of the hardest, most complex and baffling murder cases ever to be investigated by British police. The focus of each programme is the trail of evidence: how it was discovered, what it meant and how it became critical to crack the case. With interviews from the lead investigators and forensic specialists, many speaking for the first time, Robbie reveals the astonishing twists and turns of often stranger-than-fiction cases. It is a record of the detectives' art: using skill and determination to solve seemingly unsolvable cases - because the only difference between success and failure is critical evidence.
IWC Media for Crime & Investigation Channel
1) Little Miss Nobody: Alan Charlton
Robbie Coltrane reveals eight of the hardest, most complex and baffling murder cases ever to be investigated by British police. An old carpet dug up by workmen in a Cardiff back garden was the beginning of a case that would push the boundaries of forensic science. The carpet contained human bones - but whose?
On a cold winter's evening in 1989 shortly before the Christmas holidays, construction workmen make a horrifying discovery while renovating a building: they find the remains of an extremely decomposed body wrapped in a carpet, lying on the ground in a garden in Cardiff. At the same moment, the construction site turned into a crime scene, and the police's first challenge was to find out the identity of the victim, that being the most sure way to track down the perpetrator. In the laboratory, forensic scientists actually succeed in giving the dead person an identity - and ultimately in finding the murderer.
Crucial evidence for this episode: carpet, bones, DNA, facial reconstruction.
