This real-life Silent Witness is even more horrific . . . and more gripping
Truth is not only stranger than fiction, it’s a good deal more gruesome, too. Forensics: The Real CSI (BBC2) highlights all the ways Silent Witness gets its facts right . . . as well as revealing what is too disgusting for drama.
the series returned to follow detectives and forensic scientists investigating how a decomposed body came to be found in a box freezer collected by a council removals team from a derelict high-rise flat in Birmingham.
CCTV captured the moment workers at a recycling site opened the freezer, stared in horror, then reeled away. No director could have staged a more dramatic scene, though some of the details are too horrific to be described.
Where real life really resembled the TV crime thriller, though, was in the autopsy lab. A forensic pathologist stood over the corpse, dictating notes into a handheld recorder, just as Dr Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) does. the disposable white suit and clear plastic faceguard were identical to her kit — the only difference was that the Dictaphone itself was in a protective bag.
A colleague leant forward, photographing details with a highend camera . . . just like co- star David Caves does in the drama.
Dr Nikki works at the thomas Lyell Centre. this genuine pathologist was Dr Matt Lyall. I’m sure he never tires of people pointing out the coincidence.
Drawing on police bodycam footage as well as police interviews, the emphasis was entirely on details. We saw how the body was identified by overlaying a 3D scan of the skull onto a photograph of a missing council tenant, the flat’s last known occupant.
Detectives feared the victim was still alive when he was shut inside the freezer. In a complex chemical process, scientists coaxed twoyear-old fingerprints on the inside of the lid to glow under ultraviolet light. At first this looked like proof pensioner John Wainwright had struggled to fight his way out. But when the prints didn’t match his own, that theory was discarded.
What makes this programme so gripping is the depth of detail. the innumerable ways that evidence can be amassed, and the damning facts that can be deduced from its analysis, keep us glued to the screen.
there’s no need for the action sequences, unconvincing romances and, worst of all, the political storylines about far-right activists and immigrants that frequently mar Silent Witness. Dr Nikki could ditch all that and just concentrate on the forensics — we would be more interested.
the drawback of real life, of course, is that not every mystery is solved. Police were unable to discover how Mr Wainwright died, though they did establish who hid his body in the freezer — his self-proclaimed carer Damion Johnson, who carried on claiming the victim’s benefits and his carer’s allowance. the toerag was sentenced to two years in prison.
Speaking of toerags, the victim was found with a sock on one hand. In a drama, that would be a crucial clue . . . here, it was a puzzling irrelevance.