Episode Guide

Rachel Moran was stabbed to death on new Year’s day in 2003. She was just 21 years old. Initially believed to be missing, it was completely out of character for Rachel to disappear for any length of time. Chief Superintendent Paul Davison controversially organised a mass house to house search that caught the attention of the world press. Rachel’s body was eventually found at Michael Little’s house.

29-year-old Sharon Malone was mother to two young sons and had just begun training to be a teacher when she suddenly disappeared. Her husband Garry didn’t report her missing immediately and then told police and her family that she had run off with a new mystery boyfriend to escape a serious debt. There was no evidence to suggest otherwise, until the police found her abandoned car a month later. When Garry suddenly did a midnight flit to Spain with his two young boys, the police began to search for Sharon’s body.

In January 2000, two men walking down a lane in Sheffield found a holdall and were horrified to discover it contained the grizzly remains of a man’s body. It was so decomposed that South Yorkshire Police’s forensics team were unable to discover its identity.

After two post mortems and with still no clues to the man’s name, detectives turned to a technique never used before by their force. Forensic scientists carefully constructed a clay mould of the missing man’s face. This technique proved successful when a photograph of the clay reconstruction appeared in a local paper and the police were finally presented with a name; Mohammed Nasser Ali.

Unfortunately, they still had no idea how and why he was dumped in the lane and the details of his death remained a mystery. Armed with a name, police started to investigate Nasser’s family and the truth began to unravel. They discovered a tomb in the basement of Mohammed’s terraced house where his body had remained for a year.

21-year-old Jane was abducted from a supermarket car park when she tried to help a stranger. Her abductor, Robert English, drove her blindfolded to a caravan in the countryside and subjected her to a number of sexual assaults.

Finally allowed free, Jane amazingly recalled enough detail for the police to track down the caravan and ultimately her abductor.

Matthew Pyke and his girlfriend Joanna ran an internet forum site together. One of the users known only as David from Germany or Eagle_the_Lightening became obsessed with Joanna and started making regular unannounced visits to their home.

No one could have predicted that his jealousy would escalate into the murder of Matthew. With barely any details to identify David or locate him, the Police were then faced with the task of tracking him down.

On 5 March 2002, Kim Newson was babysitting at her friend’s house in Lincoln. Just after 2am, the pregnant 18-year-old walked the short distance home to her flat. She was never seen alive again.

During police inquiries officers visited Stephen Hughes who lived in the flat below Kim’s; he claimed to have heard her return home that night with a friend. When his flat was later searched in connection with a burglary police found Kim’s birth certificate, with what appeared to be a bloody footprint on it.

Further examinations by the forensic team revealed the horrific truth about what had happened to Kim in Hughes’ flat.