Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Cast: Siobhan Finneran, Imelda Staunton, Martin Freeman, Jake Davies, Peter Wight, Darcy Vanhinsbergh, Lolly Jones, Ian Puleston-Davies, Simone Lahbib, Owain Arthur, Florence Howard, Jessica D’Arcy, Daniel Betts, Joe Absolom, Faye McKeever, Derek Riddell, Charlie Cooper, Rufus Gerhardt-Williams, Dominic Tighe, Kate Ashfield, Emma Clifford, Anna Wilson-Jones, Caroline Bartleet, Maimie McCoy, David Keeling, David Nellist, Christopher Fulford, Orla Hill, Lisa Faulkner, John Thomson.
When the pressure is on to do what everyone would naturally consider the right course of action, but you are hindered by rules that would make such a decision impossible, what would you do, would you ignore official guidelines, or would you take the chance that the suspect in your care would tell you the truth once you have recorded that you have informed them of their rights.
Whilst we must never take away the point of procedure that protects both sides from false claims of coercion or corruption, there must be a place for the immediate to take precedence, that the confession of the whereabouts of a victim of violent, despicable crime should take priority over the sensibilities of a law that has ceased to be of significant worth in the modern age.
A Confession is the portrayal of events that brought Detective Stephen Fulcher to national attention as he sought to save the life of Sian O’Callaghan who was abducted, and later killed by Christopher Halliwell. It was not just the way in which Stephen Fulcher was able head a team in the solving of the disappearance of the young woman but the subsequent knock-on effect in which the death of another young woman was brought to light and the way that the rule of law sought to make an example of the detective for ignoring PACE procedures in the hope that he would bring, what he believed, was a serial killer to justice.
A Confession is hard to watch but one that arguably should be viewed as a point of order, one that shows that there are instances in which certain procedures and guidelines can hinder an investigation, that time is critical and should be given more relevance when a case is as sensitive as that which effected the families of Sian O’Callaghan and Becky Godden-Edwards comes to the attention of the police.
Writer Jeff Pope sensitively handles the issues at hand but spares no blushes at some of the more questionable attitudes by some of those involved in the case, that of the public and that of those in a higher position of authority to whom embarrassment should be a great concern in future dealing with the Pace Act.
Whilst immersed in a real-life police case, A Confession sees powerful performances by Martin Freeman as Stephen Fulcher, Joe Absolom as the convicted killer Christopher Halliwell, Christopher Fulford as Becky’s father and more notably the lead roles of the two mothers involved, the sadness, the fear and the fury etched in every detail of their time on screen, Siobhan Finneran and Imelda Staunton as Elaine Pickford and Karen Edwards respectively.
It is impossible to not be drawn into the investigation and the fall out of the case, one which shows the bravery of certain members of the police force to do the right thing and that of the families of the two murdered women. Nobody can ever truly understand such thoughts, what it means to do the right thing in exceptional circumstances, Jeff Pope shines a much-needed light on the failings of a system that does more hinder than help.
An exceptional serial which drives home the need for reform of the whole criminal justice system.
Ian D. Hall