David Wilson's Crime Files

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A BBC TV channel for Scotland which will broadcast every evening and will show drama, factual, comedy and news programmes made in Scotland

BBC Scotland HD

Documentaries

Factual: Crime & Justice

Professor David Wilson explores Scottish crimes.

Series 1

BBC Scotland

David Wilson

Craig Collinson

Harry Bell

Emma Fentiman

Ruth Mulcahy

David Wilson's Crime Files: Series 1: Miscarriages of Justice

Miscarriages of Justice

BBC Scotland - David Wilson's Crime Files, Series 1, Miscarriages of Justice

Criminologist David Wilson investigates Scotland’s most notorious miscarriages of justice.

Criminologist David Wilson investigates the reasons why blatant miscarriages of justice occur examining cases from past and present.

Leading criminologist Professor David Wilson and guests reinvestigate Scotland’s most notorious miscarriages of justice, looking for the reasons they occur.  

Investigative journalist Fiona Walker presents a short film about the Edwardian era case of Oscar Slater, a German Jewish immigrant falsely accused of murdering an elderly lady and stealing her diamond broach. Fiona joins David in the studio and, in relation to Slater’s case discuss the idea of ‘confirmation bias’, a form of tunnel vision in a police investigation where detectives believe someone to be guilty and go on to make the evidence fit the crime. In Slater’s case, anti-immigration sentiment also most probably formed part of police bias, blinding detectives to who the real killer was.

David’s next guest is Scottish crime fiction author and practising defence lawyer William McIntyre. In a humorous and insightful interview, William discusses how his own real-life experiences feed into his novels. We focus on his novel Stitch Up, in which a lawyer must defend his own father, a retired cop accused of planting evidence to convict a suspected serial killer.

In a short film David examines the recent case of a man imprisoned for armed bank robbery, convicted on the evidence of four eyewitnesses, including two police officers. He discusses how the eyewitness remains the most compelling evidence in any criminal trial, because it is human and relatable, and yet it can also be extremely unreliable. He reveals how, on appeal, DNA evidence proved that all four eye witnesses in the bank robbery case were incorrect. 

In the studio David meets eyewitness expert Graham Pike, who works with the police and the criminal justice system. In a fascinating discussion they explore in depth how the human brain works when it comes to remembering events and dissect how flawed our capacity to remember unfamiliar faces is. In even more stressful situations, like an armed bank robbery, our ability to remember is deeply compromised…
David’s master interview guest on this episode of Crime Files is American attorney David Rudolf, one of the world’s most famous defence lawyers.  He featured in the Netflix Documentary hit The Staircase. In interview he reveals his professional battles with detectives and criminal justice systems that will go to any lengths to convict the ‘wrong guy’ and the toll this has taken on his health and belief in justice.

David Wilson's Crime Files: Series 1

A BBC TV channel for Scotland which will broadcast every evening and will show drama, factual, comedy and news programmes made in Scotland


Professor David Wilson and guests discuss Scottish crimes.

Ten-part series in which Professor David Wilson and guests discuss Scottish crimes.

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David Wilson's Crime Files

Series 1

Miscarriages of Justice

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