Waking the Dead (2000) s05e01 Episode Script
Towers of Silence: Part 1
VOICES ECHO .
.
Like suicide Convince the coroner and Hi.
Mr Z? Mr Z, good.
Don't start, please.
Don't start what? You think I have a problem with the notion of eternal culpability, don't you? Well, have you? No, I don't.
Well, that's OK.
I don't.
It's a point of view, Mel.
Sorry.
You admired him? I'm sorry.
So we are looking at about I don't know if it helps but the weed killer I found Do you think this is Mr X hitting back? I don't know.
They could just be empty words, but if he won't speak to us All he kept saying was thousands.
Was it? According to the psychiatrist, yes.
And that could mean anything, couldn't it, post 9/11? Thousands of lives.
Could you mean he's a fundamentalist? Could be an epidemic.
Like AIDS, another AIDS.
OK, so we'll just stick to the fact that he's committed a murder and he's in prison.
Hi.
Can I help you? Yeah.
I want a big plane like this.
A radio-controlled one? No.
No.
No.
Just like an airliner, you know a 747.
A 400 or 200? What's the difference? So six years ago would've been The 200.
Spencer Michael Jordan, GBH.
Been in custody before, Jordan? No.
No, "sir".
No, sir.
You'll be seen by health care and a gym instructor and you'll be assigned to a wing.
Are these all the paints you need, these three? Yeah, the white for the fuselage.
There you go.
Oh, that's better.
How much is the big yellow remote-control plane? I'll just check for you.
Thank you.
Are we done then? Yeah, pretty much.
Good.
All right, here we are - Heathrow Airport, October 1998.
Flight 553 coming into runway 51.
Yeah landing.
Without wings.
It's a combination passenger-cargo plane.
Great landing, Boyd.
OK, that's my first landing.
OK, this is the runway.
You're airside.
Cargo.
Tight security.
Warehouse.
Yeah.
Warehouse, right.
Tight security.
Really tight security.
Yeah, yeah.
Plane backs up.
To deposit its cargo out of the cargo hold.
Cargo.
Forklift truck.
Come on.
You're baggage.
Thanks.
There you go.
Boom! Just turn round there.
Back into the warehouse.
Because it's got a pass.
New security pass goes in.
Doors.
What's in this cargo? Don't know.
Didn't know then, they don't know now.
What, never looked? Never looked.
Right, so it's in the security warehouse.
Four men and an armoured vehicle smash their way through the security and ram the security doors of the warehouse.
Was it an inside job? They just did, right? And they take two of the crates from the cargo.
Put them in the vehicle.
OK.
Escape, disappear forever, never to be found again.
Good! A week later, baggage handler, that's you Nadir Mehta.
Nadir Mehta.
Nadir Mehta.
Is found in a water tank in Kent, dead.
Indian immigrant.
Throat cut, hands chopped off at the wrists.
Now, not this plane, another plane.
Month later takes off for Arizona.
This is the dead plane, finished plane.
It's going to go to the graveyard of planes in Arizona, where it's dry There's no rust.
So they put them there, right? Takes off, its final voyage.
It's a little sad.
The pilot's crying Boyd.
Hi, I'm Detective Sergeant Stephenson, from Kent CID.
God, I am so sorry.
Dr Grace Foley, we weren't expecting you till tomorrow.
This is Detective Superintendent Boyd.
Hello.
Can I just finish this? Boyd! This plane's on its last flight.
From Kent CID, are you? Comes into land at the graveyard where it spends the next six years of its life for What do you have to offer exactly? .
.
Before two men come and decide to break it down for scrap.
Smash it open.
In the cargo hold they find a mummified body.
What's the connection between this mummified body and Nadir Mehta? No wrists.
Has no hands.
Do you get the connection? Now in another plane they fly this mummified body back to Heathrow, back to us, yesterday.
And it's arriving in about one hour's time in Heathrow.
Where Doctor Gibson is going to pick up this mummified body and bring it back to us.
So you are the officer that found the man in the water tower in 1998, aren't you, Detective Sergeant Stevenson? Yes.
What do you possibly think you can do to help us? Mmm? Can you build model planes? Well, I can give it a go.
Thanks.
Could you just give us a minute? Thanks.
Customs search coffins here every day.
Oh, and who was it who requested the secondment of this officer who handled the Metha family? I just didn't know that it was going to be a she person.
Oh, excuse me, but yes, you did know.
I didn't I But what you didn't know was who it was going to remind you of.
Fine.
So? So? Are we going to work? I am working.
I am working.
I am working here.
I am very busy, thank you.
I think we should be working together out there.
Well, done! I'm impressed.
This is how we work.
We throw ideas around .
.
discuss .
.
pool our thoughts.
It's not about me making a lecture up here, you understand that? Yes.
The FBI liaison office at the US embassy contacted us to say they found a body in the plane in Arizona.
The death of the body in the plane in Arizona pre-dates its arrival.
The last flight that this plane made was from Heathrow airport in 1998.
At the same time there was a baggage handler found in a water tower in Kent.
Yeah, I found the body.
I know you did.
A week before, there was a robbery at Heathrow airport.
A flight from Mumbai.
Indian baggage handler.
Indian plane.
Sarosh Mehta, who was his brother, was also a baggage handler at Heathrow Airport.
He walked into a police station and offered to make a statement, handed over a knife and confessed to the murder of his brother over a gambling debt.
And he's now serving life in prison.
So you're making the connection.
Similar physical mutilation between Arizona and the body in the water tower, yes.
No hands.
We asked the prison to produce Sarosh Mehta for interview, but we'd have to consult his psychologist.
Wouldn't talk to us.
So I talked to his psychologist and I read his file and for me, his profile doesn't fit with someone who is genuinely confessing to a murder.
There's no minimising, there's no excusing.
In fact, there's no emotional content.
There's just simply this overwhelming fear.
State of the world, thousands of lives being under threat.
Can't you insist on interviewing him? How can you? If they don't want to talk, they won't talk.
We tried twice.
But we decided to find a different way.
They have rights in prison.
Do you know who the guy in the plane was? We contacted missing persons.
They said no-one airside at Heathrow airport had been reported missing, and you can't go airside at Heathrow without a pass.
So my conclusion was To fins a different approach.
You're doing very well, believe me.
Governor says you're going on the Vulnerable Prisoner Unit.
But we're full, so you're staying on reception.
You must have assaulted someone very important.
Policeman.
Hi, Felix.
Hi.
Did you get on all right? Fine thanks.
So this is it then, yeah? Yep, this is it.
Did you have any problems getting it through the? Are you just going to stand there? No, no, no - I'll leave you to it.
I'd like you to help.
What did you say? I'd like your help.
Christmas! Pop some gloves on.
Did I say something wrong? No, I'm just not used to being asked to help in the lab, you know, it's sort of the first time.
It's a new experience.
Right.
If you can grab both ends and lift when I say lift.
Yeah.
Lift.
Looks like he's been dead a hundred years.
Going through, sir? Yes, thank you.
Cheers.
In most environments the body will bloat and decompose quite quickly.
This guy's had six years in the desert to dry out.
Exactly.
Which will encourage desiccation and some of the soft tissue will be preserved.
He was also frozen in the aeroplane for quite some time.
Is this going to smell? No.
Good.
It's like the mummies in the tombs in Egypt.
Ready? Yep.
Can you get any DNA from this mummy? I can try.
Well, the very best of luck.
Mature male.
The hands have been removed at the wrist.
He needs a name.
He's not going to answer whatever you call him, is he? It would give him a bit more dignity.
Like crispy duck? Or ice box, ice cube.
You always go too far.
Mr Freeze.
Oh, and a cause of death, Felix as soon as you can please.
To your left please, Jordan, right down to the end.
Number 25.
You're having to make room, Mr Mehta.
No, no, this is not right, lifers do not share.
They do now, I'm afraid.
We're full.
Try and make the best of it.
Is that your wife? I pray at sunrise.
You'll have to get used to it.
Doctor Felix Gibson and Crispy Duck.
Crispy Duck? Mmm-hmm.
And scalpel.
Dehydrated tissue above the sternum.
It's like peeling a very old apple.
Can you tell me what race this person is.
Could he be an Indian? Well, skin colour's not much of a guide on a body in this condition.
Shape of the skull could give us some indication.
Ah-ha.
Do you have the skeletal age? Only approximate.
Once the growth plates have gone Would the DNA help us? It may help us with ethnicity.
It will take a long time to come through.
There is a method for narrowing the age range though - racimisation.
What's that? The body produces more left-handed molecules as we age.
Oh, that is gross, oh, God! Abdominal organs partially remaining.
Soft tissue long gone.
What's happened there - just withered away? No, decomposed.
Could you help me with my mask? Dr Felix Gibson is taking a break and wants her mask.
Boyd.
Look, you look great.
Little smile.
The mask.
Yeah, mask.
Right, so Thank you.
Racimisation.
Yours.
Yeah.
Molecules can be left or right handed.
Yep, go, Freddy.
Mirror images of themselves, they vary and are called racimates.
Chemically identical except when you look at their orientation under an electron microscope.
We haven't got one of those.
That is truly disgusting.
Whatever killed him went straight through the skull and into the brain.
And it wasn't a bullet.
Looks like a staple.
A staple? Can you get some tweezers? Look at that.
Look at that.
Boyd - tweezers.
What? Busy year '98, isn't it? Yeah.
Nine robberies.
Not investigated.
No result.
Follow-up.
No result.
Why would you not investigate something? This armed robbery was the biggest security breach of that year.
No follow-up.
No result.
Yeah.
So no-one was hurt, no guns fired, no damage, nothing at the scene of that crime.
And yet a week later this man, Nadir thingy, turns up in a water tower in Kent with his throat cut.
So is there a connection between October armed robbery and him? Do you think it will be all right here? Probably not.
So where's this Salter man? Nothing wrong with your coffin I hope? Coffin's fine, the person inside is in a bit of trouble though.
Who was he? He was found in a plane that flew out of here in 1998.
Same year a baggage handler was murdered.
Well, 1998 was a different era in terms of Heathrow.
Were you here in? No, you were still at school, weren't you? Do I need my lawyer present? No We're just looking for a bit of context.
Hello.
You see, in the old days it was just sort of random checks on the airport staff.
Things are a lot tighter now.
Yeah, but nobody seems to know what was stolen in this robbery.
That's because customs never saw it before it was nicked.
Really? Who's in charge of customs? The Collector.
The Collector owns the airport.
What are you doing here? Detective Superintendent Boyd.
I'm James Alcock.
The Collector.
What's all this about importing a dead body? The Collector? I am the Customs and Excise Collector for Heathrow Airport.
I didn't know there was VAT on dead bodies.
What about the Coroner? The Coroner's Office is aware.
How long have you been the Collector at this airport, Mr Alcock? Ten years.
Ten years So you were the Collector here in 1998? Work it out for yourself.
OK.
That's the year that there were nine airside robberies reported, four of which were never investigated.
What are you talking about? February 2nd, approximately $2 million worth of Pentium 4s en route from Tokyo, were stolen from a van parked near a British Airways hanger.
March 29th, 18 cartons of Elkon were stolen from a secure area near Terminal One.
That's like holding you accountable for every murder in London.
We've got a slightly bigger patch, Jim.
Look, we don't arbitrarily decide not to follow up on cases.
If someone tells me that a box of microchips has vanished into thin air, I can't tell him he's wrong, but I can take an educated view on how much manpower to afford.
So you're saying the claims were false? Let's say we're perennially overstretched so we tend to focus on the big game.
And in 1998 that would've been the armed robbery in October, wouldn't it? That's right.
Which you didn't get a result on either.
Where do I know you from? Kent CID.
Serious Crimes Squad.
Where is the required co-ordination request? No-one's delivered it to my office.
Don't worry yourself about that, Jim.
I'll be in touch if I need to talk to you.
No nipping off to the villa in Spain without letting us know.
Nice warehouse.
In the meantime could you forward all files pertaining to the robbery to our offices? I'd be very grateful.
Our clients lost property and we have an open file on this case.
But if the insurance companies paid out, you're here because you believe that it's either insurance fraud or an inside job, yes? Incorrect.
Oh.
Our clients are not primarily concerned with fraud, they're concerned with losses which may be recoverable.
Uh-huh.
So you're Sertill.
We make a noise at Heathrow and here you are.
Who are your clients? An international trading and financial consortium.
It's not much of answer.
For security reasons, they prefer anonymity.
What did they lose? High-value industrial equipment.
In case you hadn't noticed, I'm a police officer, this is a police facility, there are no security considerations in here.
We both know that shippers of freight feel vulnerable to leakage of information.
I have no information for you.
But you'll keep us informed? Why would I do that? We like to think we have constructive and cordial relations in law enforcement.
I bet you do.
Dead Dead In prison in Leipzig.
These three are all candidates for a robbery on this scale.
Do you know any of these faces? Thomas Shatz, based in Vienna, Mr Irani, an Indian, and Lothar Munk, an Austrian, like Shatz.
Any evidence? International intelligence resources.
If any of these names crops up in your investigation, then we might be able to help you further.
But it's not our job to steer you or point fingers.
I wouldn't expect you to do that.
Will you leave those with me then? How do I get in touch with you? Thank you.
Hi.
Hi.
Anything come out of that? Not really, no.
Was it about the case? Yeah.
Sort of.
Well, who were they? Well, they protect a company's interests.
Which company? Mmm! I don't know.
Sorry, I just don't know.
Could you sign the release form for Nadir Mehta's exhumation? OK.
Thank you.
It's probably a dead buzzard.
Your man's in and the operation's secure for the time being at least.
OK.
But if a prison officer finds out, by the time the shifts have rotated every 48 hours, everyone'll know Mehta's in with a police officer.
Two nights was all I asked for.
I moved heaven and hell for you on this.
I appreciate it.
What if that Mehta guy's a nutter? Who the hell's killed thousands of people since Adolf Hitler? Pol Pot.
Pinochet.
Saddam Hussein.
Bin Laden.
Well, if your man's spotted, he's dead.
One sniff that his cover's blown and I have to pull him out.
I understand.
Pay for my fare, will you? First night it's natural to worry.
I'm not worried.
Is there good in your heart? Doesn't matter now, does it? If there is good in your heart, all will be well.
That's the John.
Oh.
That's not a chair.
This is a chair.
And that's the table.
This is the bunk.
And which one's he on? He's on the lower bunk, Spence.
Hmm? Doctor Gibson needs to talk to you.
Nadir Mehta was not necessarily murdered.
How do you mean? These are the histological samples from the post-mortem.
Clearly nobody's looked at them.
How do you know? It's fine exhuming bodies, but it's easier to start at the beginning.
You weren't here at the beginning.
I ordered the exhumation.
I'm not criticising you.
If anyone had bothered to look at these slides What? They'd have seen that there is no evidence of vital reaction around the throat wound.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
HE PRAYS Grace! Yep.
Your hunch was almost right.
Why? Nadir Mehta was dead before his throat was cut.
So he didn't kill his brother? Well, if he did, he didn't kill him by slitting his throat.
Andy.
Yep.
You need to speak to Mrs Mehta.
She already knows we've dug up her husband.
Where is he? He's at the hospital.
They have to do a post-mortem.
Post-mortem Mama, mama.
Put a mask on if you like.
I haven't established a true cause of death as yet.
But his throat was cut after he was killed? Mmm.
KNOCK ON DOOR Hello.
How am I doing? Very well.
Andy likes me a bit more now, doesn't she? Well, I hope so, but making her build an aeroplane on her first day wasn't a good idea.
It has a calming influence.
Calming influence.
Like occupational therapy, give someone something practical to do with their hands.
With her hands.
Have you heard from Frankie? Yes, she's gone back to research.
You talked to her? Yes.
Where's Andy? In the lab.
Andy, wrong place.
Mrs Mehta, remember? What's happening? Boyd.
There's damage to two incisor teeth.
Look they're cracked across, see the abrasion marks consistent with pincer pliers.
Sorry, hold on.
I think your man was tortured before he was murdered.
I was told there was going to be a DI on the team.
He's away.
On leave? No.
On remand.
He's been charged with causing grievous bodily harm.
He's in prison.
We're trying to keep it quiet, cos a policeman in prison is a bit Yeah, sorry, I didn't realise.
That's OK.
But come on in.
It's sad really because I always thought he and I were getting along just fine.
You know.
I mean, I know that people can find me a little bit irritating.
And on occasion I have been known to be a teensiest, weensiest bit difficult.
But em It's never reached that point before.
Anyway We'll be fine.
You don't look like an aggressive sort of person to me and, er I'm in a particularly calm frame of mind at the moment.
Great.
Yeah.
Feel free to ask those kind of questions.
Thanks.
Yeah.
What was all that about? I was just telling her that Spence Oh, Boyd, don't shout! I was just telling her that Spence was in prison for beating me up.
Oh, so you made her feel at ease then Well, that was what you wanted me to do.
Oh, for God's sake.
PHONE RINGS Yep? I'm not allowed to receive calls in prison.
You didn't murder your brother, did you? Who are you? I'm police.
No-one knows who I am, OK.
Who sent you? Who are you afraid of? You don't have to spend the rest of your life in prison.
We can protect you and your family.
There was no gambling debt, was there? You didn't murder Nadir, did you? Whoever you are, Druj is stronger than you.
Who is Druj? Evil.
Druj is evil.
Morning.
Mrs Mehta's in interview room one.
OK, that's great.
You want to do that now, do you? Please, yep.
Bad night? No, I She's been by her husband's grave all night.
I was hoping for a cup of coffee really.
Who's observing then? I am.
I need to speak to you about the death of your husband.
You've taken his body from the ground.
I'm afraid we had to.
You had no right to do that.
How do you believe your husband died? He was killed by Sarosh.
Who slit his throat - yes? Your husband was already dead when his throat was cut.
What? No.
Sarosh, your brother-in-law, is in prison for the murder of your husband over gambling debts.
But if he was dead when his throat was cut, he's innocent.
Nadir was not a gambling man.
But he did have gambling debts.
I didn't know.
Why disguise a death with a murder? 'Boyd.
' One second please, Felix.
I am not I am not hiding anything.
Sarosh - he lived with you, did he? You and your husband.
Boyd, I need to talk to you.
I can hear you loud and clear.
Excuse me Felix, just give me two seconds, will you? Sarosh lived with you and your husband? No, well, sometimes he would come to help look after Nadir.
What do you mean look after? Because you were having a relationship with your Boyd.
Ah, Jesus! Excuse me.
He was an honest man.
You don't have to shout.
I said you don't have to shout in these things! Nine sights potassium dichromate is a potentially toxic compound, it can cause renal failure.
Can we? So you're saying he was poisoned? Well, I'm talking scientifically, not criminally.
Couldn't be suicide, could it? I'm afraid that makes even less sense.
The tissue damage suggests long-term deterioration.
We're talking weeks not days.
Yeah.
if you want to kill yourself, you want to do it immediately, don't you? The same's not necessarily true if you want to kill someone else.
I just thought you might like some water.
Thank you.
Are you able to go on now? In the days leading up to your husband's death, did he seem worried about anything? Ney.
No.
No-one came to the house to see him? No, no-one came.
Everything was the same.
There were no problems between the two of you? No.
In the morning he went to work.
I didn't wake up because he was on early shift.
You worked different hours? We have to.
Sometimes the hours were problem and I did not see him much.
We needed the money.
It wasn't in the medical reports? There weren't any.
Only in the exhumation report.
Yep.
Three years old.
And he died? Three months after his father.
What from? Respiratory failure.
I can't breathe.
I have to go now.
Can I get you anything? They opened my husband's grave.
A dead body is an unclean thing, but I stay there all night to Sit down please, Mrs Mehta.
Sit down.
Sit down, Mrs Mehta.
How did your child die? No, I will not let you take Darius from the ground.
You will not dig up my child also! Why didn't you tell us? Because it had nothing to do with my husband's death.
So the son died three months later.
CH dichromate, mid- to long-term poisoning.
In poisoning terms, that's one to two weeks.
Now we know why she was standing by the grave.
She was guarding her son.
Yeah.
Hi.
Hi.
Got the results back on my racimate analysis.
Crispy Duck was 32-years-old.
Still not confirmed.
But I've got these in the stomach contents.
Orsak seeds.
It suggests he was in Gujarat, in West Central India within four days of his death.
Couldn't he just have had a whopping curry in Southall? No, I checked.
The export of orsak is prohibited because of its rarity.
It's only found in one part of India.
OK, so there's a distinct possibility that he's Indian.
Well, yeah, would suggest that.
Felix.
Hmm? We need a sample of Mrs Mehta's son's hair, to see if he died of the same thing as his father.
Right.
Well, rustle up a court order and we'll exhume.
We don't need a court order because we don't have to have an exhumation The grave's open.
No.
Forget it.
Out of the question.
Ethnic origin, Indian.
Oh, so I'll contact the Indian Embassy.
That's not a bad idea.
Detective Superintendent, there are 450 million people in India.
We have a DNA profile, but no local population database.
You say he's from the Gujarat.
That narrows it down to about 20 million.
Don't you run a computerised missing person database? You do everything from fingerprints? Maybe he was a stowaway.
That's very sad.
Human life is precious, but what are you supposed to do with one person? We've done a facial reconstruction.
Perhaps you could circulate it I'm sorry.
I don't think I can help you any more with this.
I understand 1 in 20 million doesn't do it for you, perhaps when I say that between 1% and 5% of your population is under threat - that's 200, 000 to 1 million people.
Does that work? Or have you got so many damn people in your country, you don't give a shit? I will say this prayer for both of us, in English.
Ahriman he keeps at bay, he holds him back.
May Ahriman the devil be struck and defeated, with devs and drujs, sorcerers and sinners, karpans and kicks, tyrants, heretics and wrongdoers, sinners, enemies and witches.
May they be struck and defeated.
May evil rulers not exist, be far away.
May enemies be defeated.
May enemies all not exist, be kept far away! You're a devout man.
Was Nadir a devout man too? He was my brother.
There were certain people who would work with the bags before they went onto the belts.
What do you mean 'work with'? Take things from marked cases.
Carry them out from the airport through the workers' gates.
Who did he work for? People from home .
.
and people here.
When he had a child, he wanted to get away from these people.
For his child, he wanted to stop.
I tried to help him.
He needed to purify himself.
Who killed him? They'll kill my family! Nobody knows I'm here.
Do you know about the Dolomiocolco? No.
That is the name of the fire that separates our world from the sacred world.
I know I need to purify myself.
I thought of nothing else since I came in here.
I've had dreams.
I've prayed for a messenger.
I've prayed for you.
I call you a Rathestar.
This means "warrior against evil".
I will tell you one thing, and that will purify the earth.
Find the Midnight Pearl.
I'm arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Sarosh Mehta.
Mr Chowdray? Chief Inspector Chowdray, Gujarat State Police.
What's that? You know what that is.
What do you expect me to do with it? I just hope you do what I want you to do.
You've been shielding a suspected smuggler.
And you've been shielding a suspected murderer! How do you work with that guy?! Now that you're saying I was killing them? That's what you are saying? The fate of the world.
Thousands of lives.
Conversion by reirei.
.
Like suicide Convince the coroner and Hi.
Mr Z? Mr Z, good.
Don't start, please.
Don't start what? You think I have a problem with the notion of eternal culpability, don't you? Well, have you? No, I don't.
Well, that's OK.
I don't.
It's a point of view, Mel.
Sorry.
You admired him? I'm sorry.
So we are looking at about I don't know if it helps but the weed killer I found Do you think this is Mr X hitting back? I don't know.
They could just be empty words, but if he won't speak to us All he kept saying was thousands.
Was it? According to the psychiatrist, yes.
And that could mean anything, couldn't it, post 9/11? Thousands of lives.
Could you mean he's a fundamentalist? Could be an epidemic.
Like AIDS, another AIDS.
OK, so we'll just stick to the fact that he's committed a murder and he's in prison.
Hi.
Can I help you? Yeah.
I want a big plane like this.
A radio-controlled one? No.
No.
No.
Just like an airliner, you know a 747.
A 400 or 200? What's the difference? So six years ago would've been The 200.
Spencer Michael Jordan, GBH.
Been in custody before, Jordan? No.
No, "sir".
No, sir.
You'll be seen by health care and a gym instructor and you'll be assigned to a wing.
Are these all the paints you need, these three? Yeah, the white for the fuselage.
There you go.
Oh, that's better.
How much is the big yellow remote-control plane? I'll just check for you.
Thank you.
Are we done then? Yeah, pretty much.
Good.
All right, here we are - Heathrow Airport, October 1998.
Flight 553 coming into runway 51.
Yeah landing.
Without wings.
It's a combination passenger-cargo plane.
Great landing, Boyd.
OK, that's my first landing.
OK, this is the runway.
You're airside.
Cargo.
Tight security.
Warehouse.
Yeah.
Warehouse, right.
Tight security.
Really tight security.
Yeah, yeah.
Plane backs up.
To deposit its cargo out of the cargo hold.
Cargo.
Forklift truck.
Come on.
You're baggage.
Thanks.
There you go.
Boom! Just turn round there.
Back into the warehouse.
Because it's got a pass.
New security pass goes in.
Doors.
What's in this cargo? Don't know.
Didn't know then, they don't know now.
What, never looked? Never looked.
Right, so it's in the security warehouse.
Four men and an armoured vehicle smash their way through the security and ram the security doors of the warehouse.
Was it an inside job? They just did, right? And they take two of the crates from the cargo.
Put them in the vehicle.
OK.
Escape, disappear forever, never to be found again.
Good! A week later, baggage handler, that's you Nadir Mehta.
Nadir Mehta.
Nadir Mehta.
Is found in a water tank in Kent, dead.
Indian immigrant.
Throat cut, hands chopped off at the wrists.
Now, not this plane, another plane.
Month later takes off for Arizona.
This is the dead plane, finished plane.
It's going to go to the graveyard of planes in Arizona, where it's dry There's no rust.
So they put them there, right? Takes off, its final voyage.
It's a little sad.
The pilot's crying Boyd.
Hi, I'm Detective Sergeant Stephenson, from Kent CID.
God, I am so sorry.
Dr Grace Foley, we weren't expecting you till tomorrow.
This is Detective Superintendent Boyd.
Hello.
Can I just finish this? Boyd! This plane's on its last flight.
From Kent CID, are you? Comes into land at the graveyard where it spends the next six years of its life for What do you have to offer exactly? .
.
Before two men come and decide to break it down for scrap.
Smash it open.
In the cargo hold they find a mummified body.
What's the connection between this mummified body and Nadir Mehta? No wrists.
Has no hands.
Do you get the connection? Now in another plane they fly this mummified body back to Heathrow, back to us, yesterday.
And it's arriving in about one hour's time in Heathrow.
Where Doctor Gibson is going to pick up this mummified body and bring it back to us.
So you are the officer that found the man in the water tower in 1998, aren't you, Detective Sergeant Stevenson? Yes.
What do you possibly think you can do to help us? Mmm? Can you build model planes? Well, I can give it a go.
Thanks.
Could you just give us a minute? Thanks.
Customs search coffins here every day.
Oh, and who was it who requested the secondment of this officer who handled the Metha family? I just didn't know that it was going to be a she person.
Oh, excuse me, but yes, you did know.
I didn't I But what you didn't know was who it was going to remind you of.
Fine.
So? So? Are we going to work? I am working.
I am working.
I am working here.
I am very busy, thank you.
I think we should be working together out there.
Well, done! I'm impressed.
This is how we work.
We throw ideas around .
.
discuss .
.
pool our thoughts.
It's not about me making a lecture up here, you understand that? Yes.
The FBI liaison office at the US embassy contacted us to say they found a body in the plane in Arizona.
The death of the body in the plane in Arizona pre-dates its arrival.
The last flight that this plane made was from Heathrow airport in 1998.
At the same time there was a baggage handler found in a water tower in Kent.
Yeah, I found the body.
I know you did.
A week before, there was a robbery at Heathrow airport.
A flight from Mumbai.
Indian baggage handler.
Indian plane.
Sarosh Mehta, who was his brother, was also a baggage handler at Heathrow Airport.
He walked into a police station and offered to make a statement, handed over a knife and confessed to the murder of his brother over a gambling debt.
And he's now serving life in prison.
So you're making the connection.
Similar physical mutilation between Arizona and the body in the water tower, yes.
No hands.
We asked the prison to produce Sarosh Mehta for interview, but we'd have to consult his psychologist.
Wouldn't talk to us.
So I talked to his psychologist and I read his file and for me, his profile doesn't fit with someone who is genuinely confessing to a murder.
There's no minimising, there's no excusing.
In fact, there's no emotional content.
There's just simply this overwhelming fear.
State of the world, thousands of lives being under threat.
Can't you insist on interviewing him? How can you? If they don't want to talk, they won't talk.
We tried twice.
But we decided to find a different way.
They have rights in prison.
Do you know who the guy in the plane was? We contacted missing persons.
They said no-one airside at Heathrow airport had been reported missing, and you can't go airside at Heathrow without a pass.
So my conclusion was To fins a different approach.
You're doing very well, believe me.
Governor says you're going on the Vulnerable Prisoner Unit.
But we're full, so you're staying on reception.
You must have assaulted someone very important.
Policeman.
Hi, Felix.
Hi.
Did you get on all right? Fine thanks.
So this is it then, yeah? Yep, this is it.
Did you have any problems getting it through the? Are you just going to stand there? No, no, no - I'll leave you to it.
I'd like you to help.
What did you say? I'd like your help.
Christmas! Pop some gloves on.
Did I say something wrong? No, I'm just not used to being asked to help in the lab, you know, it's sort of the first time.
It's a new experience.
Right.
If you can grab both ends and lift when I say lift.
Yeah.
Lift.
Looks like he's been dead a hundred years.
Going through, sir? Yes, thank you.
Cheers.
In most environments the body will bloat and decompose quite quickly.
This guy's had six years in the desert to dry out.
Exactly.
Which will encourage desiccation and some of the soft tissue will be preserved.
He was also frozen in the aeroplane for quite some time.
Is this going to smell? No.
Good.
It's like the mummies in the tombs in Egypt.
Ready? Yep.
Can you get any DNA from this mummy? I can try.
Well, the very best of luck.
Mature male.
The hands have been removed at the wrist.
He needs a name.
He's not going to answer whatever you call him, is he? It would give him a bit more dignity.
Like crispy duck? Or ice box, ice cube.
You always go too far.
Mr Freeze.
Oh, and a cause of death, Felix as soon as you can please.
To your left please, Jordan, right down to the end.
Number 25.
You're having to make room, Mr Mehta.
No, no, this is not right, lifers do not share.
They do now, I'm afraid.
We're full.
Try and make the best of it.
Is that your wife? I pray at sunrise.
You'll have to get used to it.
Doctor Felix Gibson and Crispy Duck.
Crispy Duck? Mmm-hmm.
And scalpel.
Dehydrated tissue above the sternum.
It's like peeling a very old apple.
Can you tell me what race this person is.
Could he be an Indian? Well, skin colour's not much of a guide on a body in this condition.
Shape of the skull could give us some indication.
Ah-ha.
Do you have the skeletal age? Only approximate.
Once the growth plates have gone Would the DNA help us? It may help us with ethnicity.
It will take a long time to come through.
There is a method for narrowing the age range though - racimisation.
What's that? The body produces more left-handed molecules as we age.
Oh, that is gross, oh, God! Abdominal organs partially remaining.
Soft tissue long gone.
What's happened there - just withered away? No, decomposed.
Could you help me with my mask? Dr Felix Gibson is taking a break and wants her mask.
Boyd.
Look, you look great.
Little smile.
The mask.
Yeah, mask.
Right, so Thank you.
Racimisation.
Yours.
Yeah.
Molecules can be left or right handed.
Yep, go, Freddy.
Mirror images of themselves, they vary and are called racimates.
Chemically identical except when you look at their orientation under an electron microscope.
We haven't got one of those.
That is truly disgusting.
Whatever killed him went straight through the skull and into the brain.
And it wasn't a bullet.
Looks like a staple.
A staple? Can you get some tweezers? Look at that.
Look at that.
Boyd - tweezers.
What? Busy year '98, isn't it? Yeah.
Nine robberies.
Not investigated.
No result.
Follow-up.
No result.
Why would you not investigate something? This armed robbery was the biggest security breach of that year.
No follow-up.
No result.
Yeah.
So no-one was hurt, no guns fired, no damage, nothing at the scene of that crime.
And yet a week later this man, Nadir thingy, turns up in a water tower in Kent with his throat cut.
So is there a connection between October armed robbery and him? Do you think it will be all right here? Probably not.
So where's this Salter man? Nothing wrong with your coffin I hope? Coffin's fine, the person inside is in a bit of trouble though.
Who was he? He was found in a plane that flew out of here in 1998.
Same year a baggage handler was murdered.
Well, 1998 was a different era in terms of Heathrow.
Were you here in? No, you were still at school, weren't you? Do I need my lawyer present? No We're just looking for a bit of context.
Hello.
You see, in the old days it was just sort of random checks on the airport staff.
Things are a lot tighter now.
Yeah, but nobody seems to know what was stolen in this robbery.
That's because customs never saw it before it was nicked.
Really? Who's in charge of customs? The Collector.
The Collector owns the airport.
What are you doing here? Detective Superintendent Boyd.
I'm James Alcock.
The Collector.
What's all this about importing a dead body? The Collector? I am the Customs and Excise Collector for Heathrow Airport.
I didn't know there was VAT on dead bodies.
What about the Coroner? The Coroner's Office is aware.
How long have you been the Collector at this airport, Mr Alcock? Ten years.
Ten years So you were the Collector here in 1998? Work it out for yourself.
OK.
That's the year that there were nine airside robberies reported, four of which were never investigated.
What are you talking about? February 2nd, approximately $2 million worth of Pentium 4s en route from Tokyo, were stolen from a van parked near a British Airways hanger.
March 29th, 18 cartons of Elkon were stolen from a secure area near Terminal One.
That's like holding you accountable for every murder in London.
We've got a slightly bigger patch, Jim.
Look, we don't arbitrarily decide not to follow up on cases.
If someone tells me that a box of microchips has vanished into thin air, I can't tell him he's wrong, but I can take an educated view on how much manpower to afford.
So you're saying the claims were false? Let's say we're perennially overstretched so we tend to focus on the big game.
And in 1998 that would've been the armed robbery in October, wouldn't it? That's right.
Which you didn't get a result on either.
Where do I know you from? Kent CID.
Serious Crimes Squad.
Where is the required co-ordination request? No-one's delivered it to my office.
Don't worry yourself about that, Jim.
I'll be in touch if I need to talk to you.
No nipping off to the villa in Spain without letting us know.
Nice warehouse.
In the meantime could you forward all files pertaining to the robbery to our offices? I'd be very grateful.
Our clients lost property and we have an open file on this case.
But if the insurance companies paid out, you're here because you believe that it's either insurance fraud or an inside job, yes? Incorrect.
Oh.
Our clients are not primarily concerned with fraud, they're concerned with losses which may be recoverable.
Uh-huh.
So you're Sertill.
We make a noise at Heathrow and here you are.
Who are your clients? An international trading and financial consortium.
It's not much of answer.
For security reasons, they prefer anonymity.
What did they lose? High-value industrial equipment.
In case you hadn't noticed, I'm a police officer, this is a police facility, there are no security considerations in here.
We both know that shippers of freight feel vulnerable to leakage of information.
I have no information for you.
But you'll keep us informed? Why would I do that? We like to think we have constructive and cordial relations in law enforcement.
I bet you do.
Dead Dead In prison in Leipzig.
These three are all candidates for a robbery on this scale.
Do you know any of these faces? Thomas Shatz, based in Vienna, Mr Irani, an Indian, and Lothar Munk, an Austrian, like Shatz.
Any evidence? International intelligence resources.
If any of these names crops up in your investigation, then we might be able to help you further.
But it's not our job to steer you or point fingers.
I wouldn't expect you to do that.
Will you leave those with me then? How do I get in touch with you? Thank you.
Hi.
Hi.
Anything come out of that? Not really, no.
Was it about the case? Yeah.
Sort of.
Well, who were they? Well, they protect a company's interests.
Which company? Mmm! I don't know.
Sorry, I just don't know.
Could you sign the release form for Nadir Mehta's exhumation? OK.
Thank you.
It's probably a dead buzzard.
Your man's in and the operation's secure for the time being at least.
OK.
But if a prison officer finds out, by the time the shifts have rotated every 48 hours, everyone'll know Mehta's in with a police officer.
Two nights was all I asked for.
I moved heaven and hell for you on this.
I appreciate it.
What if that Mehta guy's a nutter? Who the hell's killed thousands of people since Adolf Hitler? Pol Pot.
Pinochet.
Saddam Hussein.
Bin Laden.
Well, if your man's spotted, he's dead.
One sniff that his cover's blown and I have to pull him out.
I understand.
Pay for my fare, will you? First night it's natural to worry.
I'm not worried.
Is there good in your heart? Doesn't matter now, does it? If there is good in your heart, all will be well.
That's the John.
Oh.
That's not a chair.
This is a chair.
And that's the table.
This is the bunk.
And which one's he on? He's on the lower bunk, Spence.
Hmm? Doctor Gibson needs to talk to you.
Nadir Mehta was not necessarily murdered.
How do you mean? These are the histological samples from the post-mortem.
Clearly nobody's looked at them.
How do you know? It's fine exhuming bodies, but it's easier to start at the beginning.
You weren't here at the beginning.
I ordered the exhumation.
I'm not criticising you.
If anyone had bothered to look at these slides What? They'd have seen that there is no evidence of vital reaction around the throat wound.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
HE PRAYS Grace! Yep.
Your hunch was almost right.
Why? Nadir Mehta was dead before his throat was cut.
So he didn't kill his brother? Well, if he did, he didn't kill him by slitting his throat.
Andy.
Yep.
You need to speak to Mrs Mehta.
She already knows we've dug up her husband.
Where is he? He's at the hospital.
They have to do a post-mortem.
Post-mortem Mama, mama.
Put a mask on if you like.
I haven't established a true cause of death as yet.
But his throat was cut after he was killed? Mmm.
KNOCK ON DOOR Hello.
How am I doing? Very well.
Andy likes me a bit more now, doesn't she? Well, I hope so, but making her build an aeroplane on her first day wasn't a good idea.
It has a calming influence.
Calming influence.
Like occupational therapy, give someone something practical to do with their hands.
With her hands.
Have you heard from Frankie? Yes, she's gone back to research.
You talked to her? Yes.
Where's Andy? In the lab.
Andy, wrong place.
Mrs Mehta, remember? What's happening? Boyd.
There's damage to two incisor teeth.
Look they're cracked across, see the abrasion marks consistent with pincer pliers.
Sorry, hold on.
I think your man was tortured before he was murdered.
I was told there was going to be a DI on the team.
He's away.
On leave? No.
On remand.
He's been charged with causing grievous bodily harm.
He's in prison.
We're trying to keep it quiet, cos a policeman in prison is a bit Yeah, sorry, I didn't realise.
That's OK.
But come on in.
It's sad really because I always thought he and I were getting along just fine.
You know.
I mean, I know that people can find me a little bit irritating.
And on occasion I have been known to be a teensiest, weensiest bit difficult.
But em It's never reached that point before.
Anyway We'll be fine.
You don't look like an aggressive sort of person to me and, er I'm in a particularly calm frame of mind at the moment.
Great.
Yeah.
Feel free to ask those kind of questions.
Thanks.
Yeah.
What was all that about? I was just telling her that Spence Oh, Boyd, don't shout! I was just telling her that Spence was in prison for beating me up.
Oh, so you made her feel at ease then Well, that was what you wanted me to do.
Oh, for God's sake.
PHONE RINGS Yep? I'm not allowed to receive calls in prison.
You didn't murder your brother, did you? Who are you? I'm police.
No-one knows who I am, OK.
Who sent you? Who are you afraid of? You don't have to spend the rest of your life in prison.
We can protect you and your family.
There was no gambling debt, was there? You didn't murder Nadir, did you? Whoever you are, Druj is stronger than you.
Who is Druj? Evil.
Druj is evil.
Morning.
Mrs Mehta's in interview room one.
OK, that's great.
You want to do that now, do you? Please, yep.
Bad night? No, I She's been by her husband's grave all night.
I was hoping for a cup of coffee really.
Who's observing then? I am.
I need to speak to you about the death of your husband.
You've taken his body from the ground.
I'm afraid we had to.
You had no right to do that.
How do you believe your husband died? He was killed by Sarosh.
Who slit his throat - yes? Your husband was already dead when his throat was cut.
What? No.
Sarosh, your brother-in-law, is in prison for the murder of your husband over gambling debts.
But if he was dead when his throat was cut, he's innocent.
Nadir was not a gambling man.
But he did have gambling debts.
I didn't know.
Why disguise a death with a murder? 'Boyd.
' One second please, Felix.
I am not I am not hiding anything.
Sarosh - he lived with you, did he? You and your husband.
Boyd, I need to talk to you.
I can hear you loud and clear.
Excuse me Felix, just give me two seconds, will you? Sarosh lived with you and your husband? No, well, sometimes he would come to help look after Nadir.
What do you mean look after? Because you were having a relationship with your Boyd.
Ah, Jesus! Excuse me.
He was an honest man.
You don't have to shout.
I said you don't have to shout in these things! Nine sights potassium dichromate is a potentially toxic compound, it can cause renal failure.
Can we? So you're saying he was poisoned? Well, I'm talking scientifically, not criminally.
Couldn't be suicide, could it? I'm afraid that makes even less sense.
The tissue damage suggests long-term deterioration.
We're talking weeks not days.
Yeah.
if you want to kill yourself, you want to do it immediately, don't you? The same's not necessarily true if you want to kill someone else.
I just thought you might like some water.
Thank you.
Are you able to go on now? In the days leading up to your husband's death, did he seem worried about anything? Ney.
No.
No-one came to the house to see him? No, no-one came.
Everything was the same.
There were no problems between the two of you? No.
In the morning he went to work.
I didn't wake up because he was on early shift.
You worked different hours? We have to.
Sometimes the hours were problem and I did not see him much.
We needed the money.
It wasn't in the medical reports? There weren't any.
Only in the exhumation report.
Yep.
Three years old.
And he died? Three months after his father.
What from? Respiratory failure.
I can't breathe.
I have to go now.
Can I get you anything? They opened my husband's grave.
A dead body is an unclean thing, but I stay there all night to Sit down please, Mrs Mehta.
Sit down.
Sit down, Mrs Mehta.
How did your child die? No, I will not let you take Darius from the ground.
You will not dig up my child also! Why didn't you tell us? Because it had nothing to do with my husband's death.
So the son died three months later.
CH dichromate, mid- to long-term poisoning.
In poisoning terms, that's one to two weeks.
Now we know why she was standing by the grave.
She was guarding her son.
Yeah.
Hi.
Hi.
Got the results back on my racimate analysis.
Crispy Duck was 32-years-old.
Still not confirmed.
But I've got these in the stomach contents.
Orsak seeds.
It suggests he was in Gujarat, in West Central India within four days of his death.
Couldn't he just have had a whopping curry in Southall? No, I checked.
The export of orsak is prohibited because of its rarity.
It's only found in one part of India.
OK, so there's a distinct possibility that he's Indian.
Well, yeah, would suggest that.
Felix.
Hmm? We need a sample of Mrs Mehta's son's hair, to see if he died of the same thing as his father.
Right.
Well, rustle up a court order and we'll exhume.
We don't need a court order because we don't have to have an exhumation The grave's open.
No.
Forget it.
Out of the question.
Ethnic origin, Indian.
Oh, so I'll contact the Indian Embassy.
That's not a bad idea.
Detective Superintendent, there are 450 million people in India.
We have a DNA profile, but no local population database.
You say he's from the Gujarat.
That narrows it down to about 20 million.
Don't you run a computerised missing person database? You do everything from fingerprints? Maybe he was a stowaway.
That's very sad.
Human life is precious, but what are you supposed to do with one person? We've done a facial reconstruction.
Perhaps you could circulate it I'm sorry.
I don't think I can help you any more with this.
I understand 1 in 20 million doesn't do it for you, perhaps when I say that between 1% and 5% of your population is under threat - that's 200, 000 to 1 million people.
Does that work? Or have you got so many damn people in your country, you don't give a shit? I will say this prayer for both of us, in English.
Ahriman he keeps at bay, he holds him back.
May Ahriman the devil be struck and defeated, with devs and drujs, sorcerers and sinners, karpans and kicks, tyrants, heretics and wrongdoers, sinners, enemies and witches.
May they be struck and defeated.
May evil rulers not exist, be far away.
May enemies be defeated.
May enemies all not exist, be kept far away! You're a devout man.
Was Nadir a devout man too? He was my brother.
There were certain people who would work with the bags before they went onto the belts.
What do you mean 'work with'? Take things from marked cases.
Carry them out from the airport through the workers' gates.
Who did he work for? People from home .
.
and people here.
When he had a child, he wanted to get away from these people.
For his child, he wanted to stop.
I tried to help him.
He needed to purify himself.
Who killed him? They'll kill my family! Nobody knows I'm here.
Do you know about the Dolomiocolco? No.
That is the name of the fire that separates our world from the sacred world.
I know I need to purify myself.
I thought of nothing else since I came in here.
I've had dreams.
I've prayed for a messenger.
I've prayed for you.
I call you a Rathestar.
This means "warrior against evil".
I will tell you one thing, and that will purify the earth.
Find the Midnight Pearl.
I'm arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Sarosh Mehta.
Mr Chowdray? Chief Inspector Chowdray, Gujarat State Police.
What's that? You know what that is.
What do you expect me to do with it? I just hope you do what I want you to do.
You've been shielding a suspected smuggler.
And you've been shielding a suspected murderer! How do you work with that guy?! Now that you're saying I was killing them? That's what you are saying? The fate of the world.
Thousands of lives.
Conversion by reirei.