Silent Witness (1996) s26e03 Episode Script

1
He cheated on you, and he's getting
He's actually lighting it.
What is that?
Is there a guy in there?
What do we do?
- Is he asleep?
- I can't tell.
Guys.
He's coming.
He's coming.
Testator silens
Costestes e spiritu
Silencium
Testator silens ♪
A day trip to Kent, always a pleasure.
Maybe our new boss wants
the office to himself?
Does Dartford count as Kent?
Dartford counts as the M20.
The main people-trafficking
route from Dover to London.
And holder of the record for
the world's longest traffic jam.
DI Sarah Torres.
Welcome to The Garden of England.
OK.
Saliva.
Expirated blood.
Hey, there's a gun.
Don't kill them!
Safe.
Serial number's been filed.
Bloated, skin slippage.
Marbling.
He's been here a good few days.
Looks like he's had an
explosive bleed from the mouth.
Either he's vomited it up
from a ruptured blood vessel
in the upper gut,
or he's coughed it up from the airways.
They were trying to get out.
Anything from the door handles?
There's too much detritus
to get any clean results.
Any word on who owns the lorry?
No signage.
The licence plate's stolen.
VIN number and chassis plate removed.
We're checking the usual -
booking info, GPS and CCTV
from the Ports of Dover and Calais.
We've informed Interpol.
- Any survivors?
- Two women, one man.
One of the women had an accent,
possibly Eastern European.
Spoken to them yet?
They're in ICU, kidney failure
from dehydration and all sorts.
It's touch and go, apparently.
Jack.
Poor bastards.
There's a small cut here.
Could be a deeper stab wound.
There's something in her right hand.
It's a St Christopher.
Chain's snapped.
Lips are cracked, tongue is dry.
She looks critically dehydrated.
There's minimal rigor
mortis in the muscles
of her fingers and lower jaw.
She died recently?
Probably in the last few hours.
She's still warm to the touch.
Not much rain recently in
the Garden of England, I'm afraid.
Ground's completely solid.
Guessing there's not much
chance in finding tracks.
Hopefully the environmental forensics
can tell us where the vehicle came from.
Not the sort of place you
park up to do happy things, is it?
No.
Cattle get treated better.
So what's your guess? Sex trafficking?
The age of the victims,
it fits the profile.
Or they were refugees, possibly.
Well, she's flaccid
and cold to the touch.
She died at least 48 hours ago.
OK.
So, she's the stabber?
I don't think so.
It tends to be difficult to stab
someone if you're already dead.
Your son has a good chance
of receiving a new heart
when a donated organ
becomes available, Mrs Shaw.
He fulfils many of the criteria
a strong case for surgery,
prospective quality and prolongation
of life, a suitable tissue match.
She was admitted last week.
They think she came from abroad,
but no parents around apparently.
They say she's being
made a Ward of Court.
Oh.
Oh?
As a Ward of Court her legal
guardian is now the High Court,
so even if she's a foreign
national she'll go into Group One,
treated as a UK resident like Tommy.
Don't worry, Mrs Shaw.
The charity will be here
to help, no matter what.
So, what have we got?
Body One, male, white, middle-aged.
Has either coughed or
vomited up a significant
- amount of blood at the scene.
- Mm-hm.
Currently unidentified.
Body Two?
White female.
Bruising to her face.
ID'd as Natia Beridze, 28, Georgian,
living and working in
the UK but outstayed her visa.
She underwent Administrative Removal
last December.
- That's an attractive term, isn't it?
- Mm.
So what? She tries to
come back six months later?
Hmm. Torres is looking in
to her last known address.
We'll know more soon.
Body Three, white, female.
From examination of dental X-rays,
she seems to be in her
late teens, early 20s.
Appears to have a single stab wound.
- No ID.
- Plus three survivors.
But identities unknown,
currently in the ICU.
- It's a bit of a Gordian knot, isn't it?
- Mm-hm.
DNA on the truck's tricky too.
Multiple samples, but they're
all mixed up, basically soup.
- Morning.
- Morning.
- How you doing?
- Very well, thank you.
- Moving in day?
- Sure is.
- Morning.
- Morning.
I've asked maintenance to fit
some extra sockets in your office.
Oh great, with some USB ports, please.
So the Kent case.
Looks like people trafficking.
Three bodies including a stabbing.
The police think the victims
came from Eastern Europe.
I can manage the PMs if you
want to get your office set up?
I've a few first day emails,
but I'd love to come and observe.
He's just through here.
The lad is pretty poorly,
the doctors think he may
have underlying health issues.
But the other two are doing OK.
As you can see neither of them
are intubated, which is a good sign.
And, uh, this is your last survivor.
What happened in that truck, lady?
What's that?
An incision that's been sutured.
It looks as if there's tunnelling
above it, see, here, under the skin.
It could be from a Hickman line.
A Hickman line?
It's a tube that delivers chemotherapy.
If toxicology confirms it,
it could help narrow down an ID.
Let's have a look at the X-rays.
Hmm.
A left supracondylar humeral fracture,
which, from early callus formation,
looks like it has been there
for at least a couple of weeks.
Possibly the result of
chemotherapy weakening the bones.
Possibly?
I need a closer look.
There's bruising and some
damage to the median nerve.
How would that affect him?
Worst case scenario,
loss of sensation and key
movements of the hand and wrist.
- He was the driver, right?
- Mm.
It could have affected his driving, but
still hard to tell for certain.
Can you photograph?
Right.
The torrential
haemorrhage that killed him
was caused by oesophageal cancer.
Which the tumour then eroded into,
causing a catastrophic bleed.
Definitely not a fun way to go.
We found something in this one's pocket.
Any idea what language it is?
Sorry. I think you'll have
to phone a friend on that one.
Body Two, Natia Beridze.
A well healed Pfannenstiel scar,
either from a
C-section or a hysterectomy.
There's green discoloration
in the right iliac fossa.
So she's been dead
for two to three days.
Assuming we confirm that
the woman with the St Christopher
died more recently,
Natia here definitely wasn't her killer.
So who was?
It must be one of the
three at the hospital.
Jack's testing the knife for DNA.
I think someone
placed it in Natia's hand.
A tattoo of the number
three on her right forearm.
What's that bruising?
Upper anterior chest, right side.
There's also bruising
on left zygomatic arch,
consistent with punching.
And before you ask,
I can't say yet whether the assault
was severe enough to be fatal.
Well, that was quick.
What do you have so far?
Questions.
Right, Velvy?
The heart is enlarged.
Tox screen needed.
If the heart is enlarged due to illness,
then could whatever caused
the bruising have killed her?
Nice idea, Velvy, but too
speculative for prosecution counsel.
I did a case a few years ago,
a woman with Takotsubo syndrome.
She was assaulted during a robbery
and died from sudden heart
failure eight hours later.
I concluded that death was
due to stress cardiomyopathy.
Her assailants were
convicted of manslaughter.
There were four other
people locked inside
the back of the lorry with her, so
It's still just a theory.
Let's find the evidence.
Excuse me.
I'm not illegal. I'm an asylum seeker.
No, it's all right.
You're not in trouble.
Do you know her?
Natia Beridze.
No.
A Georgian woman
who lived next door to you
before she went back
to Tbilisi last December.
No.
Your next door neighbour?
It's London.
We sure do spoil them, don't we?
Body Three, noted to be
recently deceased at the scene.
Velvy, can you photograph, please?
What are you looking for?
There's something odd about the cornea.
It's in this one too.
There's bruising and a laceration
on the knuckles of the right hand,
which could be offensive injuries.
So she could have been the aggressor,
who was then stabbed in self-defence?
Careful, Velvy, Gabriel's here.
He doesn't like stories before data.
These injuries
could equally be consistent
with hitting the walls
or doors of the lorry.
Are you all right?
You haven't said anything
for at least five minutes.
All people want is a safe place
to live and a half-decent job.
It seems pretty unfair that they
have to travel so far to find it.
What did she leave behind, do you think?
Her clothes were brands
sold all over Europe.
We're doing pollen and hair analysis.
We should have a more exact
idea of where she comes from soon.
It looks like someone's kissed it.
Perhaps Jack could try a lip mark test.
If you kiss a saint,
does it bring good luck?
Clearly not.
What are they?
Corneal incisions around the pupils.
Made by what?
Not sure.
I'm looking into the ophthalmology now.
I've made some
progress on Natia's tattoo.
I don't think it's the number three.
I think it's Kartvelian script.
Kart what?
The Georgian alphabet.
It's the letter "P".
Did you find a match to the lip
mark on the St Christopher?
I did. It's the unidentified female.
She kissed it before she died.
Her PM showed the stab
wound punctured her liver.
Cause of death was a
catastrophic internal bleed.
Anything on the knife yet?
No prints or DNA.
Whoever planted it on
Natia knew to wipe it.
But I did discover
traces of powder in the tin
we found in the back of the lorry.
Results should be in by tomorrow.
What's that?
Organ visualisation software.
Eye-catching.
I've created a model of
the young woman's eye,
which is being
cross-referenced against photos
of surgical scars from
the academic database.
PHONE VIBRATES That'll be the mud guy.
Excuse me.
I've been comparing the images I took,
but I can't seem to find
anything in the literature.
Radial Keratotomy Surgery.
Sorry?
Known by the abbreviation RK.
A diamond knife is used to
make deep corneal incisions,
leaving spoke-like scars.
Hardly anyone does it any more
now there's Lasik.
Great. Hopefully the fact
it's an outdated procedure
will help narrow things down.
Well done, Ketevan.
You're the first one out of the ICU.
Do we have a briefing scheduled?
Why am I here, you mean?
Although, when you think about it,
why are any of us here?
- You sound like Velvy.
- Is that the young guy?
I like him. He's as depressing as I am.
The hospital found
this in Survivor Two's coat.
It's Georgian.
"Good luck, Ketevan, from Grandad."
Georgia?
The same country Natia's from?
Georgia is a high origin
country for human trafficking.
We have a cause of death
for the unidentified female.
She did die of a stab wound to the
liver, several days after Natia.
As for Natia, we found evidence
consistent with dehydration,
but we also found evidence of
assault and a heart condition.
So we can't rule out violence
yet as the cause of death.
That's a lot of bloodshed
in the back of one lorry.
The five of them were in
there for up to four days.
I imagine tempers got frayed.
Maybe the man in the
back wasn't a refugee.
Maybe he was the muscle.
It's not unheard of for them
to put an enforcer onboard,
tasked with keeping the women
quiet as they cross borders.
I'm not sure they crossed
any borders, you know.
Why's that?
There is no evidence
of environmental factors
relating to Georgia or even
France anywhere on the lorry.
No Olea Europaea pollen, no
fragments of mantis religiosa,
both of which you'd expect
on a vehicle
that had driven across Europe.
In fact, the mud from the tyres
contained a combination of insects
that indicates the UK
is the only place the lorry
has been recently.
Jesus.
So, what?
They weren't being
trafficked into the UK?
I think they were being trafficked out.
Does that happen?
Sadly, the UK is becoming an
origin country for trafficking.
The pandemic didn't help.
A million young
people went off the radar
when youth services
closed or moved online.
Gangs take vulnerable kids out of
the country, to Holland, Germany.
But at least two of the
victims weren't even British,
they were Georgian.
So who were these people?
The ones we failed.
So, the mortuary's big
enough for both of you?
Actually, I enjoyed Gabriel's company.
He comes at things
from a different angle.
You've changed your tune.
They say it's our contradictions
that make us fascinating.
Ah.
What is it?
Velvy's traced all UK
clinics still offering RK.
And it looks like
we have an ID for Body Three.
Maeve Tooney, 20.
Hmm.
How did she die?
Maeve died from a single stab
wound to the abdomen, Mrs Tooney.
She's always been headstrong,
but after her brother disappeared
Your son?
Yeah, Robbie.
He got sucked into trouble.
Bad people, drugs.
I've lost him.
Lost him?
He started living at
this house with them.
About a month ago, I saw him
on the street, I called out to him,
but they took him away,
to sell their poison.
I haven't seen him since. He's 16.
- Do the police know?
- Mm.
I were down at the police station
every day, pulling my hair out.
"We're sorry, Mrs Tooney,
we'll keep an eye out."
They'd only just lost
their dad last year.
Maeve
My bright star.
She was always fine, but
Robbie needed his dad, you know.
He was an easy target for that gang.
He'd do anything if you
said you'd be his friend.
When did you last see Maeve?
Um
Two weeks ago, we'd had an argument.
Just usual mother-daughter crap.
I thought she was staying with friends,
but when I asked, nobody'd seen her.
Did you report her missing?
Course I did.
But "resources".
She was holding this when we found her.
That's Robbie's.
His first communion.
How did she get that?
I'm sorry, Mrs Tooney, it's evidence.
- Well, how come she had it?
- I don't know.
Where's she been all this time?
Has somebody been
looking after her, or?
The police are investigating.
They'd like to come round to your house.
The police are not
setting foot in my house.
I begged them for help,
and they did nothing.
But if we want to learn how
Maeve came to be on the lorry,
then the police need to
be able to do their job.
I'll do it if you're there.
Tell them to take
their bloody shoes off.
Had to get rid of the telly.
Eye surgery don't come cheap.
Anything for your kids though, eh?
Can I get you a cup
of tea, Dr Alexander?
Oh, I'd love one, Mrs Tooney. Thanks.
Maeve's room upstairs?
Yeah.
Big sis was his protector.
But from what?
I remember where I
used to hide my secrets.
What sort of secrets, Mr Hodgson?
A lifelong love of Linfield FC
and an addiction to
ultra-strong liquorice.
Yeah, right.
I used to hide Sweet Valley High books
and lemon sherbets under my bed.
I left Sweet Valley behind,
but I'm still a sucker for sherbets.
Right.
She had a mother who loved her.
How'd she end up on that lorry?
Her dad died, her brother
got in with a shit crowd.
She was angry, vulnerable.
Find anything?
What have you got?
Cannabis resin?
Oh, what is that?
Mm. Something sweet and sickly.
It's pungent.
It's a strain called Vanilla Kush,
comes from Afghanistan.
Knowledge gleaned in a professional
capacity, of course.
Mm-hm.
I think I know where
she might have got it,
a trap house not far from here.
I'll check it out.
Look at this.
- That's not Maeve's handwriting.
- Mm.
Then whose is it?
Thanks, Mrs Tooney.
I'll get you answers
about your children, Mrs Tooney.
That's a promise.
I've two teens myself.
They drive me nuts,
but I'd die if I lost them.
We have an ID on the male survivor.
He's on the PNC.
William Sturton, 19,
low level drug dealer.
His current address is a
youth probation hostel.
Looks like he was
involved with the trafficking.
- Jack, you OK to come with me?
- Mm-hm.
Typically we're a sort of halfway house
for young offenders just out of prison.
But Will was never in prison.
No, but he's got a criminal
record a mile long, little bastard.
Drugs, shoplifting, theft.
Really, between us, he was dumped
here when he got too old for care.
We need to search Will's room.
Yeah.
What's a typical day for Will?
Sleep till noon,
then head out to sell drugs.
He's meant to be supervised.
He is, yeah, and under curfew,
but how am I meant to enforce
it when we're a skeleton staff
and half my team are
signed off with stress?
I assume this is how he left the room?
Well, we didn't come in
to stage a dirty protest.
Looks like he left in a hurry.
Which is exactly what I told the
police when I reported him missing.
I walked in, he was coming
off the phone to someone
Yeah.
- Sounded serious.
- Yeah.
Right, I'm on my way.
He rummaged through that pad,
found a piece of paper
and bolted straight past me.
I'll need to take this.
Any idea who called him?
I have 27 boys here,
I don't know their social diaries.
Do you know who Will sold drugs for?
He'd never tell me.
Besides, there's a
dozen gangs around here,
it's one of our finest exports.
You must know that.
So he was low-level, just a runner?
Will was basically a snotty little kid,
as scared and angry as the rest of them.
He was being used. It's what they do.
What are you doing?
Not sure yet.
Looks like he was hiding a laptop.
Any idea what we'll find on it?
He's a 19-year-old boy.
What do you think?
Oi.
What happened to this place?
I don't know.
It was a trap house,
you know that and I know that.
When did they pack up and leave?
I don't know.
Ever seen her hanging out,
buying Vanilla Kush?
No.
What about him?
How do you know him?
- I never said I did.
- Oi.
Wait. Wait a minute!
OK, just deep breaths.
Deep breaths.
OK. It's OK. It's OK.
We found a fingerprint on the
Post-it note from Maeve's wall.
It matches William Sturton,
the male survivor.
So maybe it was Will's phone number?
I went to a trap house that Maeve
most likely bought the drugs from.
It was abandoned, but
there was a kid hanging around
who recognised Will's picture.
He was scared, but not of Will.
So if Maeve had his number and
she got on that lorry with him,
it has to be the connection.
He befriended her, groomed her.
Maybe that's his role in all this.
I'm looking for my brother.
I can help you.
Any luck with the laptop
you found hidden in Will's room?
Did you get into the hard drive?
It's encrypted, but we're working on it.
- May I take a look?
- Knock yourself out.
Maybe Will wanted to get
out of the country too,
to escape the county lines gang?
I'm thinking of going back to
the quarry, have another look.
The Georgian female, Ketevan,
is well enough to be interviewed.
I'll see if she can tell us
anything about Will.
Hello, Ketevan.
I found this lot at a shop near me.
Gozinaki.
Traditional Georgian biscuits, right?
Can you write down what happened
..in the truck?
We're just trying to help you, Ketevan.
You're safe.
It's all right. She's stressed.
I'm sorry, given her condition,
this will have to wait.
There's a degree of hypertrophic
change with some patchy scarring.
Natia suffered from cardiomyopathy.
Would she have known she had it?
Possibly. Any symptoms?
Breathlessness, swelling
of the legs, ankles and feet,
rapid heartbeat, chest discomfort.
But there was no medication
on her or in the lorry.
What about the tin you found?
Jack said there were
traces of powder in it.
Oh, yes.
Captopril.
It's an ACE inhibitor.
There's no record of a prescription.
Well, she wasn't meant
to be in the country,
she probably used an online pharmacy.
Well, thank God for the internet.
I'm not sure God has much to
do with the internet, Velvy.
I don't know.
It's a gateway to the soul.
And to food I never knew existed.
Careful, too many
10pm Curry King deliveries,
and you'll be buying yourself a new
wardrobe.
No, I won't.
Because, thanks to the internet,
I've also signed myself up
for four different exercise classes.
Who knew spinning was a thing?
So you're finding new friends?
Friends?
The spin class is full of heavy
metal fans, it's all we listen to.
They are pretty friendly, though.
Maybe friendship creeps up on
you when you're not looking.
So, if Natia ran out of
ACE inhibitors on the lorry,
then death could have occurred
through fatal arrhythmogenesis.
The stress of the
assault could have triggered
a fatal cardiac arrhythmia.
Jack, where are you?
I'm back at the quarry,
but nothing so far.
OK. Well, Torres has got CCTV
of the truck on the motorway.
I'll let you know what we find.
OK, great. Call me back.
Right. Here's our lorry.
Take a look at this blue car.
The only other footage
is from eight miles away.
Lorry.
Blue car.
Then both vehicles disappear
not far from where the lorry was found.
- So someone was following the lorry.
- Mm.
- Any ID on the car?
- Not yet.
The footage is pretty poor quality.
The reg plate is indecipherable.
We're working on an enhancement.
You're safe now, love.
There's a police
officer coming to talk to you.
Oh, could you hold on just one minute?
I doubt you'll have much luck either,
unless you've got
major Derren Brown skills.
Your DS has been trying to
question the two women.
Hasn't got a word out of either of them.
What, nothing?
I say keep at it
until you get the evil bastards.
But the consultants say that's
enough questioning for today.
Oi!
What are you doing here?
Who are you working for?
Who sent you?
You stupid prick!
Three people died in that truck!
Bollocks.
I found this reflective plate
at the bottom of the quarry.
There's one missing on our lorry.
This could be it.
Hello?
There's a faint shoe print.
Could belong to whoever
was in the blue car.
Ah!
What was that?
- Cara?
- She scared the life out of me.
What
- I thought someone was dying!
- I thought someone was breaking in.
He thought someone was dying.
She thought someone was breaking in.
She's my niece.
Oh.
Hi.
Criminology?
She wants to study criminology.
Oh, God.
Me?
Nikki, can you bring in the deceased
shoe prints on my desk, please?
Thanks.
That looks like a match to me.
Marcus Tilman, the driver.
No surprise there.
At least it proves he stepped
out of the lorry at the quarry.
This is driving me mad.
In his postmortem,
I found an incision that could've
been from a Hickman line.
I think he'd had chemo
for oesophageal cancer.
A side-effect of chemotherapy
can be weakening of the bones.
It explains the left
supracondylar humeral fracture
that I also found during his postmortem.
The fracture damaged his median nerve.
I assumed that it had caused
minimal loss of function,
but what if he'd suffered
almost total motor loss?
So he might not have been able to
drive a seven and a half ton lorry?
Not like we saw in the CCTV.
If he wasn't the driver
..who was?
Hey!
Hey!
Stop! Get security!
I've reason to believe
that William Sturton
is the woman's trafficker.
He needs to be placed
in a police secure room
nowhere near the victims.
He's gone.
What?
- When?
- Just now.
Our security are after him.
Tell them to contain, not apprehend.
Well, he won't survive for
long without medical care.
He's got kidney failure!
Well, we'd better get him
back then, hadn't we?
DI Torres, I need urgent assistance
at the Royal Byfield hospital.
William Sturton,
19-year-old male, has absconded.
He headed back there.
He's got maybe ten minutes on us.
Clear!
Will?
Will?
Ah!
Shit.
It's all right. It's all right.
I'm police.
You're safe.
Please, let me go.
You need medical help. You're sick!
Help!
Ugh!
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