Featured Image Credit: PA Handout / ITV
Topics: Crime, Martin Freeman, True Crime, TV and Film, TV, ITV
Michael Slavin
Topics: Crime, Martin Freeman, True Crime, TV and Film, TV, ITV
A Martin Freeman ITV drama has dropped on Netflix which will see viewers revisiting the tragic murder of Sian O’Callaghan.
Sian was killed in 2011, however she initially went missing following a night out in Swindon.
She went missing on 19 March, and her body was found 24 March.
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The drama follows Freeman as Detective Steve Fulcher, the real-life man who led the investigation into Sian’s disappearance.
The drama, called A Confession, sees Fulcher leading the search for the young woman who was just 22 at the time of her death.
Shockingly, the show - and real-life case – uncovered not just the murder of Sian, but an additional woman.
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When Fulcher was able to get a confession out of taxi driver Christopher Halliwell and taken to where he hid Sian’s body, he was taken to a site in Eastleigh, Gloucestershire, where he shows detectives the body of the missing Becky Godden-Edwards.
Becky was a young sex worker tragically killed, who had been missing for roughly eight years.
When discussing playing the role of Fulcher, Martin Freeman focused on one controversial decision of his.
When Fulcher found Halliwell, he did not read him his rights, provide him a lawyer, or take him to a police stations, and instead took advantage of emergency powers to compel him to admit to the murders.
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He said he wanted to speak to him ‘man-to-man’ as he believed there was an imminent threat to life.
Freeman said: “His whole argument is that unless you know someone’s dead, they might be alive.
“Even when the percentage of likelihood goes down and down and down as the days go on. And I totally respect that.
“The question he always asks is if it were your son or daughter, what would you want people to do? I have no other answer for that other than what he did.
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“He didn’t take Christopher Halliwell into a room and kick him. He didn’t frame him up. He didn’t put words in his mouth.
“If no-one told a civilian that those rules had been breached, we would never know why they were breached. Because it looks reasonable.”
In researching the role, Freeman said: “He struck me as very professional, very high standards, and not a push-over in any way. And probably someone who could drive you mad, actually.
“I don’t think he would ever say ‘that’ll be fine, that’ll do,’ he struck me as someone who would say ‘this will be done the right way’ ironically, given his decisions breached PACE.”
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Fulcher's decisions breached the Police and Crime Evidence act (PACE), though they were still able to secure a conviction of Halliwell.
The case was the end of his career due to his breach of PACE.
Halliwell was found guilty of the murder of Sian O’Callaghan in 2012, and sentenced to life in prison.
Whilst Halliwell was originally not charged with the murder of Becky Godden, he was later found guilty and given a whole life order – meaning he is not eligible for parole and will likely die in prison.