Wrong Time, Wrong Place - Part 2

Dalziel is on bail and excluded from the investigation of the killing he is suspected of. The Radio Times summary for this part states the second half in one line, that Dalziel finds himself on the run from Dutch police in the climax to yesterday's story, and the BBC's summary is that he goes on the run and tries to prove his innocence. The listings synopsis has him released on strict bail conditions and vanishing the instant an opportunity arises.

Pascoe runs the enquiry from the British side with the Dutch police. The listings synopsis for this part says he learns from the British Consul in Amsterdam that Tracey Baxter was a police witness who had been relocated under a witness protection programme, which explains why she was in the city and what her death may have been intended to prevent. The body found in the canal on the day the British party arrived is identified in the same account as a missing British national and connected to the case. The strands named by the BBC's guide for the story, a missing young Muslim British woman, the murder of a Sheffield Wednesday supporter, illegal diamond dealing and police corruption, are drawn together in this part. The listings synopsis describes the conclusion as a realisation that the police are involved in a turf war over smuggled blood diamonds from West Africa, with someone inside the police force tampering with the evidence in the murder case. Wikipedia's synopsis for the story ends on a third piece of violence, with Dalziel witnessing the shooting of one of the Netherlands' most notorious diamond smugglers.

The published material establishes the story's subject, a witness protection failure, smuggled diamonds and a corrupt officer working against the enquiry, and states that Dalziel clears himself by finding out what happened rather than through the Dutch process. It does not identify the corrupt officer, does not name the killer of Tracey Baxter, does not state how the smuggled diamonds are connected to the death, or describe the closing scene, so those outcomes are not recorded here.

The story is the sixth of Series 10 and the second night of the Amsterdam case. Its construction is the series' most unusual, because the detective being investigated is also the detective doing the investigating, and the two roles are conducted in different countries by different forces. The witness protection failure is the detail that makes the case cohere, since the woman in the flat was a relocated witness and the men who wanted her dead had access to the arrangements.

Warren Clarke plays a man working a case from outside the police, and the episode gets its tension from the fact that every person he would normally ask for help is either investigating him or in another country. Colin Buchanan's Pascoe is the one holding the official inquiry together while his superior is on the run, and the story is arranged so that the two of them are doing the same investigation from opposite ends with no way of comparing notes.