Previous Convictions

Previous Convictions begins with a disaster. A Royal Air Force Jet Provost trainer crashes into a crowded moto-cross event and kills 22 people. One of them is a friend of Kavanagh's son. Matt Kavanagh is taking part in the event, according to TVDB.

The RAF corporal responsible for maintenance commits suicide, and in a note he pins the blame on his lover, Charlotte Sinclair, played by Amanda Ryan. She is tried for theft and conspiracy to murder. Wikipedia asks the question that the trial must answer: was it sabotage or human error?

TVDB fills in the corporal's story. The mechanic, Nicholas Coveney, had discovered that Charlotte was having an affair with another man, Francois Baudin. He was preoccupied, and negligent in servicing the jet. When he found technical drawings and plans of the base in her flat, he realised that he had been used to further the political ends of Charlotte and Francois.

Kavanagh agrees to defend a woman who is arguably the most hated in the country. His grieving son protests, which turns a legal question into a family one. Kavanagh has to uncover documents that were initially denied to the court.

Stephen Churchett wrote the film, and Tristram Powell directed. The cast includes Jude Akuwudike as Matthew Atta, Niall Buggy as Francis Durden, Penny Downie as Mrs Rosalind McEnery, Candida Benson as Vicky and Joe Alessi as Walter, with Oliver Ford Davies as Peter Foxcott QC and Daisy Bates and Tom Brodie as Kate and Matt.

Wikipedia's cast list shows John Thaw, Oliver Ford Davies, Nicholas Jones, Cliff Parisi, Geraldine James, Tom Brodie and Daisy Bates all in the fifth series, which is the last in which Kavanagh has a regular cast around him; Valerie Edmond's Emma Taylor, the junior of the fourth series, has gone.

The film was shown on Monday 8 March 1999, the first of the four in the fifth and last regular series. Central Television made it for ITV. Wikipedia gives its audience as 10.67 million viewers, the highest of the series' figures that it records; the other three films of the series drew 10.29, 9.56 and 9.39 million.

IMDb voters give it 8.2 out of 10.

According to Wikipedia, the episode ends with a magic trick and a poetry recitation at a celebratory dinner at the Middle Temple, though the summary does not state the verdict.

The summaries do not say whether Charlotte is convicted, so the account does not either.