Keeper of Souls (2)

Two accusations of child abuse, made against an Edward Parker in children's homes, and both cases thrown out without conviction. The cases were thrown out for want of evidence, a phrase Jane has learned to distrust. That is the kind of record that either means nothing or means everything, and Jane Tennison has learned to bet on the second option. She starts to wonder whether the man at the centre of the murk is actually Edward Parker Jones, and pulls at the name until it gives.

The deeper she goes, the less the dead youth's case looks like a single crime. What surfaces is a larger paedophile ring. And the corruption does not stop at the front door of the force; the misconduct runs dangerously close to the police's own ranks. The question of who is investigating whom stops being a joke. The youth's death, the accusations in the children's homes, the ring: the connections keep leading back into the ranks. Jane keeps going anyway, because somebody has to, and because a case file that keeps getting buried is a case file that matters.

Lynda La Plante wrote it and David Drury directed, for transmission on 20 December 1993. Helen Mirren's Jane is supported by Karen Tomlin as WPC Norma Hastings, Andrew Woodall as DI Brian Dalton, Tom Bell as DS Bill Otley, Richard Hawley as DS Richard Haskons, Philip Wright as DC Lillie, Mark Drewry as DI Ray Hebdon, Liza Sadovy as WPC Kathy Bibby, Struan Rodger as Supt Halliday and David Thewlis as James Jackson.

It is hard material, and the show does not soften it. The veneer of justice gets badly scratched in these two hours, and not all the scratches come from outside. Tennison has never needed a clean room to work in, only a door she can open.