Victims

Jake Barratt is a good copper, and this week the show asks what happens when a good copper lets a case get under his skin. The victim of a street robbery turns out to be Adela Baker, played by Sheila Gish, and Barratt falls for her in the way that only a man who spends his days dealing with the worst of people can. You can see it coming a mile off, and the episode does not pretend otherwise. The investigation stays professional. The feelings do not.

Peter Hammond and Terence Feely wrote it, Christopher Hodson directed, and the episode went out on 26 November 1982. It is a modest story, closer to a character study than a puzzle, and the show is right to give it room. Adela Baker is not a damsel waiting to be rescued, which is exactly why she unsettles him. Paul Moriarty plays Barratt with the right mix of competence and vulnerability; the man can run an inquiry and still not see the hole he is digging for himself.

Around him the usual machine keeps turning. Maggie, Russell, Croft and Mike Turnbull all have their moments, and WPC Evans, played by Jean Hastings, gets a look-in that suggests the station knows more about Barratt's state than he does. The two youths picked up in connection with the robbery, played by Tony London and Sylvester Williams, remind everyone that the victim's story is not the only one in the file. The episode is called 'Victims', plural, and the title earns its s.

The episode understands that the victim is the one the system is supposed to serve, and it refuses to let Barratt's crush crowd her out. That is the decent thing, and the show does it without making a speech about it. It ends quietly, and the quiet feels right. But Barratt will be fine; whether Adela is, the episode leaves open.