Trial & Retribution II (2)

The second half of the Morton story leaves the incident room behind and lets the lawyers fight it out. The case against him now has something solid underneath it: the severed breasts of the dead women, found on his own business premises. Survivor Marilyn Stark's identification of him carries a weight it did not have before, and the trial is on.

Morton is defended by Corinna Maddox, known as Batwoman for her tenacity, and she earns the nickname. Opposite her sits Rupert Halliday, a prosecutor described as supercilious but wily, which turns out to be a useful combination. Halliday's best line of attack is Cindy herself, Morton's put-upon wife, who has spent years tolerating him bringing his young mistress home. But the question that keeps the courtroom humming is whether her composure is real, or whether she is quietly handing her husband a false alibi. Watching her hold herself together under that pressure is one of the most uncomfortable things in the episode.

Lynda La Plante and Vaughan Kinghan wrote it; Aisling Walsh directed. The police side is the same team as the first night, Kate Buffery's North, Dorian Lough's Satchell, Daniel Ryan's Brown, and the rest of them, with Deborah Findlay's Jill Ashton keeping the paperwork honest. Everyone in the squad room knows how much rides on that identification, and how easily a good defence can unpick it. For all the courtroom fireworks, the grimmest detail stays in the background: the women who did not survive to give evidence. David Hayman's Walker hovers around the edges, the way he does, a man who has done his job and now has to watch other people do theirs.

What sticks with you is how little comfort anyone gets. The trial grinds on, the lawyers circle, and the truth, whatever it is, has to fight for air. That is the show at its most patient, and it works.