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UK Forensic Breakthroughs

2026Series

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Murder cases explained through the science that changed them

UK Forensic Breakthroughs examines ten British murder investigations in which scientific evidence played a decisive role. Presented by forensic scientist Jo Millington, the TRUE CRIME series is produced by Monster Films. Millington brings experience across policing, government and private practice to a programme built around the work usually taking place beyond public view.

The production combines access to forensic scientists and laboratories with testimony from detectives and specialists who worked on the cases. Its subjects include ballistics, fibre analysis, forensic ecology and fire investigation. Rather than treating forensics as one universal technique, it looks at the different questions each specialism can help answer.

Microscopic evidence and investigative turning points

Among the announced cases are a Witney murder investigation involving the first UK use of fibre mapping and a Cornwall case concerning a serial arsonist. These examples connect tiny physical traces with larger reconstructions of events, showing why a laboratory finding can become a turning point for detectives.

The broadcaster describes the series as ten real UK cases and pairs scientific explanation with the experiences of the people involved in solving them. Millington's role links the technical procedures to the investigative story: how evidence was located, what it could establish and why its significance mattered to a particular case.

Episodes

S01 · E01

Fibre Analysis Breakthrough

The story of Edwin Hiles, who was found murdered in his home. Tiernan Coyle's pioneering fibre mapping technique linked Paul Weedon to the crime.

S01 · E02

Fire at the Crime Scene

The story of Karen Pedley, who was hailed a hero after a 1983 fire, but later became a serial arsonist across Cornwall. Forensic investigators linked years of blazes to her.

S01 · E03

Digital Death

Special-needs teacher Jane Longhurst visited the flat of Graham Coutts, a guitarist and part-time salesman, in March of 2003 and never left.

S01 · E04

Crime Scene Clean Up

Kim Banyard was the mother of a ten-week-old baby boy. In 2003, she went to a party at a friend's house, and it was the last time anyone outside her own home saw her alive.

S01 · E05

Blood Spatter in the Stairwell

The story of Terry Edmonds, who had ambitions to become a midwife. In 2006, she boarded the train home, stepped off onto the platform, and was never seen alive again.

S01 · E06

DNA In the Outback

The tragic story of Peter Falconio, who was murdered while travelling with his girlfriend Joanne Lees through the vast emptiness of Australia's Northern Territory.

S01 · E07

Language of Murder

The story of a fatal stabbing outside a Gloucester nightclub, which lead detectives into gang culture, where forensic linguistics deciphered coded conversations.

Episode descriptions: TVmaze · CC BY-SA 4.0

Film details

Format
Documentary series
Release year
2026
Premiere date
2026-09-22
Production companies
Monster Films
Language
English
Episode runtime
60 min

Catalogue information: TVmaze · CC BY-SA 4.0