INVESTIGATION: The forensic expert and the parents accused of murder
The Story
The Times
3.9 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 13 October 2025
⏱️ 34 minutes
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Summary
The Times has uncovered cases of parents accused of killing their babies, based in part on testimony from a forensic expert who claimed to find evidence of harm. But serious concerns have now been raised about his conclusions by judges and other specialist pathologists. What happens if the expert gets it wrong?
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Guest: James Beal, Deputy Investigations Editor, The Times.
Host: Manveen Rana.
Producers: Micaela Arneson, Olivia Case.
Read more:
- Miscarriage of justice fears over expert’s evidence in baby death trials
- ‘Two nightmares at once’: the mothers accused over their babies’ deaths
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| 1:19.5 | Losing a child is commonly thought to be the worst thing that anybody can go through. |
| 1:22.6 | The death of a child is a tragedy, but when a parent is accused of being involved, it becomes a horror. |
| 1:31.5 | The Times has been investigating cases where parents have been accused of playing a role in their child's death, |
| 1:39.4 | based largely on evidence given by a widely respected forensic expert. |
| 1:45.0 | But what happens when the expert gets it wrong? |
| 1:53.0 | In our legal system, either a parent has played a role in their child's death, |
| 1:58.0 | something that people find heinous and horrifying. Or the parent has |
| 2:02.5 | suffered a double injustice. First, they've lost their child, and then they've been accused |
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