A new BBC Scotland documentary will delve deep into the disappearance and murder of Margaret Fleming.
The unique two-part series, Inside the Murder Trial: The Disappearance of Margaret Fleming, will feature exclusive access to the case and the Glasgow High Court trial of Edward Cairney and Avril Jones.
Margaret Fleming was a vulnerable adult understood by authorities to be in the full-time care of Edward Cairney and Avril Jones, living in a remote coastal property in the village of Inverkip.
But when police asked neighbours about Margaret, they were told she hadn’t been seen for nearly 20 years.
(Image: Crown Office)
Just before Christmas in 1999 the then 19 year old Margaret had seemingly disappeared. Yet not one person had reported her missing.
In the murder trial that unfolds across this series, Cairney and Jones stand accused of killing her, disposing of her body and claiming benefits in her name for 16 years.
With remarkable in-court access to a trial that gripped Scotland, this is the story of a prosecution without a body, a community without answers and a young woman without the means to look after herself – lost by a social care system, lost by friends and family and lost to time.
The case will take viewers deep into the inner workings of Scotland’s justice system, its social care system and of a rural community coming to terms with the prospect of a brutal and calculated crime occurring unnoticed in its midst.
(Image: Police Scotland)
(Image: Police)
Filmed by Firecrest Films – the team behind the acclaimed BBC Scotland series Murder Case – this new series was filmed in and beyond the Glasgow High Court as Edward Cairney and Avril Jones faced trial for the murder of Margaret Fleming.
The series will premiere on the BBC Scotland channel followed by BBC Two with dates to be announced in due course.
Patrick Holland, Controller of BBC Two, said: “This is a ground-breaking documentary for BBC Two that takes the audience into the very centre of a trial that gripped a nation. With access to the court, this series will follow the tragic case of Margaret Fleming and the efforts of police and prosecutors to bring her killers to justice.”
