 |
Samantha Poling is a Scottish investigative journalist working for BBC Scotland and BBC Panorama. [1]
|
Samantha Poling is a Scottish investigative journalist working for BBC Scotland and BBC Panorama. [1]
Raised in Helensburgh, [2] after graduation Poling joined the Northumberland Gazette in Alnwick as a trainee reporter. [2] She returned to Scotland in 1995, working on the Helensburgh Advertiser. [2]
In 1996, she moved to the national press, covering stories such as the Dunblane massacre and reporting from Paris on the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. [1] [2]
In 1998 she joined BBC Scotland, and later became the channel's Health Correspondent. [1] She still works for the channel on BBC Scotland Investigates .
In 2002 she moved into investigative journalism, making the film The Untouchable about a senior police officer who had raped and stalked women who he had met through his work. He was later jailed for 12 years for the attacks. [1] She then joined Frontline, making investigative films, including the award-winning Critical Error which investigated overdoses in radiotherapy treatment for cancer patients in hospitals around the UK, which prompted changes in the way radiotherapy dosages are delivered. [1] She later spent time in Iraq filming a documentary about the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, and travelled to India to examine the call centre industry for a programme about banking. [1]
In 2004, Poling made the multi-award-winning film Security Wars, in which she went undercover to expose a cartel of gunmen and convicted murderers involved in lucrative national security contracts. The film forced the legislative tightening-up of security legislation, and won Poling the first of her three BAFTAs. [1]
In October 2012, Poling filmed Britain’s Private War, which exposed flaws in G4S's security vetting procedures. These directly led to contractor Daniel Fitzsimons killing Paul McGuigan from Peebles and Australian Darren Hoare in a vodka-fuelled squabble, only 36 hours after he had arrived in Baghdad's highly securitised Green Zone. [3]
In 2018 she interviewed Iain Packer for a documentary on the BBC Scotland program Disclosure, Packer denied the murder of Emma Caldwell and stated that he had never been violent towards women. [4] Within days of the documentary being broadcast, one of his former partners went to the police to complain that Packer had pushed her onto a bed, put his hands around her throat, choked her to her injury, and to danger of life. [4] Packer later admitted the charge, he was convicted and sentenced to jail for two years. [5] In February 2024 Packer was eventually found guilty of the murder of Caldwell, and of 33 other charges against 22 women. [6] Packer was sentenced to a minimum term of 36 years before he would be able to apply for parole, the second longest sentence in Scottish legal history after Angus Sinclair. [7]
In 2008 she joined BBC Panorama and made the programme Britain's Protection Racket, which exposed the Security Industry Authority as being deeply flawed. [1] She then made Crime Pays while working undercover in 2009, which included an interview with the UK's leading cocaine trafficker telling her how he laundered his money from deals in Estonia, [1] [2] to show how organised crime was defeating government attempts to claw back its profits. [1] Poling won her third BAFTA for the investigation. [2] In 2010, she wrote, filmed and created Can I Sack Teacher?, about the fact that only 18 UK teachers had been struck off for incompetence in the previous 40 years. [1]
In 2011, she exposed petrol-laundering gangs in Northern Ireland, and exposed the quality issues within the surgical instrument manufacturing industry in Pakistan that were supplying in bulk to the National Health Service. [1] In Smoking and the Bandits, she exposed the UK's counterfeit cigarette gangs, was attacked while filming in Barras market, and discovered record levels of toxins in the products. [1]
In 2015, she presented The Dog Factory, a one-off programme about the puppy farm industry for BBC One.
Dame Emma Thompson is a British actress and screenwriter. Her work spans over four decades of screen and stage, and her accolades include two Academy Awards, three BAFTA Awards, two Golden Globe Awards and a Primetime Emmy Award. In 2018, she was made a Dame (DBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for her contributions to drama.
G4S is a British multinational private security company headquartered in London, England. The company was set up in July 2004 when London-based Securicor amalgamated with Danish firm Group 4 Falck. The company offers a range of services, including the supply of security personnel, monitoring equipment, response units and secure prisoner transportation. G4S also works with governments overseas to deliver security services.
A private prison, or for-profit prison, is a place where people are imprisoned by a third party that is contracted by a government agency. Private prison companies typically enter into contractual agreements with governments that commit prisoners and then pay a per diem or monthly rate, either for each prisoner in the facility, or for each place available, whether occupied or not. Such contracts may be for the operation only of a facility, or for design, construction and operation.
Samantha Jane Morton is an English actress. She is known for her work in independent film with dark and tragic themes, in particular period dramas. She is the recipient of numerous accolades, including the BAFTA Fellowship, a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award and nominations for two Academy Awards, a Primetime Emmy Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award.
On 27 November 2000, ten-year-old Nigerian schoolchild Damilola Taylor was killed in London, in what became one of the United Kingdom's most high-profile killings. Two brothers – who were 12 and 13 at the time of the killing – were convicted of manslaughter in 2006.
Panorama is a British current affairs documentary programme broadcast on the BBC. First broadcast in 1953, it is the world's longest-running television news magazine programme.
HM Prison Birmingham is a Category B men's prison in the Winson Green area of Birmingham, England, operated by HM Prison and Probation Service.
Port Phillip Prison is a maximum security prison located at Truganina, Victoria, Australia. It is Victoria's largest maximum security prison, able to accommodate up to 1117 prisoners. The prison is privately operated on behalf of the Government of Victoria by G4S Australia Pty Ltd. The prison is expected to close in December 2025, with prisoners to be relocated to the Western Plains Correctional Centre in Lara.
Holly Marie Willoughby is an English television presenter, author and model. She has presented various television shows for ITV, most notably This Morning (2009–2023) and Dancing on Ice.
Douglas James “Dougie” Henshall is a Scottish television, film and stage actor. He is best known for his roles as Professor Nick Cutter in the science fiction series Primeval (2007–2011) and Detective Inspector Jimmy Pérez in the crime drama Shetland (2013–2022).
John Beckett, Lord Beckett is a Scottish lawyer who was appointed in 2016 as a Senator of the College of Justice, a judge of the Court of Session.
Kate Dickie is a Scottish actress who has appeared in television series, stage plays and films. She is known for her television roles as Lex in the BBC series Tinsel Town (2000–2001) and Lysa Arryn in the HBO series Game of Thrones.
Gu Kailai is a Chinese former lawyer and businesswoman. She is the second wife of former Politburo member Bo Xilai, one of China's most influential politicians until he was stripped of his offices in 2012. In August 2012, Gu was convicted of murdering British businessman Neil Heywood and was given a suspended death sentence, later commuted to life imprisonment in December 2015.
Chris Rogers is a British broadcast journalist specialising in investigative journalism, and news presenter. He is among the long line up of presenters that began their career presenting BBC Newsround moving on to present and report for Sky News including its BAFTA Award-winning coverage of the 9/11 attacks. He then joined the Channel 4 RI:SE presenting team before heading to ITN's ITV News, and ITV's Tonight documentary series, where he presented and reported for London Today, London Tonight, ITV Evening News and produced and fronted numerous investigations for the News at Ten and the Tonight programme as ITV's Investigative Correspondent. He left ITN in 2009 to present BBC News.
Chris Atkins is a British journalist, documentary film maker and best-selling author. He has made several fiction feature films, feature length documentaries and television documentaries, which have received three BAFTA nominations.
Paul Kenyon is a BAFTA-winning journalist and author who has reported from conflict zones around the world for BBC Panorama and has written several books. He made his name confronting criminals in his own prime time TV show on BBC 1.
G4S describes itself as "the world's leading provider of security solutions" and provides security services for over 40 embassies around the world, works as stewards at football stadiums and runs over six British prisons, operates prisoner tagging schemes, assists within the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) in the United Kingdom, and provides administrative roles to the health and education sectors. The company operates as a subsidiary of an American security services provider Allied Universal since April 2021.
Brook House Immigration Removal Centre is a privately managed detention centre in England, operated by Serco on behalf of the Home Office. It is in the grounds of Gatwick Airport, Crawley, West Sussex.
Emma Margaret Marie Tachard-Mackey is a British and French actress. Her breakthrough performance in the Netflix comedy-drama series Sex Education (2019–2023) earned her a British Academy Television Award nomination. Mackey has since starred in the mystery film Death on the Nile (2022) and portrayed Emily Brontë in the drama film Emily (2022). She won the BAFTA Rising Star Award in 2023.
Emma Caldwell was murdered in April 2005 by serial rapist and sex offender, Iain Packer. The investigation of her murder was one of Scotland's longest-running cases, with nineteen years between her death and Packer's imprisonment in 2024 for a minimum term of 36 years. Angela Constance MSP, the Scottish Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Home Affairs, announced that there would be an independent public inquiry into the police handling of the investigation.
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
