In the new Apple TV Plus police procedural drama Criminal Record, two London police detectives are about to begin a rivalry which could affect the entire police force as they know it.
The show is about an open-and-shut murder case investigated a decade ago by DCI Daniel Hegarty (Peter Capaldi), the results of which are brought into question by a new line of inquiry in the modern day by DS June Lenker (Cush Jumbo).
Hegarty doesn't want Lenker ruining his stellar reputation, while Lenker wants to get to the bottom of what's going on, leading to a rivalry between the two. And it all starts here, with the first episode.
Whether you've seen the show and want to catch up on anything you may have missed, or need a reminder before you jump into the second episode, here's our Criminal Record episode 1 recap. Obviously, spoilers ensue.
Meeting our detectives
We begin by meeting Daniel Hegarty, as he drives around the Isle of Dogs. He's acting as both a chauffeur and bodyguard for a well-off young couple and when they ask, he explains that he's a police detective doing this as a side job. The inquisitive couple as him if he's ever seen a dead body, and he tells them a story of a home entry that turned into an accidental murder.
As they drive, they pass a phone box. After they've passed it, a young woman staggers into it, and calls asking for the police.
The next day June Lenker is getting to work at the police station. Her paranoid mother is worried about a van parked outside her house, however, Lenker looks up the registration number, and it's simply a greengrocer's van.
Lenker is assigned a case by her boss, Roy (Ian Bonar). It's to investigate possible domestic violence, initiated by the phone box call we saw at the beginning of the episode. Lenker listens to an audio file of the call between the woman and the operator, Jasmine (Chizzy Akudolu), while watching CCTV footage from the area.
The young woman on the phone tells the operator that her boyfriend is going to kill her, and has threatened her loads. She mentions that her boyfriend killed one of his previous girlfriends, and brags about it a lot, even using the same weapon to threaten her. Apparently, though, another man was sent to Whitecross prison for 24 years for the murder. Before the young woman can say more, she runs away — on the CCTV we see that some cyclists scared her off. She walks into the night.
On a call with Jasmine, Lenker thinks the person was Portuguese or Brazilian based on some phrases used. Lenker thinks the part about the false conviction was all just a lie, but Jasmine is convinced it's true. At her behest, Lenker looks into what the call could have been referring to, and decides it's about a man called Errol Mathis who's serving 24 years in Whitecross prison for murdering Adelaide Burrowes.
Wanting to do her due diligence, Lenker speaks to Ian. He's not convinced but tells her to inform the investigating officer from the initial case just to be safe. However when Lenker says that it's Hegarty, Ian gets nervous. He tells Lenker to just email the man instead.
A visit to Hackney, and retribution
Ignoring this request, Lenker visits Hegarty at his station in Hackney Downs to get a face-to-face meeting. He seems friendly until she explains her investigation, and he tells her that it's probably a prank, because the case was local legend and all the information is in the public domain. He gets very defensive, and when bidding her farewell, seemingly knew that Lenker's boss told her to email instead of visiting in person.
After Lenker leaves, Hegarty has a flashback to some parts of the crime. While this happens, Lenker visits the phone box the call came from. Hegarty also calls a mystery man, telling him about the new investigation and telling him to cover his back, while we see Hegarty disappearing into a mysterious doorway at night.
That evening, Lenker is home with her partner, discussing an off-the-cuff remark Hegarty made about Mathis being a "poor man's OJ". Her partner, a therapist, tells her that she sometimes looks to see offence when none is intended. Lenker also says hello to her son, Jacob.
Hegarty walks his dog that night. When he gets home, someone is sleeping on his sofa. He covers them up.
The next morning, when Lenker goes to work, her log-in isn't working. Ian calls her into his office, where she meets two people from the Professional Standards Department. She's been randomly selected for a spot-check they can do on all police workers, but she knows that this is just a message from Hegarty. He's starting a fight.
That day Lenker visits Sonya Singh (Aysha Kala), who knows a lot about the case. One thing we learn is that Burrowes had bite marks on her, and that she had a son called Patrick who was 6 at the time and was in the house at the time. Singh also knows about Hegarty, and she tells Lenker about the 'Sixty-Twos', a group of policemen led by Hegarty who always looked after each other.
Secrets lay hidden
Our story jumps over to Patrick (Rasaq Kukoyi) as he struggles to tie a tie before his first day of work. His girlfriend helps him, and then he leaves, and we see that he's in a student dorm.
Outside, an older woman is waiting for Patrick, and he's not happy to see her. She's got Matthis on the phone — this is likely the imprisoned man's mother, Doris, who we heard about before — but when Patrick takes the mobile to talk, he instead just hangs up and cycles away.
As he cycles, Patrick gets flashbacks to the night of the murder, of Matthis carrying him out of the house but then them getting into a car crash. Patrick goes to work, and since his new job is as a chef, they tell him to get changed. When he's chopping onions, he gets distracted by his thoughts and accidentally cuts his finger.
Lenker listens to an audio recording of Matthis' interview in which he "confessed" — he later retracted this confession. While we hear the file, we see Matthis in prison giving haircuts to other inmates.
Around the same time, Hegarty takes more chauffeuring jobs. Later, he meets up with a man in a wheelchair called Tony, who used to be another of the Sixty-Twos. Hegarty asks him if there's anything he's been holding onto about the case, anything that Hegarty should know about, but Tony says there isn't.
While Lenker is driving around that evening, the Professional Standards people call her, telling her that there are a few things they've found in their investigation that they need to ask her about. However she gets another call: Jasmine has the woman from before on the line, and we know now that her name is Maria.
Maria is in danger, with her boyfriend trying to kill her, and the police are 18 minutes out. As Lenker is closer, she decides to go to save Maria instead. As she drives, she talks through how Maria can use keys or a toothbrush as self-defense.
However as Lenker approaches the tower block that Maria lives in, a body comes tumbling from one of the upper windows and hits the ground. The woman is dead by the time Lenker gets there.
