Crimewatch presenter Jill Dando wrapped up filming a new series with the BBC but only the first episode made it to screens after it was dropped following her murder
Days after Jill Dando was tragically shot on her doorstep, the BBC announced its decision to pull her last TV series.
Today marks a quarter of a century since the much-loved presenter was gunned down outside of her home in Fulham, South-West London. Jill was among the most famous journalists of the ’90s and fronted hit shows such as Crimewatch and Holiday.
Before the newsreader was killed at the age of 37 on Monday, April 26, 1999, she had filmed and wrapped up her last series with the BBC. Tragically, it made its debut on television the day before she was murdered, but the rest of the episodes never got aired.
The show, called Antiques Inspectors, saw Jill lead a team of antiques experts around the UK in search of hidden treasures and forgotten heirlooms. It combined her history of presenting investigative series with travel programmes. The first episode aired on Sunday, April 25, 1999, with the next episode due to hit screens the following weekend.
But the decision was made to drop the show after talks between the BBC and Jill’s family. A BBC spokesman said at the time: “I don’t think we have any plans to show them at a later date.” An episode of Antiques Roadshow filled the designated slot instead. An edition of Crimewatch File, narrated by Jill, was also pulled from schedules on the Wednesday after her death.
Twenty-five years after Jill’s murder, Antiques Inspectors has never been aired and her murder has still not been solved. But this week, a Mirror investigation prompted a crucial witness to identify Serbian hitman Milorad Ulemek as the man she saw “running for his life” from the direction of the crime just minutes after Jill was killed.
She also identified him as the man she saw in CCTV footage from nearby Putney Bridge Tube station, which was shown to her by police weeks after the murder. A report by a facial recognition expert found there were “no differences” between the man in the CCTV image, captured around 30 minutes after her death, and the Serb assassin.
Former specialist CCTV officer at Essex Police, Emi Polito, who was commissioned by the Mirror to compare the CCTV still of ‘Man X’ to images of Ulemek, wrote: “I could find no significant differences that would permit the elimination of [Ulemek] as a candidate for Man X.” He said the low-quality photo gave “limited support” but could not discount the possibility.
Barry George was arrested in 2000 and spent eight years in jail for Jill’s murder, before being released in 2008 when he was unanimously acquitted following a retrial.
Jill’s brother Nigel Dando, who took part in the Netflix series about her unsolved murder last year, is unsure if he believes Mr George did it. In a new interview, he told The Independent: “I don’t know. Who knows? One jury thought he did. Another jury in a retrial acquitted him.”
But Nigel still has a small ounce of hope that an eyewitness or perpetrator will come forward with new information and finally solve the cold case. Nigel said that “even after 25 years, although I’m not holding out too much hope, they may just suffer a prick of conscience and put their hands up and say, ‘Yeah, it was me’.”
- The Murder of Jill Dando airs on BBC Two tonight at 9pm.
