Right from the start, the events that led to Andrew Malkinson’s imprisonment for rape were absurd. It was summer 2003 when police pulled over the motorbike on which the then-37-year-old was riding pillion – the exchange, according to a local reporter, Neal Keeling, was “quite amicable”. Weeks later, those same officers received a description of an attacker from a woman who had been raped. For some strange reason, they recalled their brief encounter with Malkinson and decided he fit the bill. Malkinson was put into a police lineup, then a courtroom, then prison – for 17 years. Truly, though, he was transported into what he calls a “parallel nightmare world”, where he remained until last year, when his conviction was finally overturned.
In The Wrong Man: 17 Years Behind Bars, Malkinson eloquently guides us through his descent into this bizarre hellscape. He willingly attended the police lineup he believed would clear his name, only to be positively identified by the victim. Oddly, two members of the public also claimed to have seen Malkinson near the scene of the crime, which took place on a motorway embankment in Salford in the early hours. He was found guilty by a jury and given a life sentence. He spent his jail time “hypervigilant” against violent attacks – yet he was always hopeful that something would come to light that proved his innocence.
