Proof of Life

"Proof of Life" is a two-part storyline from the long-running Thames Television series The Bill to celebrate the 25th anniversary of its pilot, "Woodentop". Both episodes came as part of a crossover with the German police drama SOKO Leipzig. It serves as the 79th and 80th episode of The Bill 24th series, and as the season premiere for season 10 of Leipzig Homicide. While The Bill rendition aired in November 2008, Leipzig Homicide did not air until September 2009. The episodes were filmed in English, and dubbed into German for broadcast on ZDF. A different edit was shown in each country. Prelude The events of the two-parter are built up to in The Bill's previous two episodes, Walk on By and In Deep. The first of those saw the return of Florence Bell as Holly Perkins, the daughter of DC Terry Perkins, who was last seen in 2006. Holly tried in vain to help a dying teenager stabbed to death on her bus, and her help in solving the murder case saw her tell Terry she wanted to join the police force. In the second of those episodes, Terry was troubled by Holly's comments as he investigated a woman who was dumped out of a car outside the hospital who had several bags of cocaine on her person. Terry and DC Mickey Webb learned she had been buying off taxi manager Alan Brady, so Terry was sent undercover by DCI Jack Meadows at the company, Thompson & Ray. After impressing Brady by rescuing him from his drugs supplier's thugs, Terry was asked to work on a "big job" a day later. Synopsis The day of the "big job" dawned when DC Terry Perkins was asked to drive Brady to the riverside, where he abducted a teenage girl at gunpoint. Back at Sun Hill, Superintendent John Heaton alerted DCI Meadows to events when a police director in Germany told them a German woman staying in a London hotel, Helen Wegner, had reported her daughter Charlotte Fischer missing. When Jack arrived to the hotel with DCs Mickey Webb and Kezia Walker, they met Leipzig based officers Hajo Trautzschke and Ina Zimmermann, who had flown in at Helen's request alongside her husband Karl. When CCTV showed Terry near the abduction, Jack arranged a raid on Thompson & Ray, where Alan Brady was arrested. However, Charlotte had already been taken by company boss Jimmy Thompson (Ian Burfield) to Piccadilly Circus.