Kathleen Fearn was the duty solicitor assigned to Ashley Peacock when he was questioned regarding the murder of wife Maxine and the brutal assault on Emily Bishop in January 2003, both crimes committed by Richard Hillman although no one knew this at the time.
DI Mannery, assisted by DC Holker, conducted a wholly unsympathetic interrogation of a grief-stricken Ashley, insinuating that he had a drink problem and, stating that he was no oil painting, asking blatantly if Ashley had paid money for a beautiful woman like Maxine to marry him. Holker asked if Maxine had anyone else on the side. Kathleen demanded a break from the questioning but Mannery initially refused. When a recess did occur, Kathleen tried to assure Ashley that everything would be all right but he himself was close to breaking point. The officers returned to say that Ashley could go as they had a new suspect - Aidan Critchley who, set up by Richard, had been found squatting in the vacant hardware shop on Victoria Street and arrested with items from the Peacocks' house in his possession, all of them planted by Hillman.