Death of a Son

Death of a Son opened the fifth season of Screen Two productions on Sunday, January 8th 1989, and starred the late Oscar-nominated and award winning actress Lynn Redgrave (Georgy Girl, The Virgin Soldiers), and Malcolm Storry (Firefox, Under Suspicion) as Pauline and Ray Williams. In 1986 Pauline Williams, a Luton housewife, became the first person in Britain ever to bring a successful private prosecution for manslaughter. The story begain in 1982 when John Williams, Pauline and Rays 19 year old son, died from an overdose of the drug Palfium. In spite of the inquest jurys verdict of unlawful killing, the Director of Public Prosecutions ruled that charges were not to be brought against the drug dealer who injected John with the fatal overdose. Both Pauline and Ray found this ruling impossible to accept, and so began a remarkable individual battle. Death of a Son is the powerful and moving stroy of what happened to the Williams family; of how Pauline took on the full weight of the British medical and legal establishment - and won. For after three years of campaigning and studying, Pauline finally proved to the DPP that there was a case of manslaughter to answer.