“Did you see that car/ jacket/ bracelet, etc?” they ask and you rack your brain, feeling as if you really must answer. The photofits can be fascinating, and not just because you recognise someone. “Look at that silly goatee,” you say to the other person on the couch.Eight million people watch Crimewatch, though, and it’s not just for curiosity’s sake Perhaps we watch for the same reason we play the lottery. Others find it the thin end of the real-crime-as-drama wedge It is not the easiest of subjects to write about It is tempting to poke fun at it.

Even fictional police characters, such as Prime Suspect’s Jane Tennison, go on it to solve their toughest cases.Some say Crimewatch is public service broadcasting at its best. Over the years it has become an institution, featuring 1,742 cases and resulting in 603 arrests.The presenter, Nick Ross, has been there since the beginning and must get exhausted by people quoting back to him his catch-phrase about not having nightmares. It began in 1984 and next Tuesday it goes on air with its 150th programme. This is not a movie set, though there is a cameraman who says “darling” a great deal and a man in charge of “moonlight”. But this is a crime scene first and a film set by happenstance. The resulting six minutes of television will not be a drama but a reconstruction.

This is Crimewatch.
I feel as if that sentence should be followed by dramatic music, but music, dramatic or otherwise, is just one of the things never allowed on Crimewatch. This is a rat’s tunnel, barely 3ft wide, with sides of sheet metal and wood that are at least 8ft high It is a dead end No one could escape, even in a movie

It is scary here, even if you are not alone I am here with about 10 people and I’m still shivering And not just because it’s raining. It is dark and raining, and I am standing in an alleyway just off a suburban street in Selly Oak near Birmingham The alley is an L- shape. The first bit is close to the street and has a security light, but then you turn and suddenly feel extremely vulnerable. It could be called “The AH Files” and subtitled “The bloody thing must be out there”.Maybe Saddam’s a plane-spotter specialising in Stealth bombers. And the only way he could tick it off was to kick out the weapons inspectors. So on the first night of the bombing, he was on the roof of his palace screaming “Got it at last.”.