A Witness of Fact the peculiar case of chief forensic pathologist Colin Manock

Due to be published February 2022.

The compelling story of South Australia's disgraced former chief forensic pathologist and the legal scandals in which he became implicated. For nearly three decades, Dr Colin Manock was in charge of South Australia's forensic pathology services, and played a vital role within the state's criminal justice system- in cases of unexpected or unexplained death, it was his job to determine when a person took their final breath and whether they had died naturally or as a result of something more sinister. Throughout his long career, he performed more than 10,000 autopsies and gave expert scientific evidence in court that helped secure approximately 400 criminal convictions. But, remarkably, Manock, a self-described 'witness of fact', did not have the necessary training for such a senior, specialist role, and he made serious errors in several major cases - with tragic consequences, including the apparently wrongful imprisonment of innocent people.