ITV's Fred West drama criticised by investigating officer

A controversial ITV drama about serial killer Fred West has been criticised as "inaccurate and sensationalist" by the police offer who led the investigation of the murders.

Retired Gloucestershire police superintendent John Bennett said that Appropriate Adult "glossed over the facts" and gave "undeserved" kudos to the role played by Janet Leach, the 'appropriate adult' assigned to West and played in the drama by Emily Watson.

However, the former police officer said that the portrayal of Fred and Rose West - by actors Dominic West and Monica Dolan - was "hauntingly accurate".

Bennett's main criticisms of the drama were based on Leach's "exaggerated role". He said that she broke a confidentiality agreement by selling her story to the papers, and was "continually contacting" West while he was on remand in Winson Green Prison.

He also said that the series did not include Leach's later and unsuccessful attempt to sue Gloucestershire Constabulary.

Bennett accepted that the drama gave "an even deeper insight" into the psyche of Fred and Rose West, who tortured, raped and murdered an unknown number of women over a 20-year period, but he said that there were too many inaccuracies in the portrayal of events.

"It is true ITV conducted years of 'extensive research' but seemingly for the purpose of the 'story' dismissed and misrepresented relevant facts which they know they were made aware of - including her evidence given at the trial," he said.

"For this series, 17 years on, to convey to a generation that witnessed the horror and tragic events in Gloucestershire unfold and now the next generation that was then too young to know, that the content of this series truly and accurately reflected what occurred, when it does not, I believe is wrong and inflammatory and needs saying. Anyone having seen these programmes should not base any opinion purely on the content."

In March, Fred West's daughter Anne Marie Davis criticised ITV's decision to commission Appropriate Adult, saying that she felt "physically sick" upon hearing about plans to turn the "tragic events which devastated so many people's lives into a TV drama".

However, the show's writer Neil McKay defended it earlier this month, arguing that "those subjects that are the most difficult are those you should most look at".

A spokeswoman for ITV also denied that the drama tried to "whitewash" the Leach character and claimed that Appropriate Adult - which ended on Sunday with nearly 4.5m viewers - was "balanced".

"We have not attempted to whitewash Janet - her portrayal in the drama is subtle and balanced, and shows an ordinary woman subjected to an extraordinary situation," she said.

"We depict her decision to accept the newspaper deal to sell her story, and how that was exposed in court during the trial of Rosemary West, as well as showing that her motivation was not simply financial."

She added: "It is certainly not ITV's wish to cause distress to the families of the Wests' victims, or their children. Two of Fred and Rosemary West's daughters have praised the drama and from those of the victim's families still contactable we have only received positive comments."