"Maria" ended up in A and E after being assaulted by her 11-year-old child. There’s nothing unusual about children being rude or sometimes abusive to their parents, particularly when they’re adolescents. But some parents are attacked and abused by their children on a regular basis. It’s a pattern of behaviour that can begin as young as three years old and become unmanageable by teenage years. Many parents remain silent out of shame and out of fear of the consequences if they seek help,...

It’s a scandal that went uncovered for 30 years. Body parts and organs from former workers in the nuclear industry were systematically removed for research. But the families of those former workers were never told. The truth only came to light following a three year inquiry published in 2010. But was this practice contained to one industry, or was this happening on behalf of others too? News reports around the time of the Sellafield scandal claimed that organs of coal miners were also being...

The case of Carla Foster made headlines last year after the mother-of-three was initially sentenced to two years in prison for taking abortion pills after the legal cut-off. Since then, several other women have appeared in English courts accused of having illegal abortions, with increasing numbers of women under police investigation. Reporter Divya Talwar hears from women who have been investigated on suspicion of procuring illegal abortions, meets one woman who was prosecuted and sentenced,...

File on 4 tells the story behind the brutal killing of schoolgirl Brianna Ghey. She was attacked in a park near Warrington in Cheshire on a Saturday afternoon in February 2023. Two teenagers - Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe - who were obsessed with murder and torture, have been convicted of her murder. In the build-up to the killing, they exchanged text messages outlining details of their plan. The girl even wrote a detailed plan of how they would go about the murder which was found...

When three young children and their carer were stabbed outside a school in Dublin, protests against immigration began, fuelled by rumours on social media. A night of rioting then followed, with shops looted, vehicles set alight, and police attacked. The rioting has placed immigration centre stage of Irish politics, with one of the country’s most famous sports stars, mixed martial arts fighter Conor McGregor, claiming Ireland is “at war” and saying he wants to be president. File on 4...

Councils in England and Wales are owed half a billion pounds - mainly in uncollected taxes and fines; money that's needed for essential services. Now, more and more, many are turning to bailiffs to recover the money. File on 4 hears from those on the receiving end - and industry insiders who say their colleagues are incentivised to behave badly. Mark Lobel also speaks to those at the forefront of industry reform who believe say the industry still needs to clean up its act. Reporter: Mark...

Handguns which fire blanks are being converted into deadly weapons by criminals. File on 4 has discovered they're now being used more often than real handguns. Adrian Goldberg meets victims of gun crime and explores the UK's trade in illegal firearms. He discovers how easy it is to buy a blank firing pistol which can be illegally converted into a lethal weapon in 20 minutes, and hears from a former gangster who warns the law has too many loopholes. The UK has some of the strictest firearm...

A group of women turned to a private specialist eating disorder clinic in Bath hoping they would receive life-changing treatment. They say their mental and physical health deteriorated while the psychologist in charge subjected them to psychological abuse. The clinic has since closed its doors, but the former patients say they have been left with life-long scars Reporter: Divya Talwar Producer: Ellie Layhe

The story of the Post Office IT scandal has gained new momentum in the wake of an ITV dramatisation about how dozens of subpostmasters were falsely accused of theft and fraud and hauled through the courts. After 20 years, campaigners won a legal battle to have their cases reconsidered and in 2019 the Post Office lost a High Court battle and agreed to pay nearly £60 million to more than 550 of its staff. Some ended up in prison, others bankrupt - many more have been left with their health and...

For more than twenty years, Zholia Alemi worked as a psychiatrist for the NHS. She practiced the length and breadth of the country, treating vulnerable patients with dementia, learning disabilities and mental illness. And then she was caught in a lie. Alemi was found guilty of forging a dementia patient’s will. But this deception was only the beginning. From Crowd Network, Doctor of Deception investigates how one woman’s web of lies reveals historic flaws in the system designed to keep...

File on 4 tells the story behind the brutal killing of 16-year-old transgender schoolgirl Brianna Ghey. She was attacked in a park near Warrington in Cheshire on a Saturday afternoon in February 2023. Two teenagers, who were obsessed with murder and torture, have been convicted of her murder. In the build-up to the killing, they'd exchanged text messages outlining a details of their plan. Reporter Katie Barnfield speaks to Brianna’s mother and the detective involved in bringing her killers to...

Felicity Hannah explores how climate change is leaving communities 'uninsurable' because of the rising risk of them being hit by extreme weather events. She speaks to one businessman living in 'Hurricane Alley' in Louisiana, who has seen his premiums rise by $200,000 in just three years, and learns how many residents are now having to run the risk of living without insurance, because the cost is just too high. In Australia, she speaks to residents resigned to the fact that their hometown is...

File on 4 reveals how hundreds of vulnerable women and children are being trafficked to the UK by organised crime gangs to work as shoplifters. The victims are forced to live in squalor in overcrowded houses in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Investigators have discovered there are 154 known members of one gang which is making millions for the gangmasters from Eastern Europe. High street stores have reported a 25 per cent increase in the number of shoplifting incidents over the last...

Lucy Letby was allowed to continue working with new-born babies despite her colleagues raising concerns about her for months. Her conviction highlighted how NHS executives put the reputation of the Countess of Chester NHS Trust ahead of patient safety. But what happened in Cheshire was far from a one-off. File on 4 hears from doctors with unblemished medical careers who were sacked after raising patient safety concerns. The programme follows one medic through an Employment Tribunal as he...

Artificial intelligence, or AI, makes it possible for machines to learn - and in the future it will perform many tasks now done by humans. But are criminals and bad actors ahead of the curve? AI is already being used to commit fraud and other crimes by generating fake videos and audio; fast emerging threats that form just part of a potential new crime wave. File on 4 investigates. Reporter: Paul Connolly Producer: Fergus Hewison Editor: Carl Johnston

When people who don't speak English, including refugees arriving in the UK after fleeing war, they are entitled to receive the support of interpreters when dealing with public sector organisations. The service provides a lifeline for some of society's most vulnerable people to help them navigate places like hospitals, social services and courts. But reporter Matthew Hill hears allegations the service is seriously failing those who need it most - with tragic consequences. Data obtained...

As a young person, Ellen Macleod wasn’t sure whether her disabilities would mean she could never have sex so she turned to the internet. There she found porn featuring disabled adults, but those films threw up dark questions around consent, exploitation and whether disabled people were being made the involuntary subject of a fetish. Now Ellen has teamed up with journalist Nastaran Tavakoli Far to investigate whether what she saw online was extreme role play or very real abuse. Ellen and Nas...

File on 4 highlights one fraud phone call, in order to shine a light on how scammers work. A man rings a company pretending to be from the bank. How does he persuade a victim he is legitimate? We consider the psychological, financial and emotional impact fraud has on those involved, and we hear from experts hunting the perpetrators. Producer: Vicky Carter Reporter: Iona Bain Technical Producer: Kelly Young Production Coordinators: Tim Fernley and Jordan King Editor: Clare Fordham

The collapse of retail giant Wilko in September left 12,500 people out of work across the UK. No area has been harder hit by the redundancies than the Nottinghamshire town of Worksop, where Wilko employed 1,200 people at its head office, shop and distribution centre. Citizen's Advice has been helping those affected warning that debt in the town was at a record level before the collapse and has doubled since this time last year. Reporter Jane Deith has been following the lives of several...

A perfect storm of equal pay claims and a huge overspend on an IT project has brought Europe’s largest local authority to its knees. But how did Birmingham go from the triumph of hosting the Commonwealth Games to financial ruin in just over a year? Adrian Goldberg investigates for File on 4. Producer: Phil Marzouk Producer: Fergus Hewison Producer: Megan Jones Reporter: Adrian Goldberg Technical Producer: Matthew Dempsey Production Coordinator: Tim Fernley Editor: Clare Fordham

The Manchester Arena terrorist attack in 2017 left 22 people dead and more than a thousand injured. The subsequent inquiry found security arrangements were lacking with some security staff admitting they were untrained in vital procedures. File on 4 goes undercover to reveal how, despite assurances the industry has tightened up procedures, some training companies are offering 'fast-track' courses which don't comply with regulations. the programme also reveals how candidates are told to...

The Great Replacement is an idea fueling far-right recruitment around the world - the idea that white communities and culture are being purposely replaced by non-white migrants. Many far-right terrorists have referenced this theory as the driving force behind their murderous actions - but where does this idea originate from, and how seriously should we be taking its proliferation here in the UK? Terrorism expert Raffaello Pantucci explores the roots of the Great Replacement and asks if this...

Hayley Hassall investigates accusations of bullying and body-shaming at some of the UK’s elite ballet schools. File on 4 and Panorama have spoken to more than 50 ex-students of the Royal Ballet School and Elmhurst Ballet School who attended between 2004 and 2022. Many described developing eating disorders, while some said they had been left with mental health problems. One retired ballerina File on 4 has spoken to has begun legal action against the Royal Ballet School for the treatment she...

The Crooked House: One summer’s night the Crooked House, known as Britain’s wonkiest pub, caught fire. Less than 48 hours later the ruins were knocked to the ground, completely destroying an iconic symbol of the Black Country. The pub gained its name, and worldwide fame, from its crazy angles caused by mining subsidence. But its loss is now being mourned amid calls for it to be rebuilt brick by brick. File on 4 tells the story behind the destruction of the Crooked House. Presenter: Adrian...

After an inevitable decline during the pandemic, school exclusions are again on the increase. There are concerns that behaviour is worse because, post pandemic, children can’t regulate their behaviour in the classroom. So what happens to those who are kicked out? The Government says it has issued updated guidance on suspensions and permanent exclusions and is clear that initial intervention should be put in place where children are at risk of being permanently excluded and entering...