A knock at the door and 20 years of his life were taken

On the morning of August 2, 2003 there was a knock on Andrew Malkinson’s door. It was the police. They told him he matched the description of a man who had brutally attacked and raped a young mother-of-two on a motorway embankment in Little Hulton.

They arrested him for attempted murder and rape. Mr Malkinson took part in a video lineup convinced everything was about to be ‘cleared up’. But the victim identified him.

The harrowing nightmare that consumed his life from that moment on is almost impossible to comprehend.

READ MORE: Greater Manchester Police issue statement ahead of BBC documentary on Andrew Malkinson

Just over six months later he was falsely convicted by a jury at Manchester Crown Court of rape and sentenced to life a minimum term of seven years. As he was sent down Mr Malkinson said aloud: “I’m completely innocent”.

He went on to spend a staggering 17 and a half years behind bars for a crime he did not commit - he could have been freed after six years if he had given a false confession.

Tonight (June 6) The Wrong Man: 17 Years Behind Bars on BBC Two lays bare the shocking failings of the British legal system and the appalling miscarriage of justice Mr Malkinson suffered.

On March 30, 2004, Mr Malkinson, then 37, began his life sentence on the sex offenders wing in HMP Frankland.

His rape conviction came despite there being no forensic evidence to put him at the scene. The prosecution's theory was this was because the attacker was forensically aware and had worn a condom.

When the victim was asked by the prosecution barrister during the trial whether the man who raped her was in court she said yes. Asked how sure she was she said: ‘100 percent’.

The press - including the M.E.N - reported on the