Andrew Malkinson welcomes Paul Quinn conviction after 17-year miscarriage of justice

Paul Quinn’s conviction has finally put a name to the man responsible for the 2003 rape in Salford, but it also throws fresh light on how Andrew Malkinson remained behind bars for 17 years after police, prosecutors and review bodies failed to correct a catastrophic error. Malkinson said he was thankful authorities had “finally got the real perpetrator”, a milestone that comes only after years in which the wrong man was treated as the offender.

The attack took place in July 2003 in Little Hulton, Salford, where a 33-year-old mother of two was raped on her way home. Malkinson was convicted on 10 February 2004 and did not walk free until the Court of Appeal quashed his conviction on 26 July 2023, after fresh DNA evidence linked a new suspect to the crime. By then, he had spent more than 17 years in prison and a further three years under probation supervision.

The case has become a test of whether the justice system treats exoneration as a rare correction or as evidence of deeper resistance to admitting error. A 2024 independent review by Chris Henley KC found failings that could have led to Malkinson’s exoneration about a decade earlier. The Criminal Cases Review Commission did not refer the case to the Court of Appeal until 24 January 2023, after earlier refusals in 2012 and 2020. The commission’s handling of the case triggered major criticism, and its chair, Helen Pitcher, and chief executive both resigned amid the fallout.

Greater Manchester Police said the original investigation in the summer of 2003 wrongly led to the arrest and prosecution of an innocent man. After Quinn’s conviction at Manchester Crown Court on 17 April 2026, the force said the correct rape conviction had come “two decades too late” and repeated that it was deeply sorry for a grave miscarriage of justice, both to the victim and to Malkinson.

The consequences are still widening. A public inquiry into the case is under way, and the Independent Office for Police Conduct is investigating complaints linked to five former Greater Manchester Police officers and one serving officer. Amanda Rowe, the IOPC director, said the miscarriage of justice that kept Malkinson jailed for 17 years was “one of the worst we have ever seen in this country”. For Malkinson, the conviction of Paul Quinn has brought long-delayed recognition, but not yet the full answers the case demands.