Imposter: The Man Who Came Back from the Dead starts tonight at 9pm on Channel 4
In December 2021, a man known locally as Arthur Knight wakes from a Covid coma in a Glasgow hospital to find himself surrounded by the police. It’s claimed that his name is not Arthur Knight and that he is really Nicholas Rossi – a fugitive from justice and one of America’s most wanted criminals, who’s been identified by the distinctive tattoos on his arms. Arthur insists this is all a terrible mistake. He is, he assures everyone, a bookish Anglo-Irishman trying to live a peaceful life with his English wife Miranda.
This four-part series follows the twists and turns of the months that follow. Is the man at the center of this story an extraordinary criminal, constantly changing his name and identity to escape the handcuffs of justice? Or is he a wronged innocent thrown into a limelight he doesn’t deserve? As the authorities double down in their attempts to extradite Arthur to face trial in the United States, the series follows the unlikely Glasgow-based couple and records how Arthur’s increasingly bizarre and erratic behavior in the public eye starts to cost him credibility.
The series also unpicks the life of Nicholas Rossi, the man who, it is alleged, now goes by the name of Arthur Knight, and creates a vivid portrait of a sexually aggressive narcissist through the eyes of his victims. Under a slew of aliases he defrauds, defames and assaults a string of victims across North America and the UK. And also, the police believe, fakes his own death in order to try to throw them off his trail. In episode one, recovering Covid patient Arthur Knight is accused of being Nicholas Rossi, one of America’s most wanted men. But he and his wife Miranda insist it’s all a terrible mistake and that they’re an entirely innocent couple. British and American victims of Rossi’s victims describe how he infiltrated their lives and exploited them financially and sexually.
Episode 2 is at 10pm. From behind bars, Arthur Knight rails against the injustice of his incarceration, and his distressed wife Miranda is at a loss as to what they can do to get their lives back. But there’s hope when he rolls back his sleeves for an investigating journalist and the supposedly incriminating tattoos that match Nicholas Rossi’s are nowhere to be seen. Rossi victim Mary Grebinski describes the shocking assault by Rossi when she was 19 years old and the extraordinary aftermath in which Rossi takes legal action against her for reputational damage.