Another woman is found murdered and, as pressure mounts on the gardaí to find the perpetrator, Terry’s post mortem reveals something that might hold the key to everything. But a killer is closer than she knows. And their next victim is firmly within their sights…” I was telling my 10-year-old while walking to school this morning who I was coming to interview. And he said, “that’s a very sad job”. Is it? Is what you see sad?

Between 1968 and 1969, three women were found dead, having been beaten, strangled and sexually assaulted, after visiting the Barrowland Ballroom in the city's east end. Despite one of the most extensive manhunts in Scottish criminal history, their killer has never been found.

Forensic pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy on her life at the frontline of death

While she welcomes that shift, it's made her role somewhat redundant. She went from being an integral part of the team to being on the fringes looking in. "They don't need someone like me any more - they need someone who will come in and embrace technology, that's not me. We didn't even have computers when I was at school!" Marie was state pathologist for many of Ireland’s most infamous murders over the past 20 years or so and she’s written about them in her book. You can hear her discussing her experiences of them with Ray, as well as more true crime nuggets from her book, by going here. She worked as a consultant forensic pathologist in the Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology in Glasgow for 13 years, investigating unnatural deaths and homicides from gangland shootings and stabbings to drug deaths, road traffic accidents and suicides.

You’re looking for patterns, that’s all we work on, patterns of injuries, patterns of whatever, so we’ve never really seen a pattern emerging here.”

Everybody was saying I’d be demented with boredom so I made a plan and decided that I was going to treat the first year like a gap year. So we moved house, I wrote the book, and I decided I’d start getting fit and looking after myself. Coming towards the end of the year I thought, “Okay, I’ve had the gap year, what am I doing next year?” And then the pandemic hit! I was quite delighted! I must be the only person in the world who is quite delighted that we can’t go anywhere! There are two old dears living next to us who are in their 80s and they are obviously shielding and they’re saying to me, “Why are you shielding? You don’t need to!” And I’m like, “I know, I know, but I just think it’s best for everyone!”[laughs] Pic: Lili Forberg for VIP Magazine She has previously explained her unusual job of pathologist as "telling the story of what happened. Giving the person the respect and dignity of finding out how they transitioned from life to death." You can’t be seen to be taking things lightly even though behind closed doors I’m not a very serious person. This is an opportunity and you don’t get opportunities like this very often, not at my age anyway. From being the housewife who sat and painted her nails until we came home from school, she suddenly had to become the man of the family. Our lives were always a wee bit different, but, as far as we were concerned, they were pretty normal and happy." Retirement was something she thought long and hard about. "I had never stopped for years and I thought, 'maybe this is a big mistake'. I wasn't sure how I'd take to it."

John Gilligan lifts lid on life of crime and suspected role his gang played in Veronica Guerin's murder About your husband – you say he can get irritated about your cavalier attitude to your safety (in particular when you went to war torn Sierra Leone to work) – is there something in you that likes life on the edge? Cassidy lobbied unabashedly for Taggart to feature a female forensic pathologist – rather than the stereotypical middle-aged bearded male. She finally got her wish in 2001. Born in Glasgow — with Donegal roots — Prof Cassidy first came here in 1998 to work as deputy to the then-State pathologist, the late John Harbison.I was dropping big hints: 'Hello, see this little person in front of you? I'm the one who does all this, not that big, bulky man with the beard you seem to have every week on the telly.' She said they didn't plan to get married but her mother said they couldn't live together without tying the knot. Still, those were different times. She tells a story of going for a senior registrar post in Scotland, in her early days, and being criticised for being "too honest" and told she'd never do well in her chosen career. When the job went to a less-qualified male colleague, she shrugged it off. "They told me I'd get it next round, but I didn't want it." Beyond the Tape in many ways is quite an unusual read, almost like The Dummies Guide to Pathology. It is a book that I have no doubt many crime writers will closely analyse and digest due to the very informative nature of its contents.

She has a mellifluous Scottish accent, full of warmth. And she laughs a lot; nothing seems to bother her. When I ask about sexism and whether there was a glass ceiling in such a male-dominated profession, she laughs it off. They cause the bulk of everything. Even the admissions to hospitals. The strain it puts on the health service is massive. Pic: Lili Forberg for VIP Magazine

Since her retirement in 2018, she has authored documentaries on RTÉ including Dr Cassidy’s Casebook and Cold Case Collins. She has also written a book about her career, Beyond The Tape.