Det . Sgt . Crichton Detective Sergeant Crichton was the senior policeman involved in the Alan Bradley case in late 1989 . The plainclothes detective was assigned to the case just before Alan was due to stand trial for fraud and the attempted murder of Rita Fairclough . Crichton informed Rita and Jenny Bradley that a date had been set for the trial and gave Rita advice about taking the stand . Rita felt confident about giving evidence against Alan but paused for thought when Crichton warned her that the defence would paint her as the villain and that she couldn ' t rely on Jenny and Martin Platt ' s witness testimonies to secure a guilty verdict . Just before the trial at Weatherfield Crown Court , the prosecution dealt with a number of setbacks . Martin came down with mumps , absenting him from court , and after speaking to Rita on the morning of the trial and finding her tense and excitable , Crichton warned Mr Myers , the prosecution barrister , that in her state of mind the jury may find her unsympathetic . Concurring , Mr Myers arranged with the defence to go for the lesser charge of assault , to which Alan plead guilty . Alan was sentenced to two years , with one suspended , so having served seven months , and been granted remission for good behaviour , Alan was released from the court that day . Crichton returned to the case three weeks later when The Kabin had a break - in during the night , its video library ransacked . The obvious suspect was Alan , as he had installed the burglar alarm and created the video library , but when brought in for questioning he denied involvement . After a night in the cells , Alan was released without charge as some lads had been caught trying to sell the stolen videos . A few weeks later , Mavis Wilton reported Rita missing to the police . Mavis told Crichton that Rita hadn ' t been seen for two days , but Crichton was unconcerned and suggested that she ' d left to get away from her recent troubles . Mavis wasn ' t convinced , and when Rita still hadn ' t been in touch a week on , Mavis went to the police station with councillor Deirdre Barlow in tow to convince Crichton to take the matter more seriously , voicing her suspicion that Alan had killed Rita . Crichton agreed to investigate , but several interviews with Alan and full police searches of 7 Coronation Street and Alan ' s bedsit at 31 Redford Street failed to turn up any evidence of Rita ' s whereabouts . The police then moved onto the building site in Coronation Street , where Alan had been working , and dug it up to find out if Alan had buried Rita there , also finding nothing . Rita was found safe but not entirely well shortly afterwards by Cyril Partridge , manager of The Strand Hotel in Blackpool . Her ordeal with Alan had caused her to have a breakdown and block the events of the last few years from her mind . An old friend of Alec Gilroy ' s , Cyril rang Alec to confirm that Rita was his act , as she claimed . Concerned for their friend , Alec and Bet Gilroy immediately went to Blackpool to confirm that she was at the hotel , but due to her present state of mind , Bet insisted on not calling the police . Upon returning to Weatherfield , Alec went against his wife ' s instructions and informed Crichton and Jordan , who were unimpressed with the delay as Rita had since gone missing again . The men followed up the case in Blackpool , but as there was no foul play involved , the case was turned over to the local police . Later that day , Alan turned up at the hotel and tried to force Rita into his car to prove to everyone that he hadn ' t killed her . Rita escaped from him , and while chasing her , Alan was hit and killed by a tram . In his last involvement with the Bradley case , Crichton took Jenny to identify the body and , despite her insistence of being left alone afterwards , asked Sally Webster to check in on her . Crichton had once delivered papers for Biddulph ' s newsagent , many years before it was known as The Kabin .