Emmerdale is currently a village seething with guilt and suspicion. Following the death of Ray Walters (Joe Absolom) and the discovery of his and Celia Daniels’ (Jaye Griffiths) people trafficking operation and drugs empire there are huge questions to be answered about who has blood on their hands for Ray’s murder.
One person who has the word ‘suspicious’ running through him like a stick of rock is Joe Tate (Ned Porteous). The former kidney thief was previously in cahoots with Celia as he thought he was using her to get his hands on Moira’s land at a bargain basement price. Then Celia turned the tables on him and went into business with Moira instead.
Now it looks like Joe has spotted an opportunity to continue furthering his aims to get his hands on Butlers and make Moira regret crossing him – by getting Robert (Ryan Hawley) to plant some documents at Butlers that implicate Moira in Celia’s people trafficking scheme.
Soon enough the police are heading to Moira’s farm to question Robert, Victoria (Isabel Hodgins) and the other employees. Victoria and Robert do their best to make Moira seem innocent.
It’s a different story when the police go to Home Farm to talk to Joe. His answers are ambiguous, to say the least, and he manages to make it sound like Moira is definitely hiding some secrets.
It’s enough to make the police apply for a search warrant and they’re soon on their way back to Butlers to do a thorough search. Moira is confident they won’t find anything incriminating and tells them to go ahead.
But it’s not long before the police do find something, and Moira is arrested on the spot on suspicion of human trafficking. As she’s led away by the police, Caleb (William Ash) resolves to get the best lawyer possible to defend her.
Meanwhile, Kim Tate (Claire King) is suspicious when she hears about Moira’s arrest and asks Joe if he had anything to do with it.
Before he can answer she decides she’s better off not knowing, but strongly advises him to stay well away from the whole situation.
As soon as she’s gone, Joe gets on the phone to an unknown person, asking for an update. An update to what, is the question.
To the surprise of absolutely no one, it seems that Joe Tate is heavily involved in… something shifty. But how deep is his involvement in what’s unfolding in Emmerdale? Could he be responsible for Ray’s death as well as conspiring to see Moira jailed for people trafficking?
