Attacking the Devil: Harold Evans and the Last Nazi War Crime

The editor of The Sunday Times during the heyday of investigative journalism, Sir Harold Evans spent over a decade fighting for compensation for the victims of thalidomide, a Nazi-developed drug whose postwar exploitation by British drug companies led to tens of thousands of children being born with serious defects. As editor of The Sunday Times during the heyday of investigative journalism, Sir Harold Evans had the freedom and resources to allow his journalists to work on long-term projects, including the exposure of Kim Philby as a Soviet spy. As Evans himself details in this stylish documentary, his longest and most hard-fought campaign was for the victims of thalidomide, a drug that was originally developed by the Germans in World War II to counter the effects of sarin gas. After the war, the drug was blithely prescribed by British doctors as an antidote to morning sickness, leading to tens of thousands of children being born with serious defects. The Times' fight to win compensation for these children's struggling families would take more than a decade, as Evans tenaciously pursued the drug companies through the English courts and beyond (Sheffield Doc Fest).