Sgt Wilkinson was the police officer who questioned and detained Eileen Grimshaw on a charge of suspicion of theft in September 2003. Eileen had had to cope with the presence of Tony Stewart, Jason Grimshaw’s father in her house for several weeks after he broke his leg in a car accident. Sick of being treated like a drudge and sponged off, Eileen finally lost patience and with Tony recovered, threw him out of the house. He called into the Street Cars office and spotted the sum of £700 cash in the drawer, representing the previous day’s takings, which Dev Alahan had left with Eileen to pass onto Steve McDonald to bank. Unable to resist temptation, he stole the money when Eileen was distracted. When the loss was discovered, Eileen realised who was responsible but Dev dismissed her story as being convenient and called the police. PC Thomas arrested Eileen and took her to Weatherfield Police Station where Wilkinson questioned her. He was unsympathetic to her situation and tried to dissuade her from calling a solicitor, advising her proceedings would be over with quicker without one but Eileen continued to insist. He therefore placed her in a holding cell until one could be located. In the meantime, Jason tracked Tony down and recovered the missing money but Sgt Wilkinson refused to let Eileen go until Dev dropped the charges and that was only after Jason confessed to Dev who the real culprit was.