When Louise Woodward arrived back in Britain last week and revealed that she had agreed to an interview with the BBC, the delicious prospect of a Paxman-type grilling was the least we could expect from the national broadcaster.
It came as more than a little surprise when, after days of speculation, the BBC announced that Martin Bashir would conduct Woodward's first television interview since her conviction for the manslaughter of Matthew Eappen was upheld by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.
Bashir - a journalist with a "collusive" bedside manner whose questions to Woodward were described this week as "more underarm than underhand," had managed to secure the television interview of the year. Of course, he is better known as the man who interviewed Diana, Princess of Wales, for the Panorama programme in November 1995 during which she lambasted the British Royal Family and questioned Prince Charles's suitability for kingship.
The interview was sensational and prompted Queen Elizabeth to insist on a divorce after months of speculation about the future of the Royal marriage and in the meantime earned the BBC a massive revenue in overseas screenings.
At the time, the former freelance journalist who once wrote football reports for the Sunday Times, declared that he was as surprised as anyone that Diana had agreed to the interview, although afterwards he became the most sought-after interviewer of the decade.
He was born in London in 1963 of Pakistani parents and is married to Debbie, a nurse, and they have three children. An honours graduate in history and English, his career at the BBC began in 1986 when he worked as a reporter on the local television news programmes, London Plus and Newsroom South East, before transferring to news and current affairs programmes for BBC 2's Public Eye in 1989.
He moved to the Panorama programme in September 1992, but not before an embarrassing moment while reading the news for Breakfast TV prompted his colleagues to question his famed sensitivity.
Immediately after a shocking report on the famine in Africa, Bashir introduced the next item on the programme with the words: "And now, with the business news, someone who certainly doesn't need a good meal . . ."
Judging from the careful handling of Woodward last week and the sensitive treatment given to the Princess of Wales, Bashir's technique has been described as owing more to "the prompting of a therapist than the probing of a reporter". Some commentators have criticised the fact that by simply appearing with "big catch interviewees" he invites the inevitable question of just what deals have been done to get them in front of the cameras in the first place.
Others have pointed to two incidents during his career that seriously undermined his credibility as a journalist. The first controversy in his career centred on a Panorama investigation into the financial affairs of the former England and Tottenham football manager, Terry Venables. Bashir investigated a company called Penfolds Consultants for the programme in 1993 and 1994. It was disclosed that the company, which was run by the wife of Tottenham's general manager, Eddie Ashby, had paid Ashby's wages because he was an undischarged bankrupt and the arrangement was approved by Tottenham's board of directors.
During the programme "mockup", documents allegedly showing that Venables had also profited from by selling assets that he did not own, were presented to viewers as real documents. Venables later won a £50,000 claim for damages against a former football agent that he claimed had provided the information.
Then, during research for the Diana interview, Bashir was allegedly involved in faking a two-page bank statement, which purported to belong to the former head of security for Earl Spencer, Diana's brother.
The bank statement, which was drawn up by the same graphic designer on the Venables investigation, showed that one of the account holders, Alan Waller, had received a secret payment of £4,000 from a national newspaper in 1994 and another payment of £6,500 from a Jersey-based company, called Penfolds Consultants.
The allegation by "jealous" colleagues at the BBC was that Bashir used the bank statements to confirm Diana and her brother's fears that they were being spied on and stories about their private lives were leaked to the press. The BBC later admitted that the documents had been "created" but insisted they were never published and were "discarded" when the information could not be substantiated.
For his part, Bashir went on to win two television awards for the Diana interview and threatened legal action over the allegations but never carried through with the threat.
Bashir's career since the Diana interview has been curiously quiet. Within weeks of Diana's public outpourings, Queen Elizabeth decided not to give the annual Christmas Day address to the BBC in a move widely seen as a snub to the corporation over the Panorama programme. And Bashir went on to host a BBC Radio 4 sports programme after plans for him to present the One O'Clock News were curiously dropped at the last minute.
His reputation as an "exceedingly ambitious" journalist - a colleague once remarked that he would "bite your arm off to get a story" - has undoubtedly landed Bashir with two of the most sensational interviews of the decade. Whether it is jealousy or the controversial episodes in his career which prevent him from being treated as a "heavyweight" reporter in the future remains to be seen.