Martin Crowe

Policeman Martin Crowe first appeared in May 2004, as the investigating officer when Jack Sugden was accidentally shot in the chest by his adoptive son Andy. He then made another appearance in October 2004, when he investigated Scott Windsor and Syd Woolfe's savage beating of Pearl Ladderbanks' rapist son, Frank Bernard Hartbourne.

Martin was bowled over the first time he laid eyes on Woolpack barmaid, Louise Appleton. With her best friend Diane Sugden away on holiday, Louise had offered to babysit Diane's stepdaughter Victoria and that night, took her to karate class, only to bump into Martin. While there was an undeniable spark from day one, it took a while for Martin and Louise to get together.

Not a natural mother, Louise struggled with Martin's daughter Kayleigh and often found herself annoying her new beau with her incompetence. For Martin, Kayleigh is the centre of his world. When his marriage split up, the kindly cop got custody of his daughter and put all his energy into bringing her up.

He also has a very serious job and with the Dingles operating in Emmerdale, the police always have plenty of cases to investigate. Martin also had cause to investigate another case recently. Convinced the Kings had been using illegal labourers on their new building site, Martin tried to investigate, only for big mouth Louise to let the cat out of the bag and give Jimmy King time to cover it all up!

His relationship with Louise has also brought him into conflict with Diane. When he moved in, Martin considered the place to be Louise's, but with Diane's name still above the door, she continues to have a say about what's what behind the bar. This has led to problems between them as Martin introduced an exercise bike to the living quarters and Louise tried to remove a photo of Diane's beloved daughter Bernice.

But while small domestic problems continued to vex Martin and Louise, it was Kayleigh who'd be the cause of most of their headaches. The mischievous youngster is growing up fast and has already got drunk, gatecrashed a rave and started terrorising Edna Birch. While Martin takes a heavy-handed approach to parenting, Louise – having no clue how to manage children – is very blasé about the whole thing. Consequently Kayleigh gets away with murder. With two troublesome women on his hands, can Martin ever find a moment's peace?

When Martin learned that Sam Dingle helped his wife Alice die, as she was suffering from terminal cancer, he set out to arrest him. Louise stood by Martin and this caused friction between her and Diane. In a heated argument, Diane let slip something about Ray Mullan, which Martin overheard. Louise had no choice but to come clean. Martin revealed that he had double standards and so said he wouldn't report Louise but he could no longer continue seeing her, so Martin and a tearful Kayleigh moved out of the Woolpack and Louise's life.