Russell Highsmith of Abingdon is a happy man this morning – he’s finally completed his collection of 2,400 The Bill episodes.

Earlier this year, through the Oxford Mail, news broke that Highsmith’s aim to collect every one of the 2,400 episodes of the police drama had fallen flat. He was missing a DVD set of series 19, and in spite of searching high and low for it, his collection was rendered incomplete.

But this is a story with a happy ending. Somebody at ITV picked up on the story, and went rummaging through the broadcaster’s archives. Subsequently, they dug out the episodes that Russell was missing, and have (legally) burned them onto a DVD for him. What’s likely to be the planet’s only privately-held complete collection of The Bill episodes is now finished.

The 31-year old had been missing parts one, two and three of series 19 in the end, which he reckoned included two live episodes, hence their unavailability.

He’ll be receiving his missing DVDs this week. Well done to all at the Oxford Mail for helping Russell with his quest. The full story is here.