But last week his body was found on the pavement outside his London flat. His fourth-storey living-room window was left wide open.

His death sparked immediate mutterings that dark forces had been at work. He had spent the previous week investigating the tragic deaths of the 58 Chinese men and women found sealed in a refrigerated lorry in Dover. Macklin had written stories detailing the background of the notorious 'snakehead' gangs behind the people-smuggling business, about the fact that MI6 now planned to infiltrate the gangs and about the possible suspects involved in the Dover case.

There was talk of him working on a special investigation into Chinese organised crime and that he had received death threats from the gangs, who told him to stop his probing. Did he jump or was he pushed?

Macklin was no stranger to front-line investigative journalism, a path which makes enemies. Soon after completing his University of London degree, he was the toast of the Hong Kong press in his first job. In the early Nineties, he wrote a series of fearless articles exposing inhuman conditions among Vietnamese in refugee camps.

His startling features and news stories provoked such a powerful public response that the authorities were shamed into changing their policy towards the 'boat people'. The articles won Macklin the Hong Kong Journalist of the Year award as well as first prize in the best feature story category. He became the paper's chief reporter and spent six years as its news editor before returning to Britain two years ago.

He settled in quickly and wrote on a broad range of subjects: politics, entertainment, sport, he turned his hand to everything. The investigative edge was as sharp as ever and Macklin's reports of the Dover deaths proved it.

In Britain, the story dominated the front pages of both tabloids and broadsheets for days and stirred up a hornets' nest of emotions. In China, the reaction was more extreme. The luxury home of a snakehead gang leader close to a village where the dead immigrants were said to have lived was surrounded by 70 angry relatives who hurled rocks and stones.

Later that same day a journalist and photographer from Macklin's South China Morning Post were threatened by locals after being accused of theft.

The villagers attempted to bundle them into a taxi to take them off to teach them a lesson, but government officials intervened.

By last week the Dover deaths were overtaken by other events and Macklin wrote a number of other stories. At 9pm last Tuesday he filed a piece about a visiting politician and then spoke enthusiastically to his neighbours about Euro 2000 and his bet on France vs Portugal.

Despite the fact that the main door to his flat could only be opened by those inside the block 'buzzing' people, security-conscious Macklin locked his front door and attached the chain. Nothing more was heard until his body was found at 1am.

Police first suspected he had committed suicide, although the Post's editor, Robert Keatley, said there was no evidence of depression in the star reporter.

'If anything, colleagues have said that he was happier, even more up, than he had been for some time. He even had a new girlfriend.'

Colin Kerr, deputy editor of the Post at the time when Macklin joined the paper, was equally dismissive of the idea that Macklin had taken his own life: "He was a dedicated journo in the old style. He worked hard, was always the last to leave the office and lived his life with a passion for news and for this paper.'

In fact, Macklin was set to lose his cherished London job within two weeks. A reorganisation of the paper meant that the job of UK correspondent would no longer exist. He had chosen to remain in Britain and find a new job rather than return to Hong Kong.

'We had told him two months ago and his job was due to end in mid-July,' said Keatley. 'He did not seem depressed about it at all. He was a very good writer and I don't think he would have had any difficulty finding another job.'

With no note left behind and no evidence of previous depression, his family believe that Macklin's death was simply an the result of an accident, a theory which they trust will be borne out by the forthcoming inquest.

Friends said that he often read papers and magazines with his feet dangling out of the window. Somehow or other, they think, he may have slipped.