12:27pm Friday 20th November 2009
By Catherine Pye
DETECTIVES are investigating wheth-er a headless body found in Sussex could be a worker from East Lancashire.
The male body, which had the hands removed, as well as the head, was found in woodland in Sussex in October 1991, and has never been identified.
In March this year, police re-opened the case and a recent Crime-watch appeal for information prompted a phone call from a view-er mention-ing that a symbol on the victim’s clothing was very similar to the logo of the now defunct Fraser Eagle coach firm.
Sussex DC Clinton Novelle said: “We had a phone call after the Crimewatch appeal say-ing that the T.shirt of the victim had a very similar design on it to the Fraser Eagle logo.
“But because the firm has gone into admin-istration, we are finding it very difficult to contact anyone there to follow up this lead.
“Companies’ logos do change over the years, and we want to know if this is Fraser Eagle’s logo from 1991.
“It could end up being nothing of the sort, but this is a murder inquiry and every line of inquiry has to be foll-owed up.”
Police have also revealed that the shirt was made in 1986 and bought from a Foster’s department store.
Fresh anthropological examination of the skeletal remains, exhu-med from a grave mark-ed simply as “unknown Man”, showed the victim was in his early to mid-30s and about 5ft 6ins to 5ft 8ins tall.
He was also circum-cised and strongly built, but had a protruding belly.
He also had a distinctive star-shaped mark on his right thigh, and was probably a smoker.
Forensic tests on a femur, rib bone and toenails from the corpse, which were not available 18 years ago, showed that the man could have spent some years in central, or eastern Europe, and in the last period of his life had been living somewhere in northern England.
One theory detectives are exploring is that he could have been a soldier stationed abroad for part of his life, or a foreign national living in the UK.
A police spokesman said: “This was just one of 10 to 15 phone calls we had after the Crime-watch programme and we are not shifting our focus to the North West.”
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