Is Yorkshire schoolgirl's unsolved murder linked to second killing?

Former Detective Sergeant John Matthews, of Cleveland Police, believes there is compelling evidence that a man he interviewed as part of an investigation into another murder was also involved in Lindsay’s death.

Lindsay, 13, went missing from Hebden Bridge on November 7, 1994, after visiting the Trades Club on Holme Street and 
buying breakfast cereal from the former Spar shop on Crown Street.

Her body was found five months later in the Rochdale Canal.

During his inquiries into two murders in Billingham, Teesside, 18-year-old Tina Bell and 22-year-old mother Julie Hogg, Mr Matthews interviewed a man in Hebden Bridge who had moved down from Teesside.

He later came to understand the man, who has since died, had connections to Tina and the Bell family, to the Rimer family, to both towns, to the man who was later convicted of Julie Hogg’s murder and was reported to be one of the last two people to see Tina alive.

He believes the evidence that linked the Hebden man to both murders was compelling to the point that he should have been considered the prime suspect in the investigation into Lindsay’s death.

He said: “I thought it was ridiculous to have the same circumstances 100 miles apart.

“How unlikely would it be if that person was innocent? In that line of work you don’t believe in coincidences.”

West Yorkshire Police has said the suspect was interviewed at the time of Lindsay’s disappearance and investigated since his death but would not comment further on the reasons why he was ruled out as a suspect.

Tina Bell went missing from Billingham in 1989 and her remains were found the following April.

Julie Hogg’s body was found behind a bath panel in her Billingham home 80 days after she was reported missing, also in 1989.

Billy Dunlop was eventually convicted of the murder in 2006 after Julie’s mother campaigned for the double jeopardy law – which prevented a defendant being retried for the same crime – to be scrapped after two trials collapsed in the early 1990s.

The current senior investigation officer into Lindsay’s murder, Detective Superintendent Simon Atkinson, said the suspect was interviewed by officers during initial inquiries in the 1990s and investigated again since his death but had been ruled out.

He said: “You could an make argument for him being involved and not being involved. We have put him through a process and he is not someone we are seeing as a suspect.

He said although he “couldn’t categorically rule anything out” he was satisfied the suspect was not someone his detectives should pursue. Mr Matthews said after Tina’s mother Catherine died he decided to come forward publicly with because he did not want the same thing to happen to the Rimer family.

He said: “I saw that she had gone to her grave not knowing and I thought of the Rimer family. I thought what a way to go not having any closure or not being any nearer to closure.”

Det Supt Atkinson said: “The investigation in to Lindsay’s murder is still very much a priority for the force. We take all reports seriously and thoroughly investigate information provided.”