Lamplugh police present new evidence

Police investigating the disappearance of Suzy Lamplugh said yesterday they "had made a significant step towards a prosecution" after handing new evidence to the Crown Prosecution Service.

Miss Lamplugh was a 25-year-old estate agent when she was last seen in July 1986 after going to show a house in Fulham, west London, to a man calling himself Mr Kipper. Her body has never been found, and she was formally declared dead in 1994, but the police reopened the case two years ago.

A Scotland Yard spokesman said yesterday: "We can confirm that a file in relation to the case has today been submitted to the CPS. No one has been arrested or charged today but the move is a significant step towards a prosecution."

CPS lawyers will now assess the evidence to see if a prosecution can be brought. Last year a 46-year-old man was arrested over the abduction.

In the year of Miss Lamplugh's disappearance, her mother, Diana, formed the Suzy Lamplugh Trust to promote personal safety. She was appointed OBE in 1992.

The family said last night: "The case has remained unsolved for 15 years and we feel confident that we are getting closer to knowing what happened to Suzy."

The Lamplugh investigation has examined thousands of lines of inquiry, and the case files amount to more than a million words.

Forensic science officers have searched sites around the country looking for the body. They are DNA-testing 800 unidentified bodies found over the past 16 years.

The police operation also included an appeal on BBC1's Crimewatch last summer that focused on finding a man called David Tucker, who was known to have been in the Bristol area in the late 1980s. He was not a suspect but was thought to have important information.