Sister insisted on police inquiry

Press, 4 April 1989, Page 1

Sister insisted on police inquiry

PA Wellington A Wellington woman, whose sister’s decomposed body has beep found beside a British railway line, said she had had a hard job getting the police to investigate her sister’s disappearance. The body of the former Tauranga woman, Miss Carol Lee Messenbird, aged 26, was found on Saturday. A post-mortem examination will be held today. Her body was found hidden in undergrowth on an embankment

beside the main Bedford-St Pan-? eras railway line at Ampthill, in | Bedfordshire. | The police had gone to the spot after taking into custody ij lan Steele, aged 29, an Australian, believed to be wanted in I, connection with other offences i in Britain and Australia. | Miss Nichola Messenbird said r in Wellington yesterday the I family became concerned for Carol after she failed to arrive ; home in New Zealand at Christ- I mas.

Some of her clothing had been sent home before Christmas and the family assumed she would be following. They do not know who sent the clothing. \ . The family arranged an unoft ficial search by a friend, a h former policeman who lives in i London, but this was unsuccessr; fuk i i Miss Messenbird said she was ■ ’ told by one Wellington police U officer that it would be a waste i; of time to open a file on her *•' sister’s disappearance. She had

had to insist, she said. Carol Messebird had been living in London for about two years when she disappeared. A Bedfordshire police spokesman said her body was found concealed in high grass a few feet away from the main railway line. It had been there for at least six months and was badly decomposed. He believed the woman had died elsewhere and her body had been dumped at the embankment, an isolated area.