The brother of Moors Murder victim Keith Bennett says police have ignored a taped interview which could help find the boy’s burial site.
Alan Bennett spoke to David Smith, who was a chief witness for the prosecution at the trial of Ian Brady and Myra Hindley.
Before his death in 2012 at the age of 64, Mr Smith – Hindley’s brother-in-law – gave new evidence to Alan, who then passed a dossier, including the taped interview, to police.
But Alan says the information has never been acted upon and claimed: “They have never shown any interest in the tape. It beggars belief.”
He now wants access to police case notes so he can conduct his own review of the evidence.
Keith’s body has never been found but is believed to lie somewhere on the bleak Saddleworth Moor, high above Holmfirth.
Alan added: “The passing of the years does not ease the pain of our loss but being able to lay Keith to rest with his mother would bring us some measure of peace at least.”
Keith’s mum Winnie Johnson died two years ago, aged 78. It is 50 years since Keith, 12, was snatched and killed by Ian Brady and Myra Hindley as he walked to his grandmother’s home.
In his taped interview, Smith reveals how Brady would sit staring at a specific part of Saddleworth Moor, where Smith believed the pair buried Keith.
Mr Bennett says information from Smith has pinpointed an area the size of two football pitches on the Moors. He said: “I am certain that a new, official search using this recent evidence could bring Keith home.”
However Martin Bottomley, head of the cold case review unit for Greater Manchester Police, said that a “thorough assessment” was made of a transcript of the taped interview.
He added: “Because of that assessment, Mr Smith was not interviewed at that time.” Hindley and Brady, 76, murdered five youngsters in the 1960s. Hindley died in prison in 2002, aged 60. Brady is held in the Ashworth psychiatric hospital on Merseyside.
