Missing Mary Bastholm’s remains are in a rubbish tip or a lake, Rose West’s former lawyer suspects.
Leo Goatley, who represented Fred West’s wife for 12 years, says police were right to check a cafe for remains but was unsurprised when nothing was found.
He thinks it more likely Fred disposed of Mary’s body in a tip his brother John delivered to, or a lake Fred worked near.
Fred lived in a caravan near Cheltenham when Mary disappeared in 1968.
After police ended a search in the cellar of a Gloucester cafe where Mary worked, Mr Goatley told the Mirror: “I’m not surprised they found nothing. None of the timelines ever really fit. It never felt like something Fred would do.”
What is your view? Have your say in the comment section
He thinks Fred could have stored Mary’s body and years later put it in John’s waste lorry, bound for Hempsted tip.
He said: “John West’s crew used to park their bin lorry at Cromwell Street [where West later lived] and go
in for morning coffee. Fred would come out and chuck bags on board.”
Explaining his other theory, he said: “At the time he was an odd-job man at the Lakeside caravan site at Stokes Orchard so my theory has long been he may have put the body parts in the lake.”
Fred never confessed to killing Mary Bastholm but his son Stephen claimed his father admitted it to him.
The £70,000 police search of the cafe was sparked when a TV firm drilled a hole in its basement and saw something blue.
Mary, 15, was wearing blue when she vanished.
Like news? Sign up to one of the Mirror's newsletters
It is now believed this could have been blue debris from a buried pipe.
Craig Holden, Gloucestershire Police Assistant Chief Constable, said: “Our thoughts are with Mary’s family, whose continued dignity has been humbling.”
Fred West was charged with 12 murders, but took his own life in prison while awaiting trial in 1995.
Rose West was convicted of 10 murders that year and is serving life.
