Ipswich (England): British police released surveillance television footage of one of five murdered prostitutes on Saturday as they stepped up their hunt for a possible serial killer.
The image of Anneli Alderton, 24, who was three months pregnant when she was murdered, shows her traveling on a train between the towns of Harwich and Colchester in eastern England on December 3, a week before her body was found.
All five prostitutes were naked when their bodies were discovered and police said the images were important for forensic evidence purposes, as well as trying to determine Alderton's movements in the final hours before her death.
"I would ask people to look carefully at the images," Chief Superintendent Stewart Gull told a news conference on Saturday. "If anyone saw Anneli after the evening of Sunday, 3 December, we want to hear from them."
Alderton was pictured wearing a black jacket with a fur-lined hood, a gray top and blue jeans.
The case has echoes of those involving the 19th century prostitute killer Jack the Ripper, who was never found, and Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper, who killed 13 women, mainly prostitutes, in northern England between 1975 and 1980.
The murderer has been dubbed the Suffolk Strangler, although the precise way all the women died is yet to be established.
Prostitutes in the region are being offered financial help to stay off the streets, but some have ignored police warnings and carried on working, many to feed drug habits, despite the discovery of the five bodies in less than two weeks.
Prostitution in Britain is legal but there are laws that make providing sex for money difficult. For example, a woman can sell sex in an apartment, but advertising sexual services, streetwalking, brothels and kerb crawling are all illegal.
Better protection
The case has sparked calls for better protection for prostitutes, or the creation of legalized brothels so women don't have to solicit for sex on the street.
About 350 officers are working on the inquiry and staff from more than 30 forces – including Northern Ireland – are trying to find the killer. Police said they were making progress.
"We are feeling confident about the inquiry," assistant Chief Constable Jacqui Cheer told the BBC on Saturday. "We're getting lots and lots of information in."
No one has been arrested or questioned as a suspect, but police were seeking a number of people, between 50 and 100.
As well as poring over 10,000 hours of surveillance television (CCTV) footage, police have received 9,000 calls following a public appeal for information.
The police inquiry began on December 2 when the body of Gemma Adams, 25, was found in a stream near Ipswich. Police found 19-year-old Tania Nicol's body in the same stream on December 8.
Police on Friday confirmed prostitute Annette Nicholls as the fifth victim. Nicholls, 29, was last seen on December 5, a week before her naked body was found dumped in countryside.
Alderton was strangled and Paula Clennell, 24, was killed by "compression to the neck."
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