Three-year hunt for brutal killer

By Clare Purdy
BBC News
Manchester

Stuart Milsted wrote a letter admitting to Danielle's murder

An asthma inhaler dropped at the scene of Danielle Moorcroft's murder in a Bolton back street eventually led police to her killer.

Stuart Milsted, 31, battered the pregnant prostitute to death with a brick in June 2002.

The discarded inhaler led to a mass screening of male asthma suffers in the Bolton area.

Milsted wrote to police three years after Danielle's body was found offering to give a DNA sample.

But hours after police tested Milsted, he disappeared from his home.

Officers discovered a letter addressed to a detective involved in the investigation, and Danielle's family. In it, he confessed to her murder and suggested he had hurt himself.

Danielle was last seen on CCTV footage from a petrol station

A search was already under way for Milsted when tests revealed his DNA matched that found on the inhaler, a beer bottle found at the scene and on Danielle's body.

A Bolton search and rescue team eventually found Milsted living rough on a pond island at Queen's Park, Bolton. As they approached him, he cut his throat.

He was arrested and subsequently charged - bringing an end to a three-year hunt for Danielle's killer.

He was sentenced to life imprisonment on Monday.

Danielle - described by her family as beautiful and lively - was a heroin addict who worked to fund her habit. She had moved from Liverpool to Bolton two years before she was killed.

In a statement by her family, they say they believe Danielle planned to "turn her life around" for the sake of her unborn son.

Search teams found Milsted sleeping rough in a Bolton park

"She was so full of life and energy," they said.

"We know Danielle got herself in a bad situation and people may have preconceived ideas about her and her life, but drug addiction can happen to absolutely anyone."

Danielle was last seen on CCTV at a petrol station in the early hours of 1 June 2002. Less than four hours later her battered body was found off Lower Bridgeman Street in Bolton.

It started the three-year hunt, which lead to several television appeals - including one on BBC One's Crimewatch in July 2004.

Actress Caroline Quintin also made an appeal for police, while she was filming a crime drama in Manchester.

Ch Supt Patsy Wood, of Greater Manchester Police, said: "Although Danielle was murdered over three years ago, we have never stopped looking for her killer, and never would have."