Police appeal to name mystery man

The unidentified man was pulled from the River Ouse

A clay reconstruction of a head could hold the key to identifying a body pulled from a York river, say police.

Detectives trying to identify the body of a man found in the River Ouse are hoping someone may recognise the face when it appears on national television.

The badly decomposed body was pulled from the river at Naburn Locks in September last year.

North Yorkshire Police are appealing to the public for help on the BBC1 Crimewatch programme on Wednesday.

Experts from the University of Sheffield have reconstructed the man's face using clay in the hope somebody recognises him and comes forward.

We don't want this man to go to an anonymous grave North Yorkshire Police

Despite local publicity at the time, missing persons checks and nationwide appeals his identity remains unknown.

A North Yorkshire Police spokesman said: "The body was in an advanced state of decomposition and appeared to have been in the water for some time.

"We don't want this man to go to an anonymous grave so we want to get him identified and make contact with any family or next of kin."

The man is described as 5ft 7ins, weighing 11 stone and aged between 40 and 60.

He was wearing a navy blue Umbro tracksuit, Adidas trainers and red football socks.

A post-mortem examination, conducted by a Home Office pathologist, failed to establish a cause of death but showed there was no obvious trauma to the body.

Police are not treating the death as suspicious.