Forensic review into 40-year-old sex shop murder

Just over 40 years since Sandra Phillips' death, a new forensic review is being carried out

Detectives have begun a forensic review into the death of a woman 40 years ago.

Sandra Phillips, 37, was killed while working in a sex shop in Dillwyn Street, Swansea, on 14 June in 1985.

An extensive reinvestigation of the murder got under way in 2004, but all lines of enquiry were exhausted.

South Wales Police said a number of forensic exhibits had been submitted for forensic testing.

Det Ch Insp Claire Lamerton, head of the South Wales Police review unit, said: "South Wales Police has had considerable success with cold cases, being one of the first forces in the country to set up a review team in 1999 to conduct cold case reviews.

"We hope that the outcome of the forensic review will give us the opportunity to bring justice for Sandra's family who we have informed of this new work.

"Even though four decades have passed, I appeal to anyone who has any information about Sandra's death to come forward."

The mother-of-four was beaten and strangled at the sex shop she managed and her body was in a pool of blood. She had also been doused in petrol.

South Wales Police said it knew customers had come and gone before she was brutally killed sometime around 11:00, with her body found by the store's area manager who made a routine call to the Dillwyn Street premises at 13:45.

The shop had been locked from the outside and Mrs Phillips' keys were missing and never recovered.

A number of unidentified fingerprints were found at the scene and a telephone handset that was on the wall behind the counter was gone.

Neath brothers Wayne and Paul Darvell were wrongly convicted of the murder and spent seven years in prison before being released in 1992.