The 16-year-old was stabbed more than 40 times in an apparently motiveless killing

Claire Tiltman was stabbed more than 40 times in an alleyway in Greenhithe, Kent, in January 1993.

The 16-year-old pupil at Dartford Grammar School for Girls had been taking a short cut to a friend's house when she became the victim of an apparently random attack.

She collapsed and died by the side of a busy main road less than two miles away from where she lived, in Horns Cross, near Dartford.

Review 10 years on

More than a decade later, the murder inquiry is still open.

Detectives say DNA testing has advanced so much they are re-examining a number of items connected to the case.

The hunt by Kent Police is being led by David Stevens who, as a detective superintendent, probed the murders of Lin and Megan Russell in Chillenden, near Canterbury, in 1996.

He retired, but has returned to the force where he heads the case review team.

If the answer is to be found, then we will find it David Stevens, Kent Police

Mr Stevens said: "DNA testing and other techniques have moved on so much during the last few years that we are reviewing a number of exhibits from the Claire Tiltman case to see if any DNA is evident.

"We are now awaiting results from forensic experts.

"I am confident with our new technology that if the answer is there to be found, then we will find it."

He said the family was being kept informed of the progress of the current investigation.

"We would also appeal to anyone who may have been sitting on important information during the last ten years which might help us further," he said.