Fresh talks in Genette Tate disappearance

Devon and Cornwall Police are reported to have launched fresh talks with prosecutors into the disappearance of Aylesbeare schoolgirl Genette Tate, 36 years ago.

13-year-old Genette disappeared on 9 August 1978 whilst delivering newspapers in Aylesbeare in East Devon.

Despite an extensive police investigation and a search of the surrounding countryside involving thousands of volunteers, Genette Tate's body was not found and her disappearance remains officialy unexplained.

But today detectives from Devon and Cornwall Police are reported to have approached prosecutors to look at bringing charges against the serial child killer Robert Black.

Black is currently serving a total of 12 life sentences for the kidnapping and murder of four children between the years of 1981 and 1986 and has long been considered the prime suspect behind Genette's disappearance.

Black was most recently convicted in 2011 for the 1981 murder of nine-year-old Jennifer Cardy in Northern Ireland in which bad character evidence over his previous child killings was put before the jury during the Cardy trial.

An appeal by Black against the use of this evidence was rejected by the Court of Appeal last year.

It is now thought that a similar line of prosecution could be brought against Black for the murder of Genette Tate.

In 2008, prior to the Cardy trial, the Crown Prosecution Service decided that there was insufficient evidence to convict Black, who has long been considered the prime suspect in the case.

In a statement, Devon and Cornwall Police told BBC reporters that they were: "liaising with the Complex Case Unit of the Crown Prosecution Service to ascertain if the 2013 Court of Appeal judgement following the murder of Jennifer Cardy in Northern Ireland [in which Black's conviction and the use of bad character evidence was upheld], has any bearing on the Genette Tate case".