UK UK- Michelle Bettles, 22, Mom of 3, SW, last seen, red light district of Norwich, found strangled, Rush Meadow Road, Easter weekend, 29 March, 2002.

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https://www.norfolk.police.uk/news/norfolk/news/unsolved-cases/MichelleBettles/

29/03/2002
''Michelle Bettles was 22 years old when she was murdered. Michelle operated as a street prostitute and was last seen in the red light district of Norwich during the early hours of Thurs 28 and Fri 29 March 2002 Easter weekend.

Original Investigation

Michelle unusually had not kept a pre-arranged appointment with a regular client of hers. They had arranged to meet close to her home address in the Dereham Road area of Norwich but she never kept the appointment.

CCTV footage shows Michelle walking along St Benedict's Street towards the city centre at 8.20 pm that night. Clearly, for whatever reason, she had never intended to keep the appointment with the regular client since she was heading in the opposite direction to their pre-arranged meeting.

There was a series of sightings of Michelle in various locations in the red light district of Norwich by people that knew her, the last being at about midnight.

On the morning of 31 March 2002, Michelle's body was found by a local resident in woodland by the side of a country track known as Rush Meadow Road in Scarning, near Dereham. She had been strangled. This is around 20 miles from the Red Light District area of Norwich.

A murder investigation was launched but the killer was never identified. The case remains unsolved.

Michelle's murder occurred the year the Queen Mother died.''

 

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October 17, 2022

Credit: Norfolk Police (UK)

New DNA Profiles Discovered in Michelle Bettles Murder Investigation

A forensic review into Bettles' murder – launched in March 2022 on the 20th anniversary of her murder – has identified several DNA profiles on Bettles' clothing, including a complete male DNA profile.

www.forensicmag.com

''Detectives using the latest advances in forensic science have identified new DNA profiles in their investigation into the murder of Michelle Bettles. A forensic review into Bettles’ murder—launched in March 2022 on the 20th anniversary of her murder—has identified several DNA profiles on Bettles’ clothing, including a complete male DNA profile.

Detectives are now investigating the identify of the male and forensic work is also ongoing to examine if the other DNA samples found on Bettles’ clothing can provide complete DNA profile of those individuals who were in her company in the days and hours leading up to her murder.''

Sarah Hall 15 Apr 2002

Women: Victims of a serial killer?

Four women have disappeared from the streets of Norwich. Three have been found strangled; the fourth is still missing. Sarah Hall investigates.

www.theguardian.com

'On Easter Sunday the strangled body of Michelle Bettles, a 22-year-old mother of three who had been a prostitute since her late teens, was found lying in remote woodland off the A47, some five miles out of Norwich. Three months earlier the decomposed body of Hayley Curtis, a 23-year-old prostitute who went missing last October, was found in a shallow grave off the A3 in Hampshire. And 18 months before that, in June 2000, Kellie Pratt, a 29-year-old mother of two, disappeared as she walked the streets for only the second time in her life.'

 

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07 Feb 2026

'Suffolk Strangler may have killed my daughter - his court smirk is insulting'

Heartbroken John Bettles has spent 23 years desperately searching for answers about who killed his precious daughter, after her body was found near Norwich in 2002

www.mirror.co.uk

John Bettles fears his daughter might be another of Wright's victims

'They’re urging the Suffolk Strangler – already convicted of killing five women from the red light area of Ipswich – to break his silence if he knows about Michelle’s fate. Addressing the fiend, John said: “Put us out of our misery, otherwise our sentence will continue until the day we die. We just want to know one way or another for our own peace of mind.”

 

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By Daniel Hickey 30th June 2024 rbbm

'Poor Michelle did affect me' - Expert still haunted by unsolved Norfolk murder

The unsolved murder of Norwich's Michelle Bettles, who was found in Scarning, near Dereham, still haunts one of the UK's top forensic scientists.

www.edp24.co.uk

''Prof Patricia Wiltshire appeared on BBC Radio Four's Desert Island Discs and said the death of Michelle Bettles in 2002 was one of the crimes that had stayed with her.''

''Prof Wiltshire, a forensic ecologist and botanist, and an expert in the study of pollen, said: "When you think of that girl's misery and suffering.
"Poor Michelle did affect me.
"She had a drug habit. She was supporting a pimp. Those children that she did not want to give up."

''Prof Wiltshire said Ms Bettles' body was found in "very pretty woodland" but there was an "incredible" forensic profile of "somewhere else" - a place that "involved a pond and big honeysuckle".

''The original inquiry also identified the DNA of an individual, but that line of enquiry ended with the person eliminated as a suspect.
Police also examined possible connections to Suffolk serial killer Steve Wright, who had run the Ferry Boat pub in Norwich's red light district, but did not actively link him.''