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Moira Anderson: forensics experts fail to find girl's remains in grave Moira Anderson: forensics experts fail to find girl's remains in grave
(about 1 hour later)
Forensics experts have failed to find the remains of a schoolgirl who disappeared more than 50 years ago after reopening a grave in North Lanarkshire.Forensics experts have failed to find the remains of a schoolgirl who disappeared more than 50 years ago after reopening a grave in North Lanarkshire.
A team lead by the forensic anthropologist Professor Sue Black had exhumed the grave at Coatbridge in the search for Moira Anderson, who vanished after she boarded a bus during a heavy snowstorm in 1957.A team lead by the forensic anthropologist Professor Sue Black had exhumed the grave at Coatbridge in the search for Moira Anderson, who vanished after she boarded a bus during a heavy snowstorm in 1957.
The disclosure will be a bitter disappointment to Anderson's surviving sisters and the child sex abuse campaigner Sandra Brown, who had made it a personal quest to find the missing girl's remains.The disclosure will be a bitter disappointment to Anderson's surviving sisters and the child sex abuse campaigner Sandra Brown, who had made it a personal quest to find the missing girl's remains.
Brown believed that her father, Alexander Gartshore, a convicted child sex offender and former bus driver who died in 2006, had abducted and killed Anderson after she boarded his bus, on her way to a nearby Co-op on an errand for her grandmother. Brown believed that her father, Alexander Gartshore, a convicted child sex offender and former bus driver who died in 2006, had abducted and killed Anderson after she boarded his bus on her way to a nearby Co-op on an errand for her grandmother.
She believed her remains had been hidden in the open grave of an acquaintance of her father's called, Sinclair Upton, who was due to be buried in his family's plot at Old Monklands cemetery, Coatbridge, shortly after Anderson disappeared. She believed her remains had been hidden in the open grave of an acquaintance of her father's, Sinclair Upton, who was due to be buried in his family's plot at Old Monklands cemetery, Coatbridge, shortly after Anderson disappeared.
After persuading Upton's surviving relatives, Prof Black and the lord advocate, Frank Mulholland, to support the exhumation, permission to open the grave was granted by a sheriff in December. After persuading Upton's surviving relatives, Black and the lord advocate, Frank Mulholland, to support the exhumation, permission to open the grave was granted by a sheriff in December.
The meticulous operation to reopen the lair, which contained seven bodies from the Upton family and dated back more than 100 years, began on Monday. Radar scans of the graves before the exhumation had shown signs which suggested something else might have been buried there. The meticulous operation to reopen the grave, which contained seven bodies from the Upton family and dated back more than 100 years, began on Monday. Scans of the graves before the exhumation had indicated something else might have been buried there.