Man quizzed over UK prostitute murders

Police were last night questioning a 40-year-old man on suspicion of murdering three prostitutes after the body parts of a woman were found in a river.

The man was arrested on suspicion of the murders of missing Bradford sex workers Suzanne Blamires, Shelley Armitage and Susan Rushworth, West Yorkshire Police said.

The remains of the woman were discovered by a member of the public in the River Aire, in Shipley, West Yorkshire, at about 2 p.m. yesterday.

Yesterday, Assistant Chief Constable Jawaid Akhtar said police had been granted extra time, until today evening, to question the 40-year-old man, who was arrested on Monday.

Speaking at the scene of the discovery of the body parts, Mr Akhtar said: "The man is being questioned on suspicion of the murder of Suzanne Blamires, aged 36, who went missing on Friday.

"He will be questioned on suspicion of the murder of Shelley Armitage, aged 31, who has been missing since Monday April 26, and the murder of Susan Rushworth, aged 43, who has been missing since Monday 22 June 2009."

Mr Akhtar added: "It is a very thorough and painstaking inquiry into three missing women, all of them sex workers, with all the necessary resources and expertise devoted to it."

Mr Akhtar was speaking in front of the large white forensics tent police erected by the side of the river.

The remains were found in the water just a few yards from where the busy Otley Road dual carriageway crosses the Aire. Screens were erected on either side of the bridge and forensic work continued in the small industrial estate where the tents have been put up.

A number of officers, including white-suited forensic teams, were still at the scene, behind a car showroom about five miles from Bradford's red light area.

Teams of police, including specially trained sniffer dogs, were also conducting a detailed search of the Chain Street area of Bradford's red light district tonight.

Officers in black uniforms were carrying out systematic searches of streets - stretched across the roads in lines - and other, smaller groups of police were working at locations throughout the Sunbridge Road area.

People living and working in the area said the officers had been examining a number of derelict buildings in the past few weeks and had been searching the area for days.

One householder said: "It's terrible what seems to have happened. There are girls on these street every night. Loads of them. They're so close together they don't even need mobiles, they just yell to each other. It's drugs and prostitutes everywhere round here."

Ms Rushworth was last seen at midday on June 22 last year, after getting off a single-decker bus near her flat on Oak Villas, in the Manningham area.