Joanna Yeates was strangled – police

Landscape architect Joanna Yeates, who was found dead on a grass verge on Christmas morning, was strangled, police have revealed.

The 25-year-old died as a result of “compression of the neck” and Avon and Somerset Police have launched a murder inquiry.

Detective Chief Inspector Phil Jones, who is leading the investigation, said he believed Miss Yeates’s body had been dumped in Longwood Lane, Failand, North Somerset “several days” earlier. He said a number of lines of inquiry were being pursued, including the possibility there was a sexual motive behind her killing or that the graduate knew her killer.

Police are also keeping an “open mind” over whether Miss Yeates had been held captive or had been killed where she was found. Mr Jones said Miss Yeates’s boyfriend Greg Reardon, who reported her missing on Sunday night after returning home from a weekend away in Sheffield visiting family, was being treated as a witness and not as a suspect.

“The investigation into the death of 25-year-old Joanna Yeates is now a murder investigation and I am leading that murder investigation,” Mr Jones said. “As you know, the post-mortem examination has taken longer than usual, because of the frozen condition of her body. The pathologist completed his examination (on Monday) night and concluded that the cause of her death was compression of the neck – in other words, strangulation.”

The landscape architect had been missing for eight days when her body was discovered close to the Bristol and Clifton Golf Club – about three miles from her home. She was last seen alive on the evening of December 17 having bought a pizza in Tesco Express in Clifton, at about 8.45 p.m. Police believe she then walked the short distance home to the ground floor flat she shared with her boyfriend because her keys, purse and bank cards were found there, together with a receipt from Tesco.

Making a plea for the public’s help, the detective said: “However small or insignificant you think your information might be, please come forward and speak to us. Please don’t assume we may already have been told the information that you have. We would much rather be told the same piece of information several times over than not be told it at all.”

Forensic officers were continuing the meticulous search of the Failand area and police were also examining Miss Yeates’s flat in Canynge Road for signs of a struggle.