Police appeal as girl’s bones are found 13 years on

Police will today launch a fresh appeal for witnesses into the death of a graduate whose bones were found dumped by the side of a motorway this week — 13 years after she disappeared.

Melanie Hall's skull, pelvis, arm and leg bones were discovered in a bin bag by workmen clearing vegetation on an M5 slip road near Bristol.

Despite a massive police inquiry, a £10,000 reward and television appeals, no trace had been found until now of the 25-year-old, who went missing after arguing with her boyfriend at a nightclub in Bath.

The remains were discovered at junction 14 of the M5 near Thornbury in Gloucestershire, 30 miles from where Miss Hall vanished in June 1996.

The police inquiry has never been closed, and a new appeal for information will be launched today by detectives and her parents, Steve and Patricia, who have kept her bedroom as it was in case their daughter returned.

People interviewed, including her boyfriend at the time, Dr Phillip Karlbaum, and another man who was the prime suspect in the Suzy Lamplugh case, could be re-questioned.

Miss Hall was a clerical officer in the orthopaedic department at Bath's Royal United Hospital where she met Dr Karlbaum, a surgeon.

She was last seen sitting on a stool near the dancefloor of Cadillacs nightclub shortly after 1am on 9 June 1996.

Thousands of nightclubbers and taxi drivers were interviewed.

Miss Hall's parents, who live in Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltshire, made a fresh appeal for information in 1998 and again on the 10th anniversary of her disappearance.

Mr Hall said then: "You have to try to lock the awfulness of the truth at the back of your mind."

In 2003 police arrested two men in connection with her disappearance but they were released without charge.

Detectives have looked at possible links with the case of estate agent Suzy Lamplugh and the "Batman rapist" a serial sex attacker in Bath who has evaded capture for years.