DETECTIVES have turned to DNA screening within a wealthy seaside community in a bid to make a breakthrough in the gruesome unsolved murder of a Scots artist one year after she was bludgeoned to death with a claw hammer.
Borders-based Valerie Graves had significant head and facial injuries when she was discovered in the ground-floor bedroom of a waterside house in Bosham, on the English south coast.
She was killed while she house-sat for friends in the coastal village that was featured in an episode of the ITV crime drama Midsomer Murders.
Ms Graves, 55, had moved from Jedburgh, in the Scottish Borders, to the West Sussex village just two months previously to care for her 87-year-old mother.
Now police have returned to the area of the killing in their latest attempt to find any evidence that might lead them to what happened.
She was house-sitting with her sister Jan, mother Eileen and her sister's partner, Nigel Acres in a home in Smugglers Lane while the owners of the £1.6m property were spending Christmas in Costa Rica.
Ms Graves had been repeatedly hit on the head and face with the hammer. She was discovered by her sister.
Police were yesterday in Smugglers Lane and nearby Bosham Lane to give residents and visitors the chance to pass on any information that might lead to a breakthrough. They were due to be in the area again from 10am today.
They have asked all men who visit, work or live in the area to voluntarily attend DNA screening sessions.
Officers handed out leaflets and put up posters asking "all men aged over 17 who live, work or visit Bosham to help police find Valerie's killer by providing a simple DNA mouth swab and thumbprint" to "enable police to eliminate as many men as possible from the inquiry".
The drop-in sessions will take place at the Millstream Hotel in Bosham between January 21 and 29, February 2 and 7, and February 10 and 15, police said.
Det Supt Nick May, of the Surrey and Sussex major crime team, said: "We need the public's help to catch this person before they hurt someone else and to get justice for Valerie and her family.
Sussex Police said during the course of the investigation into her murder, more than 9,500 people were interviewed and a £20,000 reward offered. A BBC Crimewatch appeal has been made and a limited DNA match of a suspect has been yielded.
But no-one has been charged over her murder despite an extensive investigation.
It is thought that the artist either got up during the night and was confronted by her killer while the rest of her family slept, or was murdered in her bed.
Her body was discovered at 9.50am on December 30.
A post-mortem examination revealed Ms Graves suffered significant head and facial injuries. A 22-year-old man arrested over her murder was later freed without charge.
Last week Ms Graves' son, Tim Wood, 32, said: "It's hard to carry on knowing that someone is out there able to do it to someone else and knowing that they haven't been caught for what they have done."
He appealed for anyone with information about the killer to come forward.
Before moving to the south coast Ms Graves ran her own craft studio and gallery called Fin Taw at the Harestanes Countryside Visitor Centre, near Jedburgh, making toy hares.
She graduated from Heriot-Watt University in 2007 in Textile Design and received an award in 2010 from the Creative Arts Business Network in Scotland.
Back in 1998 an episode of Midsomer Murders titled Written in Blood filmed in Bosham featured a middle-aged writer who was bludgeoned to death with a candlestick in his bedroom on a stormy night, while indulging a fetish for women's clothing.
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