POLICE investigating the alleged abduction and murder of a financial adviser are searching a field as part of their inquiry.
Officers have stepped up the search for the body of Lynda Spence, 28, who has not been seen since she left her parents' house in Glasgow Harbour on April 13 last year.
Strathclyde Police said a field in the Law Hill area of West Kilbride, North Ayrshire, was being searched in connection with the case. Sniffer dogs have also been used to comb hills surrounding the site near Farmfield House Farm, while police divers have also searched an underground well in the area.
In November, four men appeared in court charged with Ms Spence's abduction and murder, but the whereabouts of her body remains unknown.
Paul Smith, 45, from Largs, North Ayrshire, Colin Coates, 41, from Glasgow, Philip Wade, 40, from Glengarnock, North Ayrshire, and David Parker, 36, from West Kilbride, appeared at Kilmarnock Sheriff Court and were remanded in custody.
They were all charged with murder, abduction, assault and attempting to defeat the ends of justice.
They are accused of forcing the accountant to travel to Ayrshire and detaining her against her will at a house in Meadowhead Avenue, West Kilbride.
It is alleged that, over a two-week period, they assaulted Ms Spence by cutting off her fingers and a thumb, striking her with a golf club, scalding her with an iron and failing to seek medical attention before killing her and disposing of the body.
Coates is also charged with abducting a male at an address in Broomhill, Glasgow, detaining him against his will, forcing him to strip and demanding money.
A Strathclyde Police spokeswoman said: "Police are currently searching a field in the Law Hill area of West Kilbride as part of the Lynda Spence murder inquiry. As proceedings are live in this case, no further comment will be made."
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