A MURDER victim's mother, who has campaigned for more than three years

for an inquiry into the police's handling of the case, yesterday accused

the Scottish Office of being involved in a cover-up.

Mrs Effie Drummond criticised officials in St Andrew's House for

accepting a report from Fife Chief Constable William Moodie into the

circumstances surrounding the investigation.

Mrs Drummond, 66, of St Andrews, said: ''The police and the Scottish

Office have turned my son's murder into a farce. This whole

investigation stinks and everyone is ignoring the truth. The chief

constable is covering up for his men and his report is a pack of lies.''

Her claims follow an inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the

death of Mr Sandy Drummond, a former soldier. He was strangled and

dumped on a farm track near his home on the outskirts of St Andrews in

June 1991.

During a fatal accident inquiry into his death, a pathologist,

Professor Anthony Busuttil, of Edinburgh University, criticised police

at the scene for failing to spot signs that Mr Drummond had been

murdered. The body was also removed before a full forensic examination

of the area.

Mrs Drummond said: ''Professor Busuttil's criticism of the police

handling of the investigation has been completely ignored by the

Scottish Office. The claims that a full-scale murder inquiry was

launched by the police the day after Sandy's body was found is also a

lie. It wasn't until the case was highlighted on the BBC Crimewatch

programme many months later that police said they were treating it as

murder.

''Until then, all they would say was that my son's death was

suspicious. It meant that people questioned during the investigation

were not aware it was murder.''

The intervention of the Scottish Office and the questioning of the

chief constable followed a plea by Mrs Drummond to the Prime Minister.

The Scottish Office's Home and Health Department ordered Mr Moodie to

have another look at it and prepare a report.

A spokesman at the Scottish Office said yesterday: ''The case is still

open and will remain so until a successful conviction is secured. There

will, however, be no further inquiry by the Scottish Office into the

police handling of the case.''

The investigation into Mr Drummond's death is one of the longest and

most detailed inquiries carried out by Fife Police. It has used an

incident room with a computer database and has taken up more than 16,000

man-hours, almost 600 statements, and almost 1000 questionnaires.