Mystery on royal estate: Dog walker finds body

Police suspect foul play in death of unidentified woman

LONDON — It had all the elements of a mystery novel of the type Britons love so well: a wooded area on the queen’s country estate, a neighbor out walking a dog through the trees during the winter holidays, a body discovered.

Acorner of Queen Elizabeth II’S country estate of Sandringham, where the royal family traditionally spends the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, became a crime scene Tuesday.

Norfolk county police in nearby King’s Lynn, about100 miles northeast of London, launched a murder inquiry after the discovery of the body of a woman in the woods close to Anmer, a village on the 20,000-acre area of farmland and woods owned by the royal family.

Police said the remains were found on New Year’s Day on the royal estate’s 600 acres that are open to the public yearround and used by local hikers.

After an autopsy Tuesday, Norfolk police said the body was that “of a young adult female” whose remains had been on the site for one to four months.

“The forensic pathologist believes it is highly unlikely the death was through natural causes,” said the statement, adding that “there is no evidence of accidental injury, damage due to firearms or bladed weapon.”

Further DNA tests are Wednesday, police said.

Detective Chief Inspector Jes Fry of Norfolk police said at an earlier on-scene news conference that the inquiry could be “complex.”

“I cannot confirm whether she was clothed because, at the moment, only my staff, the person who found the body and the person or people who put it there know that and I would like it to stay that way,” Fry said. “The body was found by a dog walker and was not underground. At this stage we do not know who the victim is.”

Fry said police would be looking at missing person and cold cases nationwide.

The wooded crime scene is just three miles from the Sandringham house described by the royal website as a private holiday residence for four generations of royalty and the favorite refuge of King George V, the queen’s grandfather.

The queen and other family members were at Sandringham over the holidays. On Christmas Eve, her husband of 64 years, Prince Philip, developed chest pains and was rushed to a hospital, where he underwent surgery on a blocked coronary artery.

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