LGC Forensics has played a critical role in helping the Metropolitan Police to solve the Rachel Nickell killing.
LGC Forensics, with six laboratories across the UK and two in Germany, has worked for all 43 major police forces in England and Wales, as well as in other countries.
The work of LGC scientists was recently highlighted after the Metropolitan Police called for help to re-investigate the death of Damilola Taylor.
LGC Forensics has assisted in many high profile and cold case re-investigations, including the Paget investigation into Princess Diana's fatal car crash; the death of the UN weapons inspector, David Kelly; and the Alexander Litvinenko investigation.
'The LGC Forensics team is pleased to have helped the Metropolitan Police achieve justice for Rachel Nickell's family after 15 years,' said Dr Angela Gallop, LGC Forensics director of science and innovation.
'The major breakthrough was the discovery by our team of scientists, led by Roy Green, of DNA matching Robert Napper's on a taping taken from the victim's body.
'The link to Napper was supported by some paint flakes found on samples from the victim's son that matched the paint on Napper's tool box, and by a footwear mark at the scene that could have been made by one of his shoes.' Explaining the DNA breakthrough, Dr Gallop added: 'Initial tests did not show any DNA in a sample from the taping.
'When LGC Forensics was asked to re-investigate, we decided to re-test this taping and original samples taken from it.
'This revealed the victim's DNA along with traces of DNA from an unknown male.
'Further work on the unknown DNA established that the result was more than 1.4 million times more likely if the DNA had come from Robert Napper than someone else unrelated to him.' The forensic work on the Rachel Nickell case was undertaken at LGC's laboratories at Culham, Oxford, by a team of over 20 scientists working under Roy Green and including colleagues from Cellmark.
