The investigation into Jill Dando’s killing was one of the biggest homicide probes ever carried out in the UK.
The Crimewatch presenter was shot on her doorstep at just after 11.30am on Monday April 26, 1999, shocking the nation. The murder bore the hallmarks of a professional hit. Operation Oxborough was under intense pressure from the start. The Met Police was dealing with the fallout from the Macpherson report which two months earlier branded it “institutionally racist” over Stephen Lawrence’ 1993 murder.
It soon became apparent the Jill Dando case would be hard to solve. Det Chief Insp Hamish Campbell’s murder squad interviewed more than 2,500 people, traced 1,200 cars and produced 3,700 exhibits.
The £2.75million investigation looked into hundreds of leads. The team of 45 officers checked 80,000 mobile phones and trawled through hundreds of hours of CCTV. They analysed 60 firearm murders of women, checked out 8,000 names given to police and traced 20,000 blue Range Rovers. According to former Met Commissioner Sir John Stevens’ 2005 autobiography, 3,000 letters, calls and emails came in each day.
Barry George was arrested in April 2000 and it took a year to make the case “absolutely watertight”, Mr Stevens wrote. He recalled: “The last thing we wanted was another Lawrence-type fiasco.” He said the conviction came as an “immense relief” – but Mr George was acquitted in a 2008 retrial after eight years spent wrongly in prison.
Everything we know about Barry George now and where he is now
The case remains one of Britain’s most notorious unsolved murders but police have not touched the files for more than 10 years.
Now the Mirror investigation has revealed a man wanted for questioning in the relation to Jill’s murder bears a striking resemblance to a ruthless Serbian secret services assassin. The unidentified person was caught on CCTV following the gunman’s likely escape route. Facial comparison expert Emi Polito has found a number of similarities between “Man X” in the CCTV and twice-convicted murderer Milorad Ulemek, who is serving 40 years in a Serbian prison.
Ulemek’s lawyer Aleksander Kovacevic said his client did not wish to 'participate' when asked if he murdered Jill. He wrote: “I inform you that my client has been made aware of this and that he is not interested in participating.”
At the time Jill was killed, the 56-year-old led a feared squad of hitmen responsible for targeting opponents of brutal dictator Slobodan Milosevic. When Jill died, the Yugoslav war was raging and British planes were bombing Serbia as part of a NATO campaign. She had made an appeal for Kosovan refugees who were being massacred by Milosevic’s forces. Within hours of her death, a call was made claiming the murder was in response to the bombings.
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