Police 'ignored threat letters' sent to Jill Dando, TV presenter claims

Television presenter Jill Dando was killed outside her home in Fulham in 1999. Credit: PA Archive

TV presenter Alice Beer, who worked with murdered Crimewatch star Jill Dando, has said the pair received similar kidnap and rape threats just weeks before she was killed in April 1999.

Ms Beer, who worked alongside Miss Dando on the BBC's Children in Need and Holiday shows, told the Sunday Mirror she received the sinister letter in her BBC mail, which bosses passed on to police.

But the 49-year-old said she was not interviewed by officers either before or after Miss Dando was shot dead outside her home in Fulham, west London.

Now a presenter on ITV's This Morning, Ms Beer was working on BBC consumer programme Watchdog when she received the threats in March 1999.

Barry George was initially convicted of murder in July 2001 but was acquitted of killing the 37-year-old presenter at a retrial in August 2008.

A spokesman for Scotland Yard said: "The Metropolitan Police Service fully investigated the circumstances into the murder of Jill Dando. Two trials took place and the investigation was subject to an internal review.

"If any new information comes to our attention then this will be investigated."