Remains confirm suspicious death

The discovery of human remains in West Lothian is being treated as a suspicious death, police confirm.

Lothian and Borders Police officers found the remains at an embankment by the River Almond, in the Craigshill area of Livingston, on Monday.

They were looking for Mary Ferns, 88, also known as May, who has been missing for almost three years.

Mrs Ferns was last seen leaving her home in the Howden area of Livingston at about 0930 BST on 17 June 2008.

A police cordon is in place while inquiries are carried out.

Police had searched the River Almond when Mrs Ferns first disappeared but recent new leads caused them to search the specific embankment area where the human remains were found.

Det Insp Phil Gachagan, of Lothian and Borders Police, said: “The circumstances of the find and the inaccessibility of the area where the remains have been found make it a suspicious death.

“It is too early to identify who this is but our inquiries are ongoing and we found the remains as a result of new information we received in relation to Mrs Mary Ferns.”

Mrs Ferns, who was deaf and partially blind, had told her husband Bill, who was her second husband of 16 years, that she was just popping out to buy some socks.

He thought she had had gone to shops in Livingston, but CCTV cameras in Edinburgh later showed her walking along Princes Street with her distinctive floral walking stick.

She was last seen wearing a brown three-quarter-length jacket, brown skirt, brown shoes and was carrying a brown handbag.

Police divers searched the Almond River in the months after she was reported missing, which drew a blank.

In March 2009 a fresh appeal for information about the missing pensioner was featured on BBC1’s “Missing Live”.

In July last year her step-daughter, Anne Foster, 46, made an appeal for help in finding Mrs Ferns.

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