A BRADFORD cold case solved by an expert witness which put a killer behind bars 25 years after he murdered an old woman has been featured on a new BBC series.

The story of Amy Shepherd, and how advances in DNA science helped to nail killer Raymond Kay for her murder, has been featured in the latest episode of new BBC One series Expert Witness.

Presented by Ashley John-Baptiste, the programme looked back at the death of Wibsey pensioner Amy Shepherd in 1994.

The 86-year-old, nicknamed ‘The Duchess’ locally, was found dead in her flat in Folly Hall Gardens, strangled and stabbed to death in what was seemingly a burglary gone wrong.

After evading capture for 25 years Raymond Kay was eventually charged and convicted of her murder in May 2019, when he was 70 years old.

He was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 17 years, and told it’s “inevitable” he will die behind bars.

A career criminal, had been doing community service at the time, delivering Meals on Wheels to elderly residents, which is how he won the trust of Ms Shepherd so she would allow him into her home.

It’s then, when it’s believed she caught him stealing, that he killed her in a vicious attack that shocked the local community.

He was interviewed at the time but there was insufficient evidence at the time to charge him, and he must have thought he had got away with it until police knocked on his door over 20 years later.

The expert witness in the case was DNA scientist Edward Jarman, who analysed carefully preserved items from the crime scene to reveal Kay as the killer.

That included a hair found on Ms Shepherd’s neck which modern DNA profiling matched it to Kay, but that was not enough by itself.

Mr Jarman also used a new technique which can search through DNA where there is a large amount of female DNA, to identify the Y chromosomes that only men have.

Male DNA which at the time was found to be from an unknown source was put through modern technology and it found that it matched Kay.

He also found Kay’s DNA on one of the murder weapons, a tea towel, which was another piece of the jigsaw to reveal Ms Shepherd’s killer.

This gave police enough to arrest and charge Kay. At trial, he was found guilty and given a life sentence.

You can watch the full episode – episode 10 in the series – titled: Expert Witness – Pollen, Bones and DNA, by visiting the BBC iPlayer.