Robert Black could have snatched toddler

Four months after his death, he is still making the headlines after an expert in child abduction revealed the snatching of a British two-year-old in Germany could have been carried out by the Grangemouth-born murderer.

Black was convicted of the murders of four young girls from across the UK in the 1980s, but he was suspected of being involved in further abduction, abuse and murder cases.

He died, aged 68, from natural causes in Maghaberry prison in Northern Ireland on January 12.

However, former police officer Chris Clark, has been investigating Black’s crimes, and believes that the disappearance of Katrice Lee in Paderborn, Germany, was carried out by the killer.

Katrice disappeared without a trace in 1981 and Mr Clark says that the pattern of her snatching bears the hallmarks of Black.

And he believes petrol receipts in a file on Black that has not yet been released by police will pinpoint Black to the Paderborn area of Germany.

Katrice was snatched in November 1981 from where her family were stationed with the British Army.

A retired detective, Mr Clark (70) has worked on dozens of child abduction cases, and said the two theories put forward previously - that Katrice drowned in a nearby river or that she was snatched by a childless couple - do not make sense.

He said Black was working for a poster company at the time of the abduction.

His other murders took place across the UK while he was working as a delivery driver and police were eventually able to link him to the areas where his terrible crimes took place by petrol receipts.

Mr Clark has been researching Black’s crimes for four years for a new book co-authored by criminologist Robert Giles.