The father of a schoolgirl stabbed to death almost 16 years ago has been told to ignore speculation that serial sex killer Robert Napper may have murdered her.

Cliff Tiltman has endured an agonising wait for justice since his 16-year-old daughter Claire was stabbed and left to die in a Greenhithe alleyway on January 18, 1993.

But he says he is not getting his hopes up over links drawn between her death and psychopath Napper, who last month admitted to killing Rachel Nickell on Wimbledon Common in 1992.

Mr Tiltman, 59, of Woodward Terrace, Greenhithe, has read a series of reports in national newspapers which said police were considering Napper as a potential suspect in the unsolved case.

Claire’s death came just 10 months before Napper killed 28-year-old Samantha Bisset and her four-year-old daughter, Jazmine, in Plumstead, and six months after he killed Ms Nickell.

But Mr Tiltman said Kent Police had visited him over the Christmas period and told him to ignore the rumours.

“I never get my hopes up,” he said. “They only tell you what they want you to know. If they can say 100 per cent this is the person and we are going to make sure they get what they deserve that’s fine. It would be nice to know, but the other people who would really have liked to know aren’t around any more.”

Mr Tiltman’s wife, Linda, died of throat cancer in March 2008, without knowing who had taken her daughter’s life.

But Mr Tiltman, who is resigned to living the rest of his life alone, is convinced years of grief after Claire’s tragic death also took their toll.

He said: “If Claire was still around I’m convinced Linda would be.