by Dan Bloom

A funding stream for a cold case team hunting the killer of a woman found dead 23 years ago has dried up.

The body of Caroline Pierce, 20, was discovered in a water-filled ditch at St Mary in the Marsh on December 15, 1987.

She had suffered fatal head wounds in a brutal sex attack and was naked apart from a pair of tights when farm worker John Minnis found her body.

Just months earlier another woman, 25-year-old Wendy Knell, was found battered to death in a similar attack.

Both women were shop managers in Tunbridge Wells and both lived in bedsits there.

The link brought the cases national fame, with the media dubbing them the "bedsit murders".

Officers at Kent Police's cold case unit had received funds from a government programme, Operation Stealth, to help look into the cases since 2008.

They made a significant breakthrough when they isolated new DNA for both attacks, but no matches were found on the national database.

And since Christmas the government funding has stopped - although the team still receives funds from Kent Police.

Det Ch Insp Dave Withers, who leads the unit, said: "Before Christmas I made a final bid for some remains of funds but we were unsuccessful.

"We are still doing the work, but I will continue to seek funding to supplement it as ours is being squeezed at the moment."

Miss Pierce's case appeared on the BBC's Crimewatch UK when police first re-opened the bedsit murder files in 2007.

Officers received more than 40 calls, but none led to an arrest.

Anyone with information should call Kent Police on 01622 690 690 or Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.