Rennes - Genetic tests carried out on an entire French village in the hunt for the man who raped and strangled a British teenager last year proved negative, justice sources said yesterday.
They said that DNA samples taken last month on 252 male residents aged 36 to 60 from the Brittany village of Pleine Fougeres did not match the killer's DNA recovered on the body of Caroline Dickinson (13). A series of tests carried out in October on the 170 male residents aged 15 to 35 had also been fruitless.
The tests were ordered by an investigating magistrate to widen the scope of the inquiry into the murder of the teenager who was strangled while on a school trip to France in July, 1996.