Linda Donaldson: Unsolved Murder (1988)

On Tuesday the 18th October 1988, an elderly couple found the body of Linda Suzanne Donaldson (31), in a ditch behind a hedge in a farmer's field at Winwick Lane, Lowton, near Leigh. Linda, from Liverpool, had been stabbed ten times. Her breasts were missing and an attempt had been made to hack off her head. Her clothes - black ankle boots, a black miniskirt, black jacket, and a studded belt, were never found, nor her distinctive gold earrings and white address book. Her body had been washed down before being dumped, most likely to erase forensic evidence.

On the day before her murder, Linda was seen by her flatmate in Toxteth, where she lived, at around 11.30pm on October 17. She was known to work in Liverpool's 'Red Light District' to feed her heroin addiction and a Merseyside Police officer, who knew her well, recalled seeing her between 11pm and midnight.

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Connection?

Just two years later two children fishing at Pennington Flash, Leigh, spotted five plastic bin bags. Inside them was the dismembered body of Maria Christina Requena, 26, also a sex worker, from Manchester. The youngsters saw the bags floating in the 170-acre lake, less than two miles from where Linda’s body had been discovered in Lowton. Maria, a mother-of-one, had vanished on New Year’s Day 1991 and her remains were found less than a week later on January 6. However, it's been reported that there was no forensic link between the two deaths, although there were similarities.