Breakthrough in 1982 Yiannoula Yianni case
There was a development in the unresolved case of a 17 year-old rape and murder in 1982, a man has been arrested in connection with the rape and murder, confirmed Metropolitan Police.
Yiannoula Yianni was found dead at the family house in Belsize Park, which immediately triggered a murder enquiry by the Met on Friday, 13th August 1982.
The 56-year old man, linked to an address in Golders Green, was detained on 12th January, for an unrelated matter. His detection seemed to have come about by matching him on the National DNA database.
The police recollecting the fateful day’s events of 1982, Yiannoula initially spent the morning with her mother, at about 12:30 they walked to nearby family shop where they brought lunch to Yiannoula’s father and brother.
Later, that afternoon 13:30 Yiannoulla had gone back home this time without her mother in order to fix dinner. Her parents returning home made a gruesome discovery only a couple of hours later, found Yiannoula’s body, at 15:00.
Yiannoulla was a pupil of the Quintin Kynaston School, in St John’s Wood, and was employed part-time in Finchley Road’s Woolworth’s branch.
This represents the biggest breakthrough in the case, with police reviewing the case from time to time, and more than 1,000 witness statements have been accounted for in the intervening years.
Det Insp Julie Willats, of the Met’s Homicide and Major Crime Command, said: “The Met never close unsolved murders and regardless of the passage of time cases can and will be reviewed, for any new opportunities to develop previously unknown lines of enquiry, and follow-up any fresh information which has become known to us.
“Yiannoulla’s family – who understandably are still devastated by the loss of their beloved daughter and sister more than three decades ago – have been fully informed of this new development.”
