KILLER STONE BID TO CLEAR NAME

Barrister wants test on DNA from scene

- DAN WARBURTON

JAILED Michael Stone is staging a last-ditch legal battle to clear his name over the Chillenden Murders, pleading: "I didn't do this."

The 63-year-old has pointed the finger at Milly Dowler's killer Levi Bellfield after he penned a signed confession to the 1996 hammer attacks.

Stone is serving three life sentences for the murders of Lin Russell, 45, and her daughter Megan, six, and attempted killing of sister Josie, nine.

Now his legal team is launching an action to challenge the Criminal Case Review Commission's refusal to refer his conviction to the Court of Appeal.

Kent Police have always maintained Stone's conviction is safe, while twisted Bellfield has a history of playing mind games with officers with fake confessions.

Now Stone's barrister Mark McDonald is demanding a judicial review that would force the CCRC to carry out forensic tests on broken strands of DNA found at the crime scene. They include fragments of DNA found on a bootlace that was discovered a short distance from the bodies.

No forensic link has ever been established between ex-heroin addict Stone and the murder scene.

In a written confession, Bellfield, 55, claimed he used the lace to tie up Lin's hands before the savage attack on the mother and her daughters.

Stone's legal team say that special DNA testing techniques known as Y-STR- could prove Bellfield was responsible.

The move comes as interviews with Stone from his prison cell in HMP Frankland are due to be aired in a Sky documentary.