Calls for police review as agonising wait goes on for Nicola Bulley family

Key moment that will change the way police operate in case like this for good

- Martin Bentham

THE family of Nicola Bulley was suffering more agony today as a forensic examination of the body found in the River Wyre continued - amid calls for a review of the way police handle high-profile cases.

Lancashire police were waiting for the findings of a detailed scientific analysis of the female body, which was spotted in the river by two walkers about a mile from where Ms Bulley disappeared more than three weeks ago, before confirming whether it is hers.

Police have yet to give any indication of the cause of death, amid speculation that it could be some time before what happened is fully understood. A man and a woman out walking a dog yesterday called police after seeing a body in a reed bed in a part of the Wyre which had already been searched. Officers arrived and found the body soon after.

Ms Bulley's partner, Paul Ansell, said the discovery left him with "no words right now, just agony". In the statement to Sky, he added: "We're all together, we have to be strong."

The only new information issued by police was that the death of the woman found in the river was being treated as "unexplained", and that Ms Bulley's family "have been informed of developments and our thoughts are with them at this most difficult of times".

The discovery of the body came more than three weeks after Ms Bulley disappeared on January 27. She had been walking her dog Willow near the home she and Mr Ansell shared with their two daughters, aged six and nine, in St Michael's on Wyre.