Bexhill 'monster' case set for TV's Crimewatch

The detective leading the hunt for the man who attempted to abduct a local girl plans to take up to four colleagues to the studios.

Using child actresses to play the roles of the eight-year-old victim and her friend, and actors as the offender and investigating officers, a BBC team spent two days at the scene of the May 18 attack in Woodsgate Avenue this week.

The re-enactment of the incident is due to be screened as part of the nationwide programme on June 26.

Detective Inspector Trevor Bowles, head of Rother CID, said of the film crew: "They have been fantastic to deal with. But they are very thorough..."

Filming which took the better part of Monday and Tuesday will be edited down to a few minutes.

But the prime-time television coverage might just provide the investigating team with the breakthrough they need.

D.I. Bowles said: "We will be there to take calls from the public responding to the programme. You have to have people there who have been involved in the investigation and know the case intimately so that when people call in you can assess which might be definite lines of inquiry.

"We still have officers from the serious crimes branch assisting us in this inquiry."

From the outset, D.I.Bowles has been full of praise for the victim for the courageous way she has assisted detectives.

Now she is helping an expert produce an artist's impression of the man who leapt from bushes as she played in the road, grabbed her round the throat and announced his evil intentions.

The attacker ran off when the victim's friend re-appeared and screamed in terror.

*The Observer has been assisting in the investigation by supplying police with the "Find This Monster" posters they have put up across the town. The man they are hunting is in his 40s, with long, curly ginger hair.

He had his left eyebrow pierced with a ring and his blue shirt was open, revealing a hairy chest.

He had badly bitten nails and dirty hands.