Man's severed head found in field

The head was found by a farmer on his land in Asfordby, Leicestershire, on Tuesday afternoon.

The test results were made public by Leicestershire Police after it was disclosed that an arm and a leg found in separate locations in Hertfordshire had belonged to a man.

The Herts and Leicestershire forces are working together to find out whether the human remains were all from the same person.

The results were released after an initial post-mortem examination at Leicester Royal Infirmary, but forensic tests are continuing to try to identify the dead man.

The examination was not able to establish a cause of death or to give a precise indication of how long the head had been in the field.

But police are trying to determine whether the body part belonged to the same man whose arm was discovered on farmland in Wheathampstead on Sunday, a week after his leg was found in a holdall about a 30-minute drive away in Cottered.

Tests have shown the leg belonged to a man between 5ft 6ins and 5ft 10ins tall. He is believed to have been white or Asian, but his DNA profile did not match any held on the National DNA Database.

Detective Superintendent Julia McKechnie, of Leicestershire Police, said: "This is a large investigation and my main priority is still to determine the identity of the person involved. Work is ongoing in order to obtain a full DNA profile and we recognise that this may take some time.

"As we are still waiting for results we are not able to make any links to any crime or investigation being undertaken by colleagues in other forces at this time. I know the incident has been shocking and upsetting for the local community and I want to thank them for their cooperation and understanding."