UPDATE on 03/08/17

We have since been contacted by the family of Levi Bellfield who have asked us to make clear that while Mr Bellfield was interviewed by police regarding other offences, he did not confess to any other crimes, nor subsequently deny them. We would like to clarify that the police statements on the matter said that all lines of enquiry regarding Mr Bellfield's involvement in additional crimes had been exhausted.

The serial killer and former West Drayton bouncer Levi Bellfield might have lied about other murders to hurt grieving families, according to the retired officer who caught him.

Bellfield, 48, is serving a whole life sentence for the murder of 13-year-old schoolgirl Millie Dowler after snatching her while she walked home from school in Surrey in 2002.

The Metropolitan Police announced on Wednesday (November 9) that a two year investigation into Bellfield's claims found no evidence he was linked to other crime.

Levi Bellfield, serving a whole-life sentence for the murder of Milly Dowler

Bellfield was jailed in 2008 for killing 19-year-old Marsha McDonnell in 2003 and Amelie Delagrange, 22, in 2004.

'He likes to inflict pain on other people'

The retired officer who caught Bellfield in 2008, Colin Sutton, told the Daily Mirrror : “You can't believe a word he says.

"He likes this kind of attention and to inflict pain on other people.”

Bellfield had told police he was guilty of other attacks in early 2015 but later withdrew the claims.

When he was convicted of Milly Dowler's murder in 2011, detectives said Bellfield may have been responsible for 20 attacks on women that remained unsolved.

Unsolved crimes in west London

Possible crimes linked to Bellfield included the disappearance of student Elizabeth Chau, 19, in 1999.

She was last seen on CCTV in Ealing on her way home from Thames Valley University, but has never been found.

In January 2000, Lola Shenkoya, 27, a US-born computer graduate, got off a bus near Ealing Broadway station when she too disappeared.

But Scotland Yard ruled out Bellfield, saying “there is no evidence to link him to any case for which he has not already been convicted.”

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