THE woman whose dismembered body was found in bin bags at Treales, near Kirkham, before Christmas has now been named by police as Chandrika Suryakant Patel, aged 50, from Wembley, North London.

The grim discovery was made when a couple out walking on December 27 saw a pile of bin bags in a frozen field off Spen Lane near the Derby Arms.

Det Supt Mike Arnold of Lancashire Police said Mrs Patel was reported missing from her London address on November 20. A post mortem examination revealed the cause of death to be asphyxiation but at first police were stumped as to the woman's identity. They even took the unusual step of releasing an artist's impression and a photograph of her earring found at the scene.

DS Arnold said: "From the beginning we treated the death as suspicious and made nationwide appeals for information. Now after almost five weeks' investigation we have established who she was." Following the identification of Mrs Patel, DS Arnold travelled to London to continue the investigation. He said: "We still do not know what Mrs Patel was doing in Lancashire and we need to build up a picture of her movements from the time she was reported missing."

It is thought Mrs Patel entered the country from India in the summer of 1991 and subsequently married an Indian man but this ended in divorce in 1999. From this time she was living in the Wembley area and it is not known what, if any, connection she had with the Lancashire area.

DS Arnold said: " We are unsure whether Mrs Patel was killed in the county or killed elsewhere and her body dumped at Treales."

Anyone with any information should contact Blackpool Police on (01253) 293933 or Crimestoppers on (0800) 555 111.