THE hunt for the murder weapon used in the killing of Julie Smailes was called off yesterday.

A specialist police search team spent yesterday and all of Wednesday digging up a garden behind a semi-detached council house in Briardale, Delves Lane, near Consett, County Durham.

Officers leading the inquiry would not say if a weapon had been recovered, but said several pieces had been taken from the garden over the two-day dig.

Detective Superintendent Harry Stephenson, said last night: "Further items have been recovered as a result of the work. They will be forwarded, along with those recovered yesterday, to the forensic science laboratories for detailed examination."

Sales manager Julie Smailes, 27, was found dead in her home in Wingrove Terrace, Leadgate, near Consett, in October 1996. She had been repeatedly stabbed and strangled.

The search team was called in to look for the murder weapon, after a tip-off to detectives. The house attached to the garden was once the home of Emma Kennedy, a close associate of John Thompson, the man police believe killed Miss Smailes.

Thompson, 27, hanged himself in August 1998, days after 18-year-old babysitter Rachel Tough was found beaten to death at his home in Warwick Avenue, Moorside, Consett.

Miss Kennedy, 22, was found dead at the bottom of Hownsgill Viaduct, near Consett, known locally as Gill Bridge, on New Year's Eve, 1999. The spot is only yards from where Thompson's body was found.

In April, detectives said they had DNA evidence proving Thompson was in Miss Smailes' house on the night she was killed.

Officers from Durham's Major Crime Team, led by Detective Inspector Neil Redhead, spent yesterday interviewing new witnesses they believe have key information.

Today, they will re-interview "old" witnesses in the light of their new findings.