A MAN has been arrested in Golders Green for the rape and murder of a teenage girl more than 30 years ago.

The body of Yiannoulla Yianni, 17, was discovered by her parents in their family home in Hampstead on August 13, 1982. She had been raped and strangled.

More than 1,000 witness statements have been taken since the Metropolitan Police launched a murder inquiry.

But no arrests were made until yesterday (January 12), when a 56-year-old man was arrested at a Golders Green address on suspicion of rape and murder.

It comes after the man was matched on the National DNA Database, after he was arrested for an unrelated matter.

The man remains in police custody at a north London police station.

On the day that she died, Yiannoulla had spent the morning at home with her mother.

At about 12.30pm, they walked to the family's shop near to their home to take lunch to her father and brother.

An hour later, Yiannoulla returned home to prepare dinner while her mother stayed at the shop.

It was to be the last time her family saw her alive.

Her parents found Yiannoulla's body when they returned home at about 3pm that afternoon.

Detective Inspector Julie Willats, of the Met's Homicide and Major Crime Command, said: “The Met never close unsolved murders and regardless of the passage of time cases can and will be reviewed, for any new opportunities to develop previously unknown lines of enquiry, and follow-up any fresh information which has become known to us.

"Yiannoulla's family - who understandably are still devastated by the loss of their beloved daughter and sister more than three decades ago - have been fully informed of this new development.”