AN inquest will be resumed this Wednesday into the unsolved murder of Hampshire pensioner Georgina Edmonds.

Central Hampshire Coroner Grahame Short, sitting in Winchester, will hear details of how Mrs Edmonds, 77, of Kiln Lane, Brambridge, near Eastleigh, died on January 11 2008.

The hearing is expected to only last 30 minutes. When the inquest opened it heard the cause of death was head injuries.

The savage killing may never be solved after the man police believed was responsible walked free from Winchester Crown Court in January.

A jury cleared Matthew Hamlen, of Hamilton Road, Eastleigh, of the murder.

The trial that started last November heard that Mrs Edmonds is thought to have had lunch and been taking an afternoon nap when she was disturbed by an intruder who had broken into her house next to the River Itchen.

She was tortured with a knife before the killer battered her to death with a marble rolling pin kept on her kitchen worktop.

The attack left her lying face down on the floor in a pool of blood.

The police have vowed that the case will never be closed and urged people to come forward with fresh information.

It was the biggest murder investigation in Hampshire in more than 30 years, generating more than 26,000 documents.

More than 10,000 people were listed on the police database as featuring in the inquiry, 1,000 members of the public offered information, more than 350 people were also named as suspects and hundreds of local men had their DNA taken as police strove to find the killer. Thirteen people were arrested during the enquiries.

The inquest hearing will be held in the Basing Room, Castle Avenue, Winchester.