Friends and family of murdered Canadian teen Rebecca Middleton are trying to revive a prosecution after no one was convicted for her 1996 killing.

Family friend Rick Means believes charges of aggravated sexual assault, which carries a life sentence, could be laid but he is frustrated prosecutors have not lived up to a promise to review the case.

He said supporters were prepared to launch a private prosecution and even take the case to the European Court if the Director of Public Prosecutions failed to act.

Canadian Rebecca Middleton, 17, was raped, tortured and killed on Ferry Reach Beach while on holiday in Bermuda.

Two men later appeared in court over the case. Kirk Mundy was jailed for five years in 1996 after pleading guilty to being an accessory after the fact.

The Crown accepted a plea from Mundy before Police had completed forensic tests which revealed Mundy?s semen was inside Rebecca?s body.

Justis Smith had also been charged with the murder but London?s Privy Council ruled he could not be re-tried after Puisne Judge Vincent Meerabux ruled there was no case to answer although the Privy Council described his decision as astonishing. Mr. Means accepts it would not be possible, under Bermuda law, to re-charge anyone for murder but he said there were other avenues to take.

He said: ?We were supposed to have a review of the case in March, now they are saying October.?

Mr. Means said understaffing at the DPP?s office was big problem.

He said other lawyers had reviewed the court papers and said there were still grounds to lay charges.

?We are in the process of hiring a QC from England.?

Asked about the costs involved he said: ?You?ve got to do what you?ve got to do, there has to be some justice done here.

?This child was brutally and viciously attacked, raped and murdered.?

Mr. Means said the case was mishandled by virtually everyone who dealt with it.

The man who did the autopsy was unqualified to do so said Mr. Means but had been made to do it and did not take scrapings from Rebecca?s fingernails which could have yielded vital DNA evidence.

But he believes breakthroughs in DNA technology could help nail the killers.

He said the fact the case was old was not a good enough reason to drop it after pointing out that the Crown had recently got convictions on old cases, including the jailing of Stanford Archibald in 2003 for the 1985 murder of Aaron Easton.