The heartbroken mother of Moors Murders victim Keith Bennett has begged Ian Brady to reveal where he buried the 12-year-old 45 years ago.

Winnie Johnson, 75, broke down as she pleaded with the child killer to help find her son's grave on Saddleworth Moor, after police announced they had called off the search for his body.

Keith was the third of Brady and his lover Myra Hindley's five young victims. He was abducted on June 16, 1964, in Manchester as he headed to his grandmother's house four days after his birthday. Mrs Johnson him part of the way and waved him goodbye, but never saw him again.

Appealing directly to Brady - who is being held in Ashworth High Security Hospital on Merseyside - Mrs Johnson said: "I'm pleading with him to get to me or the press or the police and tell me where Keith is, it is the last time it will be done.

"I appreciate what the police have done, they have done a lot of work in the last three to four years...they have done their best, they can't do anymore they have got nowhere else to look.

"It is up to Brady now to do what he can for me to get Keith back. I want them getting to Brady and ask him to either write to me or the police or the press to get more information, where Keith is. It is the last time ever. If I could speak to him now I would wring his bloody neck, but they will not let me see him."

Brady and Hindley were jailed for life in May 1966 for their two-year reign of terror during which they murdered Keith, Lesley Ann Downey, 10, John Kilbride, 12, Edward Evans, 17 and Pauline Reade, 16.

During their trial, the court heard tape recordings made by the couple of Lesley Ann pleading for mercy before she was raped and strangled. Hindley was Britain's longest serving female prisoner when she died in 2002 after 36 years in jail.

Mrs Johnson spoke at the police headquarters in Ashton-under-Lyne, Greater Manchester. She broke down in tears after grainy black and white photos of Hindley and then live pictures of Saddleworth Moor flashed up on TV screens.

She continued: "It is not fair, oh dear God, I can't talk now. It is not fair on me, what I have had to go through. I did not ask him to be picked up and murdered."

Mrs Johnson said of the decision to call of the search: "I was disappointed in one way but can understand what they mean because they have worked bloody hard up there and come to a dead end. I want Keith found before anything happens to me because I want to give him a decent burial.

"It's a nightmare. It's been a nightmare for the last 45 years how I have carried on - 45 years in limbo. He knows where he is and won't tell anyone. If he's got any decency or respect for anybody it should be me. He says he's got rights, and I have got none."

Police went to see Brady at the high security Ashworth Hospital in 2003 when they reopened their search, but he refused to see them. Since then officers have conducted periodic operations on the moor based on what Hindley had told them about where Keith's body was buried, along with photographs taken by Brady at the time.

Scientists believe some of the boy's remains would be preserved, due to the nature of the moor soil. The investigation had involved clinical psychologists, imagery experts, geologists, geophysicists, geochemists, archaeologists and anthropologists.

Detective Chief Superintendent Steve Heywood, head of its serious crime division, said although the search was over the case would never be closed.

He said: "As a force, there is nothing we would have liked more than to draw a close to this dark chapter, and we are very disappointed that we have not located Keith's remains.

"But we will never close this case and remain open to any new lines of inquiry which may come about as a result of significant scientific advances or credible or actionable information."

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