THE mother of a missing woman fears killer Christopher Halliwell could be connected to the disappearance.

Halliwell is serving a life sentence for abducting and killing 22-year-old Sian O’Callaghan and 20-year-old Becky Godden - but there have been suggestions that the two young women were not the taxi driver’s only victims.

Chef Claudia Lawrence of Heworth, York, was 35 when she was reported missing after failing to turn up for work at the University of York in March 2009. Nine people have been questioned by police, but no charges were brought.

Claudia's mum Joan told the Mirror: “Something has always bothered me about Halliwell and leaves me feeling very uneasy.

“The police may not have proved he had anything to do with my daughter’s disappearance, but they haven’t disproved it either. I still don’t feel the police have investigated the link between Claudia’s disappearance and Christopher Halliwell.”

Claudia went missing on March 19 2009, exactly two years to the day before Sian was killed.

Joan added: “A witness came forward who was adamant he tried to get her in his car, at six o’clock in the morning, after she finished her shift at Rowntree’s in York.

“She recognised his eyes from all the publicity around him. She was terrified, but nothing came of it, despite her giving a statement to the police.”

Joan claims one police officer told her that if she wanted answers to her questions, she could always visit Halliwell in jail.

She said: “I was horrified. I’ve lost my daughter and they told me I could go and visit a convicted murderer in prison.”

Police unearthed the taxi drivers’s trophy store of 60 items of women’s clothing after the killer took them to Sian’s body in 2011.

Only two items in the hideaway have been identified so far – a cardigan worn by Becky, and Sian’s high-heeled boot.

Police showed pictures of all of clothing in the store to Joan but she said they were too old and messy to tell if any had once belonged to her missing daughter.

She added: “Claudia has been missing for so long now, surely any possible link needs thoroughly investigating?

“This is about me and a daughter I have not seen for 12-and-a-half years.

"Every single day is a nightmare but [my Christian faith] will give me courage and strength to get through. If you give up hope, you might as well give up altogether.”

Earlier this week, specialist officers, including divers using an inflatable boat, searched gravel pits in Sand Hutton.

Joan, who lives 20 minutes away, told the Mirror the search had left her in “utter shock”.

North Yorkshire Police previously said: “There are no known links between Halliwell and the Claudia Lawrence case.”