Police investigating a child abuse scandal in Jersey fear they could find another dead body at a former children's home after their forensic sniffer dog showed an "extremely strong reaction" when it was lowered into the cellar of the building today.

The partial remains of a child were found at the weekend in the Haut de la Garenne building and officers have now broken into the cellar, which has been mentioned by several victims of alleged child abuse as a place they were taken to be brutalised.

Today police broke through from the first room of the cellar into a hidden second chamber, about 12ft square, which they discovered had been bricked up.

They say that the reaction of the specialist search dog, trained to respond to the scent of human remains, when it went down into the dark, rubble-strewn cellar makes them fear that more grim finds will be made at the Haut de la Garenne building.

Officers are refusing to say exactly what they saw in either chamber of the cellar, but they indicated that it bore out the stories of various former child residents at the home who have called in the last few days to report being abused.

Police say they have received more than 70 calls since the skull was found underneath a concrete floor in a corridor in another part of the building.

“The initial look at what’s in there certainly corroborates some of the victims,” said Lenny Harper, Jersey's deputy police chief.

“I don’t wish to elaborate on what’s in there at the moment.”

Mr Harper did say however that the force was making inquiries to try to find a set of shackles mentioned by victims which they believe have been removed from the building.

He said that police had been unaware of the existence of the bricked-off room until recently. The bricked-up area entered today is one of a number of sites being looked at by police after being identified by sniffer dogs trained to find human remains.

They have not ruled out finding more bodies. “There is another room of the same size that appears to have been bricked up,” Mr Harper went on.

“Some of the bricking-up appears suspicious but there could be an innocent explanation for it.”

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