DETECTIVES have reopened a 13-year-old rape case in which a girl aged 14 was attacked and threatened at knifepoint.

The schoolgirl was on her way to meet friends when the rapist struck, held the knife to her throat and said he would kill her.

Officers have now been able to use some of the most advanced DNA and forensic techniques to also establish the same man carried out two other rapes in the county - one in the 1970s and another in the 1990s when a teenager was stabbed.

It was on a November evening in 1994 at the remote cricket pitch at Southampton Sports Centre he pounced, armed with a knife.

Police spoke to more than 400 men and visited hundreds of homes as they tried to find the man responsible for the attack.

Today the hunt for the attacker has been relaunched and been widened after detectives using the latest forensic techniques discovered the same man had struck twice before.

New information suggests the rapist struck in the 1970s in Portsmouth and outside a nightclub in Southsea in 1990 where he stabbed his victim before sexually assaulting her.

The victim in the latter attack was 19 years old. She died of an illness 18 months later - something her parents claim was impacted by the terrifying attack.

The cases have been reopened as part of an on-going investigation into "cold-case" rapes being carried out by the Major Crime Department and Hampshire's Police's recently-formed peformance and review team.

Tomorrow the hunt for the rapist will turn national as detectives make an appeal through BBC's Crimewatch programme. Evidence is so strong that all they need is a name to rule someone in or out of the inquiry.

The show will feature a reconstruction of the attack on the 14-year-old which happened as she was walking to her friend's house - where she eventually managed to run to and call 999 for help.

Police are particularly hoping that the fact it happened on the night of the first ever National Lottery draw - November 19, 1994 - will jog someone's memory.

An e-fit produced at the time, when the victim described her attacker as looking like Phil Mitchell from EastEnders, and the rapist's hat - a black baseball-style cap bearing the Los Angeles Raiders logo, will also be shown.

It is thought he could have strong links with Hampshire - in particular Southampton because of his knowledge of the location of the city-council-run sports centre.

To read an interview with the victim, see today's Daily Echo.

Crimewatch, BBC1, 9pm,tomorrow