Serial child killer Robert Black is to appeal against his recent convictions for kidnapping and murdering a schoolgirl in Northern Ireland.

Black, 64, from Grangemouth, was found guilty last month of snatching nine-year-old Jennifer Cardy as she cycled to a friend's house in Ballinderry, Co Antrim, in August 1981.

The former delivery driver was already serving multiple life sentences for the murders of 11-year-old Susan Maxwell, from the Scottish Borders, five-year-old Caroline Hogg, from Edinburgh, and Sarah Harper, 10, from Morley, near Leeds, all in the 1980s.

His reign of terror was finally ended in 1990 when he was caught red-handed by police with a barely alive six-year-old girl hooded, bound, gagged and stuffed in a sleeping bag in the back of his van in the Scottish village of Stow. He had sexually assaulted her moments earlier.

Detectives in England are reviewing the evidence against Black in connection with another schoolgirl disappearance.

He has long been the prime suspect in the case of missing 13-year-old Genette Tate, who was last seen in a rural lane in Aylesbeare, Devon, in 1978.

Black is due to be sentenced for Jennifer Cardy's kidnap and murder by judge Mr Justice Ronald Weatherup on December 8.

It is understood the killer's legal team will submit appeal papers to the court authorities in Belfast within two weeks.