The body of a British teenager raped and murdered last month in India's resort state of Goa will be released this week to her mother for burial at home, a family lawyer said Wednesday. Scarlett Keeling's body has remained in police custody since her death on February 18 as her mother, convinced the 15-year-old was murdered, battled with local police who retracted an initial report that said she drowned. Police will on Thursday release the body to her mother, Fiona MacKeown, who then plans to return to London at the weekend or early next week. “We have all the required permissions,” said family lawyer Vikram Varma. The lawyer said MacKeown hopes to return to India to pursue the case. MacKeown decided to take her daughter's body home for burial in Devon, southwest England, after the Goa government on Tuesday accepted her demand that it hand over a murder probe she has called “a farce” to federal investigators. __
