TORONTO — A man who believes former prime minister John Diefenbaker may have been his father has turned up some new leads in his paternity search.

George Dryden says he was contacted by a woman who also believes Diefenbaker may be her father and started making inquiries in 1977.

He says she told him she was then visited by an RCMP agent who was "very concerned" about a nine-year-old boy Diefenbaker had just met and thought might be his illegitimate son.

Dryden says he met Diefenbaker in 1977 at a function on Parliament Hill that he attended with his mother -- when he was nine years old.

Canada's 13th prime minister had no known children.

Dryden says he was also recently contacted by someone claiming that a relative who was present during Diefenbaker's autopsy told him the brain was removed and preserved, which Dryden believes could yield DNA.