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New Jay Slater clues - leg injury, hotel room search and holiday friends

20 June 2024 , 12:38
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British tourist Jay Slater is still missing in Tenerife (Image: MEN Media)
British tourist Jay Slater is still missing in Tenerife (Image: MEN Media)

The hunt for missing British tourist Jay Slater continues on the island of Tenerife - and over the past four days, there have been several updates about the teenager's last moments before vanishing.

The 19-year-old apprentice bricklayer, from Oswaldtwistle, Lancashire, was enjoying a festival with friends on Sunday evening when he decided to extend his night out with pals he had met on holiday. As his other mates returned to their accommodation, in the early hours of Monday morning, Jay found himself lost in a rural location after missing the bus back.

Before his phone died just before 9am, he was last in touch with his friends to say he was attempting the 11-hour walk back to the hotel and that he needed water. But days later, he is still nowhere to be seen.

Police have scoured the area of his last known location in the mountains around Rural de Teno Park, while also searching for clues in his holiday apartment, south of the island. Officers searched the room he was sharing with a friend at the three-star complex in Los Cristianos.

His mum, Debbie Duncan, who flew to the Canary Island on Tuesday, said she and the police had been in the room trying to find clues as to where he might be. "Everything of Jay's was neatly hung up, it’s just a normal room and there’s nothing untoward there," she said.

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"His passport was there along with all his euros which I’ve got now. I’m not sure he had any money on him when he made that last call to his friend Lucy on Monday morning before he vanished. But he had his bank card and I’ve checked his bank because I can get into his account online and there’s nothing gone out since he was on Veronica’s Strip in Playa de Las Americas earlier.

"He and his friend Brad who he flew out here with would have been getting up tomorrow and flying home. They had a flight tomorrow morning. I've got the tickets as well as Jay’s passport, which has had a stop put on it by the British authorities before they knew it was in my possession."

Jay's last known location registered near a hiking trail, several hundred feet above the small village of Masca. Friend Lucy Mae, who he was on the trip with, says that he complained of being thirsty and that he was lost when he managed to phone her at around 8am on Monday, just before his phone ran out of battery.

In an interview with Sky News late on Wednesday, Lucy revealed he had told her that he had "cut his leg on a cactus." Expressing concern about her friend, Lucy said: "It's very warm in the day and very cold at night. So in the day, he's going to be really warm without a drink, and then at night, he's going to be very cold without any suitable clothing."

New Jay Slater clues - leg injury, hotel room search and holiday friendsJay attended a festival in Tenerife before disappearing (MEN)
New Jay Slater clues - leg injury, hotel room search and holiday friendsThe search for Jay continues (TNS/SOLARPIX.COM)

She previously shared details of their final phone call to the MEN on Tuesday. She said: "He's gone on a night out, he's gone to a friend's house, someone that he has met on holiday. One of the people he has met has hired a car out of here, so he's driven them back to his apartment and Jay has gone there not realising how far away it is.

"He's ended up out in the middle of nowhere. Jay was obviously thinking he would be able to get home from there. But then in the morning he's set off walking, using his Maps on his phone and ended up in the middle of mountains with nothing around. He rang me at about 8 o'clock morning saying his phone was on 1 percent."

She added: "He said 'I don't know where I am, I need a drink and my phone is about to die.'" Since then, Lucy has joined the search party in and around the mountainous area and after "driving around all day", said there was "literally no trace of him". He had sent her a photo saying he didn't know where he was, she claimed, and she used this image to look out for landmarks.

Lucy claimed they had come across a property in the north of the island where Jay spent the night on Sunday. Two unidentified people there allegedly said Jay had been out for a smoke before saying he wanted to leave.

The two also said he had been directed to a bus stop "right by the house", with a service every 10 minutes to Los Cristianos. However Lucy believes her friend must have lost his bearings as "everything looks the same".

Speaking from near Rural de Teno park in northwest Tenerife on Wednesday afternoon, the young woman said her friend vanishing was 'suspicious'. "Jay's not stupid, it was just before 9 o’clock in the morning when he rang me so broad daylight and the area he was in is full of hikers," she said.

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New Jay Slater clues - leg injury, hotel room search and holiday friendsFriend Lucy Mae says her friend's disappearance is 'weird' (Facebook)

I've been up there every day every since I got that phone call from Jay on Monday morning that made me panic and so many walkers and other people are up there. It’s secluded but the spot where he last made phone contact with me is near a main road and he would have had the wherewithal to flag someone down, to wave someone down and ask for help.

"There’s something weird going on. It is suspicious. In two days you’re telling me someone’s not seen him. There’s a restaurant 10 minutes away that he would have seen or walked past. Fair enough it didn’t open for another two hours but if that were me I would have sat and waited at the restaurant till it opened and as soon as it opened I would have said, ‘Please can you put my phone on charge’ and then I would have rung someone, I would have rung a taxi. It’s suspicious and it’s weird."

Jay's mum has also shared her fearful concerns for what may have befallen her son. She revealed she worries "something bad" has happened as he tried to back his way home, and believes he may be being held "against his will." Since his disappearance, the mum has been tormented by hoax calls from people pretending to have her son, and most recently, she revealed she has been sent a terrifying Snapchat message that read 'kiss goodbye to your boy' - claiming that Jay owed the sender 'lots of money'.

"I got a Snapchat about 10 minutes after I got off the plane saying ‘Kiss goodbye to your boy, you’re never going to see him again, he owes me a lot of money,’ which I passed on to police with the number it came from because I had my wits about me at the time and got my eldest son Zac to take a screen grab before it disappeared," she said.

A Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office spokesperson said: "We are supporting the family of a British man who has been reported missing in Spain and are in contact with the local authorities." Jay had been attending a three-day NRG festival, which ended on Sunday, 16 June at Papagayo beach club in South Tenerife.

A Civil Guard spokesperson in Tenerife told the Daily Mail that "everything possible" was being done to find Slater. "A specialist mountain rescue and intervention group called the Greim have been mobilised," she said. "A police helicopter is also out and focusing on the area around the village of Masca. Other emergency services including firefighters have also been mobilised."

Saffron Otter

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