SPANISH POLICE HUNTING FOR JAY SLATER MUST RE-EXAMINE AIRBNB

A retired Scotland Yard officer who investigated several missing persons has urged Spanish police to accept an offer of help from their British counterparts.

Graham Wettone, who was in the Met for 30 years, has poured over the evidence and the investigation since Jay vanished seemingly into thin air after a three-day dance music festival on the morning of June 17.

Speaking to MailOnline he said: 'I've been following this case closely and discussing it with colleagues and it's certainly a very bizarre one, lots of things just don't add up.'

Apprentice bricklayer Jay has not been seen since he was driven to the isolated £40 Airbnb by the two Britons following a rave after party in the heady resort of Playa de las Americas on Tenerife.

Little is known about the two men other than that they are in their late 30s and early 40s and they have been questioned by Spanish police and allowed to fly back to the UK.

Amazingly the Spanish police have described the men as 'irrelevant' and Mr Wettone also suggested the Tenerife authorities should swallow their pride and accept an offer of help from Lancashire police where Jay is from.

They have now called off their search after almost two weeks of looking although they insist the case is 'still open' and they are asking for anyone with any information to contact them.

Mr Wettone said: 'I'm sure the Spanish police kept their details and if need be can go back to them and investigate them with the help of British police.

'I know people are saying these two should have been kept but unless there is any real incriminating evidence it would be hard to keep them in Spain.

'That's why I would start again from the beginning and speak to all the witnesses again, my gut feeling is that many of them may not be telling the truth.

'There are so many inconsistencies in what I am seeing and reading. I think the Spanish police need to take a step back and think 'Why did he go missing where he did and in what circumstances?'

'They seem to be focusing primarily on the fact that they were told he wandered off into the mountain, but we are now almost two weeks in, and nothing has been found up there.

'I would hope that they have at least secured the Airbnb because if evidence is there then it will need to be gathered.

'But to be honest, I would even go back further to the days leading up to his disappearance, have they checked his bank accounts for anything untoward in the hours before he went missing.

'Were there any patterns forming that would point to him going wandering off but the fact he is said to have done that just doesn't square with me.

'Was there anything sinister and untoward there, that would have made him go off with these two men, is there anything in his past that needs looking at more fully.

'That is where help from Lancashire would have been vital, they would have resources to look into his background.

'He's young, he's fit, so if he did wander off and something happened why hasn't he been found?

Mr Wettone added: 'I think after almost two weeks searching and with nothing found, the Spanish police should go back their starting point and take another look.

'It seems to me on the face of it that they are just focusing on the mountain, but I would hope they are looking at other avenues and those include criminality.

'I think I would have put some form of block on that road to stop and ask witnesses if they had seen anything, it was 9am so I would have thought people would be around.

'It seems to be they haven't done that, and you have to ask is it resources, maybe they haven't got the officers to spare to stop people and ask questions.'

The retired Met officer conceded that the Spanish detectives have a difficult task because they are questioning witnesses, many of whom would have spent the three days before Jay vanished at the three-day NRG music festival. Drink and drugs may have been taken at the event, which may have distorted witnesses' memories, he said.

'I would also be challenging some of the witnesses as well, and that's always the most difficult part of an investigation because you are questioning their honesty.

'With a suspect you know they will try and lie but a witness is different and that's why you need to try and find something else that corroborates what they are saying.

'And that can be a very difficult conversation to have with them but you need to be 100 per cent sure of what they are saying.

'As we know you can ask four or five people the same thing and get four or five different answers.

'On the face of it they say they seem to be just focusing on the mountain, but I would hope they are looking at other avenues, it just doesn't seem open-minded enough to me.'

Mr Wettone added: 'After this length of time and with nothing being found you have to ask is he even there and he is perhaps somewhere else?

'The fact no body or evidence of him up there has been found would start leading me to another avenue, I'd even be asking are we sure he was up there in the first place.

'They seem to be thinking that he is up there sadly under a rock may somewhere maybe but I'm not so sure and that's why I think they should have accepted Lancashire's help even just to get a second opinion.'

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2024-06-30T15:57:48Z dg43tfdfdgfd