Jay Slater friend says 'he has been kidnapped' after mountain search stopped

A close friend of Jay Slater says she is 'starting to think he has been kidnapped' after police halted their mountain search for the missing Brit.

A huge search operation involving sniffer dogs and mountain rescue experts has been taking place since Monday in the mountains near the village of Masca. Jay, a 19-year-old apprentice bricklayer from Lancashire, vanished on Monday after making a call to his friend saying he was lost.

Since then the search has centred around the mountains in the north, but that changed today when police said the search operation had been switched to the south - in the tourist resorts of Los Cristianos and Playa de Las Americas near to where the teenager was staying. A spokesman for the Civil Guard said at 12.30pm local time: “The search operation has moved to the south of the island. The search areas are Los Cristianos and Playa de Las Americas.”

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Jay Slater’s friend Lucy Mae, who had flown to Tenerife with him to attend a three-day rave festival, said around the same time she was growing increasingly concerned for his safety as she described his disappearance as “suspicious and weird”.

Reacting to police confirmation they had switched their search for Jay Slater from mountains Lucy Mae said: “Someone has given a false lead to the police saying he’s rang a taxi down to Los Cristianos. If this was the case he would have rang his mum or one of us. I know him well and he would NOT have us worrying.

“Someone is trying to deter the police from him being up there. I’m starting to think he’s been kidnapped.”

Asked if she thought that was the reason for the switch, she said: “Yes, This is really serious.”

There was no immediate response from the Civil Guard.

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