Yahoo News "We just need you home": Broken mum of teenager Jay Slater issues direct plea to her missing son
The broken mum of missing teenager Jay Slater has issued a direct plea to her son, saying: "We just need you home."
Debbie Duncan, the 19-year-old's mum from Lancashire, has said she has 'not slept' since travelling out to Tenerife but that she 'can't give up' on her son.
Jay, from Oswaldtwistle, vanished on Monday morning (June 17), with the major search to find him now well into its sixth day across the mountains around Masca, in north west Tenerife.
He had been to the NRG festival the night before with friends. It is reported that he then travelled back to the rural village of Masca with others he met, staying in a remote Airbnb holiday rental, before ‘walking off into the mountains on foot’.
Asked how the family was coping with the situation, Debbie told reporters: “We’re not. I’m not coping very well at all. I’ve not slept, I’m exhausted. It’s been awful. I can’t give up on him, I just can’t.”
Ms Duncan said 'we just need you home' as she issued the heartbreaking plea to her missing son. “We just need you home – we just need him home," she said.
Speaking to the Manchester Evening News on Friday (June 21), Debbie said that local police had 'stepped up' their searches and informed her of the mountainous areas they were scaling in a bid to find Jay.
Jay, who is understood to have then left the Masca holiday cottage on Monday morning on foot and alone, later called his friend Lucy to say his phone was on just 1 per cent battery. The last mobile phone data pinged in a remote mountainous area around half a mile further north from the village.
And on Friday, it was reported that Spanish police had rejected offers of help from Lancashire Constabulary, with officers on the island insisting they were 'satisfied' with the resources that they had.
Ms Duncan said she did not know whether the Spanish authorities turning down an offer of help from the UK was because they viewed it as 'an insult'.
“I believe they said they’ve got enough resources and they don’t need the help from English police," she said. “I don’t know if they find it an insult – I really don’t know. I really don’t know.
“They say they’ve got enough resources to get on with the investigation… I don’t know, I don’t know.”
On Saturday (June 22), the sixth day of the major rescue operation, Civil Guard and Civil Defence teams were seen conducting a further search of the area, which is around 30km wide, as part of their efforts.
Search dogs were seen being walked uphill to the base from a dirt track as a number of Bomberos personnel (fire crews) also attended the scene and were seen to be conducting meetings with one another at the hillside.
