Search for missing midwife Samantha Eastwood moves to rural area

Detectives hunting for missing midwife Samantha Eastwood are searching a rural area of Stoke-on-Trent for the 28-year-old.

Staffordshire Police said specialist search teams are looking at an area of Caverswall, where a section of land has been cordoned off so officers can carry out painstaking searches for clues.

Ms Eastwood was last seen in her uniform leaving work at Royal Stoke Hospital at 7.45am on Friday, July 27.

The alarm was raised the following evening when she failed to show up for her next shift.

A 32-year-old Stoke-on-Trent man has been arrested but has since been released under investigation, Staffordshire Police said.

On Friday, Samantha’s sister made an emotional appeal for help in tracing her sibling, saying: “We miss you very much, we need you home where you belong.”

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Ms Eastwood is described as white, approximately 5ft 3in tall, of medium build, with shoulder-length ginger hair, brown eyes and a fair complexion with freckles.

CCTV footage showed her leaving work with a colleague last Friday, before driving off alone. Police said her mood at the time was “happy and jovial”.

Staffordshire Police have said that neighbours reported hearing a scream in the vicinity of the midwife’s house at about 2pm on the day she went missing.

Detective Superintendent Simon Duffy from the force’s major and organised crime department said: “Today’s extensive searches are part of the ongoing investigation, which has officers and staff working round the clock in an effort to find anything which brings us closer to finding Samantha.

“I am calling on any member of the public with any information, however small and insignificant it may seem.

“Have you seen any unusual or suspicious activity, including parked vehicles in laybys in rural locations around the Stoke-on-Trent/North Staffordshire area?”