Mother of teenager missing in Tenerife says police have ‘stepped up’ search

The mother of Jay Slater, the 19-year-old apprentice bricklayer who is missing from Tenerife, has said she believes that Spanish police have intensified their search for him, as the hunt enters its sixth day.

Debbie Duncan told the Guardian she spent eight hours in a police station on Friday, as police outlined their detailed plans to search for the missing teenager from Lancashire. “I think it’s been stepped up,” she said, which she described as “too right”.

Duncan, who flew out to the island on Tuesday, a day after Slater went missing, said she still believes “something untoward” may have happened to her son, and said police had told her “we’re investigating all leads.”

She also said Spanish police fear that “noise” around the case may have a negative impact on the search.

“They have actually said that there’s too much noise, that’s affecting it,” she said. “They’ve got all the plans, their locations. They have got this map they were showing us, shaded different colours.”

Duncan also renewed calls from the family for British police to fly to Tenerife to join the search. But last night, in a statement, Lancashire constabulary said that their offer of help had been refused by Spanish counterparts.

“We’ve had a problem with the language barrier,” Duncan said. “It’s difficult with all the Spanish police and British police, they have to let the Spanish police do the investigation, but I want somebody to come out there.”

Lancashire police said specialist officers from the force were continuing to support the family.

“While this case falls outside the jurisdiction of UK policing, we have made an offer of support to the Guardia Civil to see if they need any additional resources,” a spokesperson said.

“They have confirmed that at this time they are satisfied that they have the resources they need, but that offer remains open and they will contact us should that position change.”

On Friday, search teams in the Rural De Teno natural park said they had not given up hope of finding Slater alive. They said the search focused on three distinct areas, covering a distance of 30 square kilometres.

“We still have hope that he’s alive, up until the last moment when the last hope is lost. The truth is that we feel a bit frustrated because we can’t find him. It’s so big [here] that it’s very difficult to search in such a steep area. But we’re doing everything we can,” one rescuer said.

“We haven’t found anything, we have combed this entire trail, we’ve been up and down but, until now, nothing.”

The teenager was last heard from on Monday morning when he phoned a friend saying he was lost, needed water, and that his phone battery was on 1%.

He had been with friends at the NRG music festival, but had gone back with two men, believed to be British, who he had met that night, to their holiday cottage on the outskirts of the village of Masca, almost 40km north of the holiday resort where he was staying with friends.

The last known sighting of Slater was by Ofelia Medina Hernandez, whose brother owns the cottage where the men were staying.

She said Slater had asked her about bus times, then later saw him walking up hill – in the opposite direction to Los Cristianos, where he was staying.

“He walked along the road when I saw him for the last time, up there … He was there alone,” she said. “He was walking normally, though fast, a little fast.”

To walk back on foot would have taken about 11 hours.

On Friday evening, search teams deployed dogs and drones from the Cruz de Hilda viewpoint, close to where Slater was last seen.

The Guardia Civil said on Friday: “There is a search on going and the police operation is focused on the area of Masca (Tenerife). We cannot confirm any more information.”