Missing Jay Slater’s devastated mum Debbie breaks down in tears over son’s disappearance & pleads ‘I want my baby back’
JAY Slater’s heartbroken mum wept as she begged for help to find her beloved son and pleaded: “I just want my baby back”.
The 19-year-old, from Lancashire, has not been seen or heard from since he vanished in Tenerife on Monday.
Worried mum Debbie Duncan said the past few days have been a “living nightmare” as she issued a tearful plea for help.
She told ITN last night: “It’s just an absolute living nightmare. It’s like a dream – it’s like it’s not happening, it really is. I wouldn’t wish this on anybody.
“I just want my baby back. Please, just anybody who can help just look for him. There’s a massive area up there, massive.
“It’s over 48 hours now since he last had any contact with anybody.
“He’s out there somewhere, or somebody knows where he is. We just need to find my baby.”
Devastated mum Debbie flew to the island earlier this week as rescue crews stage a frantic round-the-clock search for Jay.
The massive search operation has entered its fourth day after the apprentice bricklayer disappeared on Monday while on holiday with two friends.
He went to a rave on Sunday night before with two men he’d met that evening.
Jay’s last known location at around 8am on Monday was the Teno Rural Park in the northwest of the island – a 10-hour walk from his accommodation.
He was last heard fro when he called his friend Lucy Law after he missed the bus and was trying to walk back.
Jay told her he was lost, needed a drink of water and had only 1 per cent battery on his phone.
His phone then cut off, with his last location showing as the Rural de Teno park – a mountainous area popular with hikers.
Cops scoured the teen’s hotel room in the tourist resort of Los Cristianos on Wednesday, where his distraught mum Debbie is waiting for news.
Jay was sharing the room at a three-star apartment complex with pal Brad – who he’d flown out with alongside friend Lucy – to go to Tenerife’s New Generation Rave festival.
- Jay, 19, was first reported missing on Monday after vanishing on his way home from a rave the night before
- Mum Debbie was told by cops at 2am on Tuesday to catch the first flight to Tenerife
- A Coronation Street star with a connection to Jay’s family published an appeal for help to find him
- Jay’s posted a Snapchat the night before he vanished showing him smiling with friends
- His friend Lucy described the teen’s disappearance as “suspicious and weird” as cops vowed to keep an “open mind”
- Jay’s mum was sent a message saying “kiss goodbye to your son” amid family fears he’s been kidnapped
- She gave a tearful plea last night and said “I just want my baby back”
- His family have endured days of bogus theories and sick messages from trolls
- Cops searched the teen’s hotel room in Tenerife for clues on Wednesday
Police, who promised to keep an “open mind” about his disappearance yesterday, have scanned his accommodation for clues.
But Jay’s stricken mum Debbie said there was “nothing untoward there”.
She explained: “Police have been into Jay’s room today. I’ve been in his room as well.
“But everything of Jay’s was neatly hung up, it’s just a normal room and there’s nothing untoward there.”
Yesterday the mum shared a twisted Snapchat she was sent as she touched down in Tenerife on Tuesday – telling her to “kiss goodbye to your son”.
She told ITN: “I got a Snapchat about 10 minutes after I got off the plane saying ‘Kiss goodbye to your boy, you’re never going to see him again, he owes me a lot of money.
“I just think he’s being held against his will. He’s not a stupid lad. He wouldn’t have gone walking down bloody mountains.
“There’s a road there with tourists and buses and properties, He’s not that daft.”
It’s just an absolute living nightmare. I just want my baby back.
Jay Slater's mum Debbie
In the three days since Jay vanished his heartbroken family have had to endure an onslaught of sick messages from trolls claiming to have kidnapped the teen.
One even came from a so-called medium who claimed to know where Jay was – and promised to tell his mum if she’d pay for their flights to Tenerife.
Apprentice bricklayer Jay, from Oswaldtwistle in Lancashire, was booked on a flight back to the UK this morning.
But Debbie, who has now been joined in Tenerife by Jay’s dad Warren Slater, said she has his passport and isn’t expecting him to reappear in time to catch his plane.
Around 15 of Jay’s family and friends have flown out to the Canary island this week to help with the search.
She has been staying at another apartment in the same complex Jay had booked into although she is due to move to new accommodation on Thursday.
Jay has been missing for three days now after vanishing early on Monday morning.
A Spanish missing persons association has launched an appeal for help in finding him, dubbing his case one of “high vulnerability”.
The nonprofit has sounded the alarm in previous cases involving Brits and urged anyone with information to call the country’s emergency number 112.
Tragically valuable hours were wasted in the search on Wednesday when cops moved the operation to the other side of Tenerife after a false sighting.
Mountain rescue were told around midday to leave the hills where Jay was last seen and move to the southern tourist resorts of Los Cristianos and Playa de Las Americas.
The huge search operation was later moved back near the village of Masca in northwestern Tenerife after the report turned out to be false.
The “Jay Slater Missing” Facebook group, which already has more than 330,000 members, claimed that cops were stopping drivers in the area to show them Jay’s photo on Wednesday morning.