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Jay Slater’s family are ‘absolutely broken’ after discovery of a body in mountainous area suggests teenager ‘was killed instantly after falling from a height’ – as Civil Guard reveal they continued ‘discreet search’ away from ‘curious onlookers’

Jay Slater’s family are ‘absolutely broken’ after discovery of a body in mountainous area suggests teenager ‘was killed instantly after falling from a height’ – as Civil Guard reveal they continued ‘discreet search’ away from ‘curious onlookers’


Jay Slater’s family are ‘absolutely broken’ following the discovery of a body in the mountainous area of Tenerife near to where the missing British teenager’s phone last pinged.

The 19-year-old, from Oswaldtwistle in Lancashire, vanished following a night out on the Spanish island on June 17, prompting a huge search operation involving police, volunteers and family members which spanned almost a month.

On Monday morning, the Spanish Civil Guard tragically discovered a body near to Jay’s last known location, with the apprentice bricklayer’s possessions and clothes found nearby. 

Formal identification is yet to take place, but officers say that ‘everything is pointing to it being’ the missing teen. 

Amid questions over how the body was missed, Jay’s family now say they can ‘appreciate the remoteness’ of the area and believe he would ‘most likely have been killed instantly’ after ‘falling from height’.

A family source told MailOnline today: ‘The whole family is absolutely broken. They are devastated. It’s not the outcome they were hoping for. Initially they thought how could he be so close and yet be missed but now having seen the location they appreciate the remoteness of it and there is no criticism of the search. 

‘It looks as if he fell from a height so he would most likely have been killed instantly and he wasn’t there for a long time. There will be a PM [post-mortem] in Tenerife and probably one in the UK and repatriation should be within a week or so it’s all time dependent.’ 

It comes as: 

Spanish police yesterday found a body in the search for missing British teenager Jay Slater

Jay's family are 'absolutely broken' after a body was found. He is pictured here with mother Debbie Duncan (left) and brother Zak Slater (right)

Jay’s family are ‘absolutely broken’ after a body was found. He is pictured here with mother Debbie Duncan (left) and brother Zak Slater (right)

Jay's father Warren Slater and brother Zak pictured during a search and rescue last month

Jay’s father Warren Slater and brother Zak pictured during a search and rescue last month

Spanish police released footage showing officers searching the area in the hours before they found a body

Spanish police released footage showing officers searching the area in the hours before they found a body

‘All indications indicate that it could be the young British man who has been missing since June 17 in the absence of full identification. The first investigations reveal that he could have suffered an accident fall in the inaccessible area where he was found.’

When the Spanish Civil Guard called off its official search for Jay after just 13 days, there were dozens of unanswered questions about the missing teenager’s mysterious disappearance.

Jay Slater timeline

Sunday June 16: Jay and his friends, including Lucy Mae Law, party at the final day of the NRG music festival at Papagayo night club in the resort of Playa de las Americas, Tenerife.

Monday June 17: Between 3am and 6am BST, Jay goes back to an Airbnb with two men after they leave Playa de las Americas in a car.

7.30am: Jay shares a photo on his Snapchat account, which shows him standing at the doorway of a house with the location Parque Rural de Teno.

Between 8.15am and 8.30am: Jay calls Lucy and says he is ‘lost in the mountains with one per cent battery and no water’ and has missed a bus back south and was attempting to walk. It would take 11 hours.

The call cuts out and the phone’s last location is a path in the rugged Rural de Teno national park, which is popular with hikers.

Grainy CCTV, released on June 24, shows a possible sighting of Jay at Santiago at around 6pm – nearly ten hours after his mobile phone last pinged in the Rural de Teno Park at around 8.50am.

The CCTV is taken close to a church, San Fernando Rey, where Jay’s mother told MailOnline a man has come forward to say he saw someone matching her son’s description sitting on a bench with two men.

Tuesday June 18: Friends search the area but there is no sign of Jay and he does not return to his accommodation.

Local police and mountain rescue teams start hunting for Jay – and his mother Debbie flies to Tenerife.

Wednesday June 19 – Spanish police use drones, dogs and a helicopter but Jay is not found. They change their search to Los Cristianos because of a possible sighting, but it is ruled out and they return to Rural de Teno.

Thursday June 20: Guardia Civil, mountain rescue, firefighters and volunteers continue to search the national park.

Friday June 21: Lancashire Police offer support but it is declined by the Spanish police.

Saturday June 22: Search teams continue scouring the national park and Debbie says: ‘We just need you home.’

Sunday June 23: Police examine outbuildings at the bottom of a ravine where his phone last pinged.

Monday June 24: MailOnline learns Spanish police are investigating whether Jay’s past is relevant. Jay’s family focus on the area of Santiago de Teide – where the grainy CCTV they think is Jay was taken.

Tuesday June 25: Jay’s mother issues a heartbreaking plea for her son to come home as more friends fly out to Tenerife. TV investigator Mark Williams-Thomas is seen outside Airbnb Jay went to.

Wednesday June 26: Mr Williams-Thomas tells the two men that Jay went back with to ‘come forward with crucial information’

Thursday June 27: Jay’s mother says she is in talks to withdraw some of £36,000 from GoFundMe to help with rescue efforts and living expenses.

Friday June 28: Police in Tenerife call for an army of volunteers to help them scour the rugged terrain.

Saturday June 29: Only six volunteers show up to help with the search. Investigators also say the two men Jay went back with have ‘no relevance’ to the case.

Sunday June 30: Spanish police officially end the search for Jay Slater. They say the investigation ‘remains open’, however. 

Monday July 15: A body is found in the hunt for Jay Slater. His possessions and clothing are discovered next to human remains. Spanish cops say it points to an ‘accidental fall’.

The shock decision on June 30 led to amateur sleuths vowing to continue their own search through the rugged Tenerife mountains, while Jay’s family refused to give up and leave the Spanish island.

It has now emerged that the Spanish police had in fact continued a ‘discreet search’ of the mountains away from what they described as ‘curious onlookers’. 

They found a body near to where Jay’s phone last pinged yesterday.

The high-profile investigation saw internet sleuths jet out from the UK to Tenerife, while platforms such as TikTok and Facebook were awash with vile conspiracy theories which Jay’s mother claimed ‘hindered’ efforts to find him.

Announcing the discovery of a body yesterday, the Spanish Civil Guard said: ‘Given the complexity of the case, the discovery has been possible thanks to the incessant and discreet search carried out by the Civil Guard during these 29 days, in which the natural space was preserved so that it would not be filled with curious onlookers.

Jay, 19, vanished on the island of Tenerife last month, prompting a huge search effort which involved police, volunteers, family members and even TikTok sleuths. 

The apprentice bricklayer was attending the three-day NRG music festival with friends before his disappearance.

Video from the early hours of June 17 shows Jay partying the night away at Papagayo nightclub in the tourist resort of Playa de las Americas in the south of the island.

At around 5am, Jay left the Veronicas strip and got into a Seat Leon hire car with convicted drug dealer Ayub Qassim, 31, and Qassim’s unnamed friend, who he had met earlier on the holiday. 

They travelled to Qassim’s £40-a-night Airbnb, Casa Abuela Tina, in the remote village of Masca – around an hour’s drive away from Playa de las Americas.

While in the car Jay sent a Snapchat message to his friends boasting that he had just stolen a £12,000 Rolex watch from a reveller and was going to sell it for £10,000.

At Casa Abuela Tina, Jay posted a picture on Snapchat at 7.30am of him standing in the doorway of the property having a cigarette – with the location tagged as being in Rural de Teno park, near Masca. The men he went back with were deemed ‘not relevant’ to the investigation by Spanish police.

Half an hour later, the teenager decides to try and make his way back to his accommodation and is spotted at a bus stop outside the Airbnb.

After missing a bus, he calls his friend Lucy Law between 8.15am and 8.30am, telling her he was attempting to walk back to his accommodation – a journey that would take around 11 hours.

In the frantic last phone call, Jay said he had ‘cut his leg’ on a cactus and had ‘no idea where he was’.

Lucy said her friend told her he was ‘lost in the mountains, he wasn’t aware of his surroundings, he desperately needed a drink and his phone was on 1 per cent’.

Jay’s phone runs out of battery shortly after with his phone last pinging in the Rural de Teno park at 8.50am.

At around 9.04am, Jay is reported missing and his friends spend the day searching but to no avail.

The following day, local police and mountain rescue teams scour the rugged landscape and his family fly out to Tenerife to join the search. 

On June 19, the search was temporarily moved to the Los Cristianos area in the south of the island because of a potential lead, but this is quickly discounted and the search returns north.

Jay’s mother, Debbie Duncan, said she feared her son had ‘been taken against his will’.

Emergency workers continued to comb bushes, overgrown terrain, hillsides and rivers back in the Masca valley, but failed to find the missing teenager.

The Spanish police also came under fire for rejecting support from the Lancashire Constabulary back in the UK. 

On June 28, after having no luck in finding Jay, the Spanish police appealed for a mass army of volunteers such as firefighters and mountaineering experts but only six people turned up the following day.

On June 30, Spanish police then called off the search but insisted the case ‘remains open’.

Jay’s family and friends stayed in Tenerife, while TikTok sleuths also vowed to continue helping. 

One TikTok detective subsequently quit the search after saying he and his group had not received any of the money raised to help find Jay on GoFundMe.

But Jay’s mother hit back, claiming she had given him £740 of her own money for accommodation, adding: ‘We don’t need hikers, we need experts.’ 

TikTok explorer Paul Arnott was also helping in Tenerife, as was detective-turned-investigator Mark Williams-Thomas. 

Nevertheless, Spanish police officers were discreetly continuing their own search of the mountains.

On July 14, Debbie spoke of her ‘heartache’ and criticised ‘awful comments and conspiracy theories’ about her son’s disappearance.

Jay Slater's family have been informed that human remains have been found in the mountainous area of the Spanish island after a body was found (pictured: Jay Slater with his mother Debbie Duncan)

Jay Slater’s family have been informed that human remains have been found in the mountainous area of the Spanish island after a body was found (pictured: Jay Slater with his mother Debbie Duncan)

A video released on Monday showed police mountain rescue experts moving through difficult terrain on foot, scaling mountains and picking their way through thick undergrowth

A video released on Monday showed police mountain rescue experts moving through difficult terrain on foot, scaling mountains and picking their way through thick undergrowth

Part of the clip shows two members of the search team (pictured) being winched out of the area by helicopter after the body (not pictured) had been found and recovered

Part of the clip shows two members of the search team (pictured) being winched out of the area by helicopter after the body (not pictured) had been found and recovered

A 13-day search by police using drones, dogs and a helicopter failed to find any trace of Jay

A 13-day search by police using drones, dogs and a helicopter failed to find any trace of Jay

In a statement released through LBT Global, Ms Duncan said: ‘As we approach four weeks of our beautiful Jay’s disappearance, we cannot put into words the heartache we are suffering as a family.’

Ms Duncan said the family wish to thank the public for ‘their continued support and well wishes’ and praises the British Embassy and police for ‘doing all they can to support us’.

But she also criticised ‘awful comments and conspiracy theories’ posted on social media, which she branded ‘vile’ and says were ‘hindering’ people trying to help locate the teenager.

Just 24 hours later, a body was found by Spanish police. 

Charity LBT Global said that while formal identification has not yet taken place, the remains were found with the 19-year-old’s clothes and possessions near his last known location.

Members of a mountain rescue team from the Spanish Civil Guard discovered the body near the village of Masca on Monday.

The force said Jay could have fallen in the steep and inaccessible area where the body was discovered.

The body was lifted out of a ravine — described by police as ‘steep and inaccessible’ — by a helicopter belonging to a regional government emergency and rescue group.

The £40-a-night remote Airbnb in the remote village of Masca where Jay spent his final hours before going missing

The £40-a-night remote Airbnb in the remote village of Masca where Jay spent his final hours before going missing  

Jay Slater's final Snapchat at 7.30am on Monday June 17, taken at remote Airbnb before he went missing

Jay Slater’s final Snapchat at 7.30am on Monday June 17, taken at remote Airbnb before he went missing

Jay's mother Debbie Duncan and father Warren Slater leaving the Guardia Civil in Playa de las Americas on July 2

Jay’s mother Debbie Duncan and father Warren Slater leaving the Guardia Civil in Playa de las Americas on July 2

Volunteers searching for Jay in Masca after the teenager went missing

Volunteers searching for Jay in Masca after the teenager went missing

It will likely be transported to the northern city of La Laguna where an autopsy will be performed in the coming days.

A spokesman for the Civil Guard said that the ‘lifeless body of a young man in the Masca area after 29 days of constant search’.

They added: ‘Given the complexity of the case, the discovery has been possible thanks to the incessant and discreet search carried out by the Civil Guard during these 29 days.’

Parts of the countryside were ‘preserved’ so they were ‘not filled with curious onlookers’, they told Sky News.

Officers continued: ‘All indications indicate that it could be the young British man who has been missing since June 17 – in the absence of full identification.

‘The first investigations reveal he could have suffered an accident fall in the inaccessible area where he was found.

‘We are awaiting the results of the autopsy.’

Written by bourbiza mohamed

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