'You should be ashamed': Anger and recrimination in Jay Slater social media groups after body found
Within days of his disappearance, a number of Facebook groups dedicated to the case had been set up - with some going on to attract hundreds of thousands of members.
Tuesday 16 July 2024 07:36, UK
The discovery of what police in Tenerife believe is Jay Slater's body appears to have brought to an end a search that lasted for almost a month.
The case has led to online speculation around his disappearance and only on Sunday, Mr Slater's mum Debbie Duncan felt compelled to .
Within days of his disappearance, a number of Facebook groups dedicated to the case had been set up - with some going on to attract hundreds of thousands of members.
Many members of the groups used them to engage in serious discussion about the teenager's possible fate, or simply to express sympathy for him, his family and his friends.
However, the story also prompted a succession of wild theories, often based on unsubstantiated rumour, fabricated screenshots of online messages from people connected to the case and, in some cases, faked videos purporting to show Mr Slater or what happened to him.
In some posts, users made abusive and untrue statements about members of his family. For others, the plight of Mr Slater became the source of memes and joke suggestions as to how rescuers could find him.
Within minutes of the announcement that a body believed to be that of the 19-year-old had been found, members of those social media groups expressed anger at those who made abusive comments or false accusations.
'Vile trolls'
In one Facebook group with more than 282,000 members, Karen Glen said: "I hope when the family have processed everything they go after all these big accounts that went live, wrote all the rubbish they did, making their pain 100 times worse."
And Loz Kelly wrote: "Absolutely heartbreaking. Hope all you vile trolls are ashamed! Sick."
Read more:
How the search for Jay Slater unfolded
Liz Constantine said on Facebook that the Slater family should be allowed "some peace".
"All you armchair detectives should be ashamed of yourselves," she added.
Be the first to get Breaking News
Install the Sky News app for free
Lily Eason Miller wrote: "All nasty people here, are you happy now because you've all gone quiet.
"Hope you're all happy. Sick people."
Meanwhile, a TikTok user commented under a video about the discovery of the body: "So sad, I think a lot of creators on here will need to start apologising."