A BURLY man who claimed to have his pricey Rolex watch stolen hours before Jay Slater vanished could hold the key to the case.
Jay, 19, is claimed to have admitted swiping the valuable timepiece in a Snapchat to pals after leaving a club in the early hours of June 17.
Police have been investigating a brawl outside the Papagayo Beach Club in Tenerife shortly after closing time that night.
A scuffle is understood to have broken out after a burly Eastern European man claimed his Rolex watch had been nicked.
Detectives have been combing through CCTV footage from the venue’s security cameras and speaking to witnesses, including taxi drivers and bar staff.
One of Jay’s friends who flew to Tenerife after he vanished told investigators the alleged theft may have something to do with him going missing.
And today, ex-detective Mark Williams-Thomas made extraordinary claims in an eight-minute video.
He said the apprentice bricklayer, from Lancashire, posted a Snapchat saying he had taken a Rolex worth £12,000 from an unknown person.
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According to Mark – who worked on the Madeleine McCann case – the teen shared the post with pals while in a hire car.
After going to a club all night in Playa de las Americas, Jay travelled north to the Airbnb in Masca village with two men.
During the journey, Mark claims Jay admitted taking a Rolex to friends while talking to them on Snapchat.
Mark said he and his team had been “unable to validate” Jay’s claim on Snapchat “in terms of reported theft”.
It remains unclear who the owner of the apparent stolen Rolex is.
Mark added: “However friends of Jay said he would not make this up and the watch was subject of later conversation between the friends.”
Jay was last year handed an 18-month community order for his part in a gang attack on a teenager.
Tom Hilton was left with his skull split open when an eight-strong gang – including Jay – ambushed him with a machete, golf clubs and an axe.
Tom, then 17, was left fighting for his life after the assault in Rishton, Lancashire, in 2021.
After the trial at Preston Crown Court last year, Jay was given an 18-month community order with 25 days of rehabilitation activities and 150 hours of unpaid work.
As he came to the end of his sentence, he jetted to Tenerife with friends Lucy Law and Brad Hargreaves for the three-day NRG festival.
During the trip, Brad said Jay became friendly with the two men whose Airbnb – called Casa Abuela Tina – he travelled to by car hours before he vanished.
But Mark claimed Jay left “feeling scared” and would not return to the cottage despite his phone battery dwindling.
According to Mark, the host of the Airbnb told Jay at around 8am there would be a bus two hours later.
Jay then tried to make his way back to his holiday accommodation, faced with an 11-hour walk.
Mark – who worked on the Madeleine McCann case – said Jay talked to at least three friends via message and the phone while trekking back, telling them he was lost.
At around 8.50am he made a final frantic call to friend Lucy, saying he was in the “middle of nowhere” with no water and had just one per cent battery on his phone.
Mark said in a video update today: “He was told to go back by two people to the rental.
“He said he could not do that and that he’d already been walking for 30 minutes and that he was now off road and was walking on a track where there were loose stones.”
Jay did, however, send his location at both 8.49am and 8.50am to friends, showing him on a hiking trail in the desolate Rural de Teno park.
The teen’s phone battery then died, and he has not been seen or heard from since.
He said: “We have received information that would suggest that Jay left the rental property feeling scared and he would not return to the rental, even though that would have been the most sensible course of action, and also where he could have charged his phone, got some water and made contact with friends.
“We continue to investigate this aspect.”
The two men Jay was with in the last hours before he disappeared spoke to police on the island before jetting back to the UK.
They have been deemed “not relevant” to the investigation by Spanish police.
Today, a picture emerged of the man who rented the Airbnb for £40 a night.
Ayub Abdul paid £120 for the remote holiday let in Rural de Teno park for three days.
Cops on the island called off the mammoth search operation for Jay on Sunday in a huge blow to his devastated family.
On Tuesday, however, two plain-clothed police officers searched the Airbnb apartment again.
Detectives spent two hours combing the let on the island’s northwest.
Jay’s heartbroken family said “words cannot describe the agony” after the search was abruptly called off less than two weeks in the hunt.
Mum Debbie Duncan said in a heartbreaking statement “we just want to find him” after the family vowed to keep looking.
Her emotional message said: “Jay is a normal guy who is in his third year of an apprenticeship, and he is a very popular young man with a large circle of friends.
“We are a very close family and are absolutely devastated about his disappearance. Words cannot describe the pain and agony we are experiencing.
“He is our beautiful boy with his whole life ahead of him and we just want to find him.
“We do not have any information on his whereabouts.”
Parents Debbie and Warren, as well as brother Zak, are all in Tenerife still looking for answers on what happened to Jay.
