ITV presenter Isla Traquair has hit back at the trolling she has faced online due to her coverage and dedication to trying to help find Jay Slater who has gone missing in Tenerife.
Slater was attending the NRG (New Rave Generation) music festival on Sunday, June 17 with his friend and the last person to hear from him, Lucy Law.
The following Monday, Slater attempted to get the bus back to Los Cristianos, where he was staying, but missed the bus and decided to try and walk back – unaware it would take 10 hours.
He then phoned Law between 8:30am and 9:00am saying he was lost in the “middle of nowhere” and was in desperate need of water after walking for half an hour.
The call cut out and a missing person report was filed, prompting a mammoth search with drones, sniffer dogs, and a helicopter.
During her coverage of the missing teen, Traquair received criticism after jetting to Tenerife to stay close to the search for the missing teen and interviewed his best friend, Brad Hargreaves.
In an explosive rant on TikTok, Traquair issued a brutal response to the trolls and slammed: “I’m vastly experienced. I’ve won awards for what I do. And what do journalists do? We go to the location of a story and we report on them.
“I find it rather hilarious that has become the focus. I genuinely really don’t care about the stupid comments because they’re written by people who have absolutely no clue what they’re talking about.
“I’m getting really angry about the GoFundMe stuff. It’s an automatic thing to do. These really annoying people – just shut up. Just leave them alone for God’s sake. My head is going to explode. I’ve not had enough sleep.”
Disapproval of Traquair first emerged when she hit out against internet sleuths who were posting troubling hypotheses and even spreading hoaxes about the disappearance while “sightings” had been reported.
In another rant on her social media, she added: “I went into a deep dive very late last night looking into all this. People have posted photos of bodies saying ‘that could be his body’ and they’ve traced it to a photograph taken in Iceland.
“It’s absolute nonsense – can you imagine how traumatic that is for his family? There are links to Moroccan drug gangs, organised crime, human trafficking… The noise online and the criticism of him as a person and also his family.
“There’s a GoFundMe, I think we’re at 35k now and there’s people online saying ‘they’re just on holiday’.”
It was announced on Sunday, June 30 by the Civil Guard that the search for Slater had ended after two weeks. However, the case will remain open and the Police will continue to act on any major tip-offs.
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Traquair isn’t the only TV personality who has spoken out on Slater, as Coronation Street actress Vicky Entwistle insisted she was “confident” that he would be found.
Entwistle revealed Slater was the grandson of her godmother as she appealed to fans to pray for his safety, with her initial X post reading: “My God Mother’s Grandson has gone missing. His Mother has flown out 7pm.
“To join the police search. Hope to God they find him. Please [pray] for him.” (sic)
