Decision to send Nicola Bulley cops back to river months later is ‘very rare & embarrassing for cops', ex detective says | The Sun
A FORMER detective has claimed the decision to send cops back to the river where Nicola Bulley was found is “very rare” and “embarrassing”.
Specialist divers were last week seen searching the water to try to confirm the tragic mum's cause of death.
Nicola's body was found in the river on February 20 – three weeks after she vanished
This week Video showed police combing through the water less than a mile from where Nicola, 45, was last seen on January 27.
And Lancashire Police confirmed coroners requested they re-search the river to get a "complete a picture" of how the mum died.
However former Scotland Yard detective Peter Bleksley has claimed the decision shows the force has made a “dog’s dinner” out of the investigation.
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He told The Sun: “Quite frankly Lancashire police have lost all control of the narrative here.
“For the coroner to send search teams yet again some five weeks after Nicolas' body was found, by the public – not by specialist teams, is enormously embarrassing.
"It is very rare. It shows the police failed their initial search.
“The coroner clearly has questions which shows all the police’s actions in the first place were not sufficient enough.
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“The coroner is clearly not satisfied with the force. It shows their search clearly wasn’t as thorough as it could have been.
“This is a massive embarrassment for Lancashire police and at the end of the day they only have themselves to blame.
The area cops were seen searching is less than a mile from where Nicola was last seen on January 27, after a tip-off from two dog walkers.
Footage, taken by a local resident, shows officers wading through the water.
He said: “It seems the police were trying to keep the second search quiet from the public.
“I was no water specialist but if I was asked to go back to a scene five weeks after by anybody I would be professionally embarrassed.
“Because the subtext is that your first search wasn’t good enough.
“If someone said to me ‘go back and search again’ I would say ‘you’re questioning my thoroughness and professionalism’.”
An extensive search was launched to find the mum-of-two, involving police, firefighters, mountain rescue, underwater teams and the local community.
Officers scoured wooded areas, ditches, water margins and the grounds of an abandoned house.
A specialist search was also launched by dive expert Peter Faulding, who used £50,000 sonar equipment to scour the water.
He later pulled out of the hunt, saying he did not believe Nicola was in the river as she could have "stood up" if she fell in.
Nicola's disappearance sparked a huge amount of speculation online with web sleuths flocking to the area she was last seen in an attempt to crack the case.
For her funeral last month a no fly zone was put in place over the church – so sick TikTok sleuths couldn’t film her funeral using drones.
The move comes after a sleuth was arrested for filming and uploading footage of Nicola’s body being recovered from the River.
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Curtis Arnold, 34, of Kidderminster, Worc, was detained on Wednesday on suspicion of malicious communications offences and perverting the course of justice.
A Lancashire Police spokesperson said: "We can confirm we are carrying out some work on the direction of HM Coroner."
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