Now police search for uncle of arrested teenager

POLICE are searching for the uncle of the teenager who was arrested on suspicion of killing Gaia Pope, his family said yesterday.

Paul Elsey, 49, has not been seen since Tuesday afternoon, before police searched his father’s home and seized his car.

His mother Rosemary Dinch, 71, and her actor grandson Nathan Elsey , 19, were arrested on suspicion of murder on Monday but were released 24 hours later.

Yesterday, Mrs Dinch ’s ex-husband Greg Elsey, 69, said police had obtained a war - rant to search his £460,000 bungalow in Romsey, Hampshire, in the hunt for his son on Tuesday evening.

He revealed officers had also seized Paul’s car for forensic examination but said he had not seen or heard from his son since he left with a friend on Tuesday afternoon.

According to Greg Elsey, Paul, who left his mobile phone at his father’s address, claims he was carrying out work on a flat he owns in Weymouth, Dorset, on the day of Gaia ’s disappearance last week. Paul, a carpenter, shares a first-floor flat with his mother Mrs Dinch in Swanage, where Gaia was last spotted when she visited last week.

Greg Elsey told the Daily Mail: ‘Last week, the police spoke to P aul and asked him where he was when Gaia went missing.

‘He turned around to them and said, “There’s my iPhone, there’s my bank card, I brought some stuff down in Weymouth last Tuesday. You can take it and do you want to check my car?” They didn’t want to.

‘Then suddenly last night, Dorset P olice turned up with a search warrant and then took the car away in a covered wagon.’ He added: ‘I don ’t know where he is, he went off with one of his mates on T uesday afternoon. He’s got no mobile phone. He left it because he has no charger for it.’

Since their release, Nathan and his grandmother have been staying at Greg Elsey’s bungalow.

Greg Elsey married Mrs Dinch in 1966. They had two children, P aul and Debbie, before divorcing. He said Debbie and her son Nathan had been very close to Gaia and her twin sister Maya when Nathan was growing up, but the teenagers fell out recently after Nathan broke up with his girlfriend.