Police reject suggestions missing Nicola could have been a victim of crime

POLICE have rejected suggestions that missing mother-of-two Nicola Bulley could have been a victim of crime.

Superintendent Sally Riley, of Lancashire Police, said “every single” potential suspicion or criminal suggestion that had come in, had been looked at by detectives and discounted.

She said: “I would like to reassure the community that nothing in this investigation so far... it has been checked out if it has come in suggesting crime, it has been checked and discounted.

“So every single potential third party line of inquiry and potential suspicious or criminal element has been looked at and discounted.

“It does remain our belief that Nicola sadly fell into the river and that this is a missing persons inquiry.”

Police think mortgage adviser Ms Bulley, after dropping her daughters off at school, tragically fell into the water while walking her dog along the River Wyre in St Michael’s on Wyre.

The National Crime Agency had also looked at the investigation by Lancashire Police and had also failed to identify any other suspicious line of inquiry, she said.

The officer spoke after suggestions Ms Bulley’s phone, still on a work call and left on a bench overlooking the river, could be a “decoy” and questions being raised about gaps in CCTV coverage of the area where she vanished from.

The lead and harness for Willow, her springer spaniel dog, were also left on or close to the bench.

Police say it is still a “possibility” she left the area by one path not covered by cameras, which is crossed by the main road through the village, and officers are now trying to trace dashcam footage from 700 drivers who passed along the road at the time she disappeared, around 9.20am on January 27.