{"id":101936,"date":"2023-12-16T14:36:30","date_gmt":"2023-12-16T14:36:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebritycovernews.com\/?p=101936"},"modified":"2023-12-16T14:36:30","modified_gmt":"2023-12-16T14:36:30","slug":"cops-missed-chance-to-return-alex-batty-to-the-uk-after-kidnapped-teen-tried-to-enrol-in-french-school-last-month-the-sun","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebritycovernews.com\/world-news\/cops-missed-chance-to-return-alex-batty-to-the-uk-after-kidnapped-teen-tried-to-enrol-in-french-school-last-month-the-sun\/","title":{"rendered":"Cops \u2018missed chance to return Alex Batty to the UK after \u201ckidnapped\u201d teen tried to enrol in French school last month\u2019 | The Sun"},"content":{"rendered":"
MISSING English teenager Alex Batty tried to enrol in a school in France last month but nobody worked out who he was and police took no action, French media has claimed.<\/p>\n
The 17-year-old was officially being searched for everywhere after spending the last six years living in a "nomadic spiritual community" with his mother.<\/p>\n
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Melanie Batty, 48, allegedly kidnapped him when he was just 11 and officially under the guardianship of his grandmother, Susan Caruana, 68, from Oldham, Greater Manchester.<\/p>\n
Alex finally handed himself over to gendarmes last week after claiming he spent four days walking across countryside.<\/p>\n
He told a delivery driver who found him walking along the side of a rural road in south west France on Wednesday: "I need a future."<\/p>\n
But on Saturday French newspaper La Depeche reported that Alex in fact tried to "enrol in a school" in the town of Quillan in November.<\/p>\n
He could not provide any identity papers, so teachers contacted police about the British teenager, who spoke little French.<\/p>\n "The gendarmes tried to contact the English authorities," said an investigating source, but "there was a hiccup which did not allow the report to be followed up".<\/p>\n They added: "Collaboration [between the French and the British] did not make it possible to establish a link between the presence of Alex Batty in Quillan and his disappearance notice issued seven years earlier in England."<\/p>\n The slip-up shows how far away combined police forces working through the international crime agency Interpol were from finding the vulnerable boy.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Antoine Leroy, the Toulouse deputy prosecutor, said Alex was finally expected to make an emotional return home to Oldham "this weekend".<\/p>\n On Saturday he was still in the care of French social services, as gendarmes tried to find his mother.<\/p>\n She was with his late grandfather, David Batty, when Alex went missing on a week-long family holiday to Spain in 2017.<\/p>\n They embarked on a travelling lifestyle, which did not involve a formal education for Alex.<\/p>\n With his 18th birthday approaching in March, he had no passport or permanent address, let alone any qualifications.<\/p>\n Mr Leroy said: "When his mother indicated that she was going to leave with him to Finland, this young man understood that this had to stop.<\/p>\n "So then he decided to leave the place where he was with his mother and walked for four days and four nights."<\/p>\n Assistant Chief Constable Chris Sykes, of Greater Manchester Police, said: "We are relieved and overjoyed to receive the news from French authorities that Alex Batty has been found safe and well."<\/p>\n Speaking from her home in Oldham, Ms Caruana said she could not wait to be reunited with Alex.<\/p>\n She said: "It\u2019s amazing. It\u2019s an incredible story.<\/p>\n "It\u2019s unbelievable after all these years. I\u2019m in shock. I can\u2019t believe it. <\/p>\n "I have spoken to him and he\u2019s well, that\u2019s all I can say for now.<\/p>\n "I\u2019m desperate to see him over the weekend but I don\u2019t know what\u2019s happening.<\/p>\n " I\u2019m waiting for the authorities to let me know. It\u2019s been all over the news.<\/p>\n "It\u2019s breathtaking, and I\u2019m over the moon. I just can\u2019t believe it."<\/p>\n Consular officials are also liaising with the French authorities, after Alex produced a long statement to gendarmes.<\/p>\n<\/picture>FREEDOM BID <\/span><\/p>\n
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