Two people have been arrested over alleged malicious messages in the case of missing mother Nicola Bulley, police have confirmed.
As we've previously reported, Bulley disappeared on January 27 while walking her dog Willow near the River Wyre in St. Michael's On Wyre, Lancashire.
The 45-year-old had just dropped her children - aged six and nine - off at school and had logged on to a Microsoft Teams call at around 09:00 AM.
Despite the call ending at around 09:30 AM, Bulley's phone was reportedly still logged on. At around 10:30 AM, a passerby noticed the mortgage adviser's phone lying on a bench next to the river, and her dog running around in a distressed manner.
Since then, Lancashire Police worked around the clock searching the lake near where she seemingly vanished, as their main working hypothesis was that the mother-of-two had fallen into the river and drowned - a theory rejected by many of Bulley's friends and family.
Forensic diving expert Peter Faulding also rejected the police's working hypothesis, telling Talk TV (via The Daily Mail) that he was "truly baffled" by the case and doesn't believe she fell into the water - adding that if she'd drowned, her body would have been recovered by now.
Faulding - founder and CEO of Dorking-based specialist diving group Specialist Group International (SGI) - and his team had been assisting in the search for Bulley but eventually called off their search having recovered nothing. His own hypothesis is that a third party was involved and that the phone left on the bench was a decoy.
"After 25 years of doing this kind of work, after hundreds of cases, I am well and truly baffled. Normally you would expect the divers to find them easily," Faulding stated, further explaining that when a person drowns they "generally go down where they are", with search teams normally finding their bodies within five to 10 meters of where they fell in.
"The police have nothing to go on. All they have is a mobile phone at the moment and they said it could possibly be a decoy [...]," he added.
Recent reports have said that police are looking into a sighting of two "suspicious men" near to where Bulley was last seen after a witness came forward. The witness, who reported the sighting to the police, told The Sun that the men were carrying fishing rods and wearing hats or hoods which covered their faces.
Now, police have apparently arrested a man, 49, and a woman, 20, involved in spreading malicious messages about the case, after the BBC reported that the pair had been leaving malevolent voice messages about Bulley to local parish counsellors. Leader of the council Michael Vincent said he would "not tolerate" the "vile" abuse of elected members.
"It is a shame we have had to take this step at such a difficult time and appropriate steps are being taken to ensure that residents are still able to contact their elected representatives," he said.
The man - who reportedly hails from Manchester - has been bailed until May 12, while the woman - from Oldham - is still in custody amidst ongoing enquiries.
