'We've been to hell and back with online trolls'

Jay Slater's mum Debbie Duncan said social media was helpful initially but then conspiracies started

The mother of Jay Slater, who died after going missing in Tenerife last summer, has stepped up her campaign for a new law to tackle online trolls.

Debbie Duncan, from Oswaldtwistle in Lancashire, is being backed by her local MP in calling for Jay's Law to prevent the online trolling of grieving families like hers.

The 19-year-old's disappearance sparked a massive manhunt and a host of conspiracy theories about his death after he attempted a 14-hour walk home the morning after a night out on the island.

"I'd like to see the social media companies take away all the misinformation to protect families like ours, especially when there has been a massive story in the media," Ms Duncan said.

A huge search was launched after Jay was reported missing on 18 June last year and his body was found by a mountain rescue team almost a month later in the steep and inaccessible Juan Lopez ravine.

An inquest concluded his death, from head injuries, was an accident after he lost his footing and fell in a ravine but the conspiracy theories continued online.

"Whilst we were still out there in Tenerife, the online world was just going crazy," Ms Duncan said.

"At the beginning it was all positive, sharing the awareness that Jay was missing, asking for information, but then it just became absolutely ridiculous.

"We were getting sent videos.

"They were sending photographs of Photoshopped images of Jay, making out he'd been tortured.

"It was just awful. I thought how can people do this? It was sick and it's never stopped."

'Most painful thing'

Ms Duncan said the family hoped a Channel 4 documentary about her son, The Disappearance of Jay Slater, "would help a lot of people understand the truth and the facts".

However, the conspiracy theories "just carried on and carried on", Ms Duncan said.

"People are still going online, going down rabbit holes," she said.

"It's just unbelievable - making out he was involved in some drug cartel. It's absolutely crazy."

In September, Ms Duncan launched an official Parliamentary petition calling for Jay's Law which was backed by Sarah Smith, her local MP for Hyndburn and Haslingden.

The two women are now working together to convene a cross-party meeting of MPs and ministers to discuss how Jay's Law can be brought forward.

"We've been to hell and back," Ms Duncan said.

"It's one thing losing a son. It's the most painful thing - but then to listen to all that and see all that's going on in the background... there needs to be something that can stop it."