New Search for Missing Luke Durbin
24 October 2011, 05:47 | Updated: 24 October 2011, 06:47
Police will be doing more house to house enquiries in Ipswich and Woodbridge to try and find a missing Suffolk teenager.
Luke Durbin was 19 years old when he was reported missing by his mother on Saturday 13 May 2006.
Luke had been out for the evening in Ipswich with friends on Thursday 11 May through to the early hours of Friday 12 May.
Through enquiries carried out to date, the final CCTV footage from Ipswich captured Luke near to the bus station in the town centre at 4am on Friday 12 May.
Follow up enquiries have highlighted two reports of Luke being seen in Woodbridge in a dark blue Renault Megane being driven by a black man. This sighting was between 11am and 2pm on Saturday 13 May near to the rear entrance to the Turban Centre car park on Quay Side, Woodbridge.
Detectives are now renewing their appeal for information on Luke’s whereabouts, focussing on these two areas in Ipswich and Woodbridge.
Senior Investigating Officer, Detective Chief Inspector John Brocklebank said: “My main focus in this investigation is to find out what has happened to Luke and to do that we need to piece together his last known movements.
“The response we have had to media appeals both locally and nationally has been phenomenal and I am grateful for the help we have had so far, but it is important that we find out where Luke was between the two sightings in Ipswich and Woodbridge and ultimately where he went afterwards.”
From Monday 24 October detectives will be re-visiting these two areas, conducting house to house enquiries and where possible capturing any CCTV footage that hasn’t already been viewed.
“I want to be confident and assured that we have covered all bases and spoken to everyone we need to,” continued DCI Brocklebank.
“Five years is a long time but often people don’t come forward as they feel that the information they have is not relevant. We would rather have the details and follow it through; often it is the smallest piece of information that can give us a breakthrough.
“We need to speak to those people who lived or worked in the area of Dogs Head Street Ipswich and Quay Side, Woodbridge and people who may have been visiting the area between 11 and 13 May 2006.”
To jog people’s memories back to 11-13 May 2006 the headlines at the time included:
- Joe Royle left as manager of Ipswich Town Football Club (11 May);
- Gnarls Barkley was number one in the UK charts with ‘Crazy’;
- the Da Vinci Code film was about to premier in the UK;
- national news included the murder of 29 year old female Special Constable Nisha Patel-Nasri near her home in Wembley, London (12 May); and
- Liverpool FC won the FA Cup against West Ham United FC on penalties after a last minute 40 yard Steven Gerrard equaliser (13 May).
Officers from the Norfolk and Suffolk Major Investigation Team took over this enquiry in November 2010 and have since reviewed the sequence of events and enquiries that had been carried out during the previous four years while also undertaking new lines of enquiry.
So far hours of CCTV footage have been viewed, officers have spoken to in excess of 100 people, taking statements where necessary from them; house-to-house enquiries have been conducted and police search teams with the assistance of Suffolk Lowland Search and Rescue and National Search and Rescue Dog Association have carried out searches in and around Ipswich.
“The focus of this investigation now is re-visiting the locations in Ipswich and Woodbridge,” said DCI Brocklebank. “Although this still remains a missing person enquiry, we are looking at all possibilities of what has happened to Luke, which includes the possibility that Luke has been unlawfully killed.”
Luke’s family are being fully updated with how the investigation into Luke’s disappearance is progressing, and as would be expected, Nicki Durbin, Luke’s mother is keen to encourage people to come forward, she said:
“Not an hour of a day goes by without my thoughts turning to Luke. In order to find some semblance of peace, I need to know what has happened to my child.
“If you have any information about Luke’s disappearance, however small it may seem, please, please tell the police.”
Images of Luke are being released to help jog people’s memory, these include one of Luke inside Hawk Express taxi rank in the early hours of Friday 12 May where you can see what he was wearing (a black collared shirt under a grey long sleeved sweatshirt, blue jeans and brown suede shoes), the image of Luke captured on CCTV outside the bus station at 4am on Friday 12 May, two photos of Luke provided by his family and replica pictures of the long sleeved grey sweatshirt.
Anyone with information in connection with the disappearance of Luke Durbin is urged to contact detectives from the Norfolk and Suffolk Major Investigation Team on 01473 613500 or Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.