‘Positive’ week of action for investigation into disappearance of Lana Purcell
John Purcell, 61, and Megan Purcell, 15, the father and daughter of Lana Purcell, at the launch of a fresh appeal for information. Picture: Aaron Chown/PA - Credit: PA
The detective in charge of the search for missing Lana Purcell said last week’s fresh appeal to try to find out what happened to her has had a positive response.
Lana Purcell - Credit: Archant
DI Mike Stubbins, who has led the renewed push to find information about what happened to Lana, refused to be drawn on whether it yielded new leads.
He said: “It was good. It was a positive week. We reached a lot of people who have been spoken to across the Kentish Town and Camden Town area, and that carried on through the week.
“The community really liked it that the police are still treating this thing seriously. The family who for one reason or another had not had a sustained push in activity appreciated the lengths that we went to.”
Lana, then 26, vanished from Queen’s Crescent in January 2011. After her family raised the alarm, police treated the case as a missing person investigation - although the Met later asked its murder squad to look into the case. Lana was involved in drugs and was working as a sex worker to support herself, and it was thought this may have been linked to her disappearance. The case was later passed to Scotland Yard’s cold cases unit.
READ MORE: £20k reward offered for information about the disappearance of Lana Purcell
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Officers, along with members of Lana’s family, gave out leaflets in Camden last week. The Met’s team reviewing the case is re-interviewing former leads and looking over old information from the original investigation to see whether there is any further lines of inquiry.
Lana’s dad John was one of the family who gave out leaflets to members of the public, wearing a T-shirt with his daughter’s face on, encouraging people to come forward.
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He said: “We got a bit of a response. People were very kind. Some people were saying they would like to help but I don’t know what they can do. They were saying they would put the picture up on Facebook and Twitter so it spreads it a lot more.
“I was trying to get some feedback from the people in [Queen’s Crescent] and Camden Town. I’m more hopeful than confident but we’ll see.”
The Ham&High is aware of further police interviews taking place this week, with potential new leads being presented to police.
John urged anyone who may be considering coming forward to do so, to help him find out what happened to his daughter.
“Give me a call. They can speak to me if they don’t want to speak to the police. I’m quite happy to talk to people. Even if it’s obvious, even if they haven’t realised what they saw, ‘oh I did see her with someone but it didn’t look like anything to me.’ One bit of information can help.”
Anyone with information is asked to call the incident room on 020 8345 1570, or 101 quoting Operation Kagal.
