Wow….
Williams-Thomas told The Mirror the family received 'two videos posted of separate people, meant to be Jay, having been beaten up'.
One clip allegedly featured the 'We have your son', with the detective saying it was 'created for publication by someone wanting to give the impression they had Jay held hostage'.
He explained that 'within hours' they had established that Slater was not the individual depicted in the videos.
The investigator also revealed that the family have been contacted by people who said 'they have Jay and will give information in exchange for a sum of money'.
'What has taken up the most time has been investigating the many theories and the false information that gathered traction on social media and then subsequently in the media,' he told the newspaper.
'You will understand that the family lived in hope of every new piece of information that Jay was alive, so they all needed to be investigated.'
Jay Slater's mother Debbie Duncan, 55, has 'lots of questions which she hopes will be answered in the coming days,' a source close to the family has claimed.
www.dailymail.co.uk