Lancashire police have arrested a 34-year-old man from Kidderminster, who claimed to be a TikTok sleuth, on suspicion of malicious communications offences and perverting the course of justice. The arrest is related to footage of Nicola Bulley’s body being recovered from the River Wyre, which was filmed from inside a police cordon and subsequently posted online. The footage went viral on social media, sparking a public obsession with the mother-of-two’s mysterious disappearance.
Ms Bulley, 45, vanished while walking her spaniel near the River Wyre on Jan 27, and her body was eventually recovered on Feb 19, around a mile downstream from where she was last seen. The intervening weeks saw a toxic spectacle, as the case attracted growing interest from the public, theories about her fate circulated widely on social media, and armchair detectives became fixated on the idea that Ms Bulley had been murdered or abducted. The TikTok user was bailed with conditions after the arrest.