British toddler missing in Greece for 35 years no longer pursued by police—here’s why
Kerry Needham, the mother of a toddler named Ben Needham, who disappeared in 1989 in Greece, has now taken a surprise twist.
Needham, the mother of the British toddler, spoke out in public that after a UK police force told her it would no longer be pursuing her son’s case, she became heartbroken.
Ben, who hailed from Sheffield, was 21 months old when he disappeared on the Greek island of Kos in the summer of 1991.
He was staying in a farmhouse with his grandparents.
At the time, her mother was employed at a hotel on the island and although 35 years have passed, she is still looking for answers.
Needham, in an interview with The Mirror, said that she was informed by South Yorkshire Police’s major crimes unit that it is no longer going after the case, putting responsibility onto the Greek police for future inquiries.
“This is devastating news,” she told the outlet. Adding, “The case will now fall solely to the Greek authorities. If this happens, I feel like I may as well give up the search for Ben because the Greek police have only ever wanted this case to go away.”
In a separate development, SYP said that Greek authorities “have full primacy over the investigation,” but it continues “to allocate resource to Ben’s case, in the form of a Family Liason Officer and a detective acting as a single point of contact,” per The Independent.
Needham is now urging people to contact SYP and PM Sir Keir Starmer to ask for the case not to be shut forever until she gets the answers.
She said, “No parent should ever have to stop searching for their child and I never will.”
