Sarm Heslop: Missing British woman’s family appeal to government for help

Ms Heslop’s parents have written to the UK Foreign Secretary, appealing for help

Sarm Heslop has been missing since 8 March (PA)

The parents of a British woman who went missing in the US Virgin Islands, have written to foreign secretary Dominic Raab asking for help to locate their daughter.

Sarm Heslop, aged 41, went missing from her boyfriend’s boat in the Caribbean on 8 March and has not been seen since.

In a letter released on Saturday, Ms Heslop’s parents called on the UK government to help with their daughter’s case.

Brenda Street and Peter Heslop said they had not given up hope of finding their daughter.

In a BBC interview, Ms Street said: “I still do not feel she’s gone.”

Local police officers questioned Ms Heslop’s American boyfriend, Ryan Bane, with reports suggesting he was urged to cooperate fully with the investigation after he refused to allow coastguards to search his boat.

Coastguard officials told local media that when they visited Mr Bane on his boat during a search and rescue operation, they found him drunk and he refused to answer questions while physically preventing them from searching the vessel.

He told officers he woke up at 2am on the yacht they were on to discover she was missing. Detectives have said it is not certain Ms Heslop ever made it back to the boat as she was last seen eating dinner.

Mr Bane has said he is “desperate” for her to be found while his attorney, David Cattie, said: “Ryan’s only hope is that Sarm is found alive and well.”

He has since left the US Virgin Islands and it is not clear whether local police are aware of his current location.

In an appeal to Mr Raab, who is currently under fire for his handling of the situation in Afghanistan, Ms Heslop’s parents asked him to put more pressure on authorities in the US Virgin Islands and to up their investigation into her disappearance.

In the letter to the foreign secretary, Ms Heslop’s parents expressed their frustration at the lack of support provided to them by the Foreign Office.

“Disappointingly, we feel that there has been only minimal support from the UK government and the Foreign Office and we are now requesting your involvement to do all you can to assist us,” they wrote in the letter, seen by The Telegraph.

Ms Heslop is described as being 5ft8in tall and of slim build. She has a brightly coloured tattoo on her left shoulder of a seahorse, bird, butterfly and pink flower.