Amy’s family to give DNA samples

SPANISH police investigating the disappearance of Amy Fitzpatrick have asked her family for DNA samples.

The 15-year-old Dublin girl disappeared without trace almost two weeks ago after she left a friend’s house to walk home.

An intensive search of the area around her home and where she was last seen failed to turn up any clues.

Police are now concentrating on interviewing those close to her and trying to discover if she had been in touch with someone she might have gone off with.

They removed the family computer, having obtained permission from a Spanish judge to probe its contents.

Amy, a keen instant messenger and member of the social networking site Bebo, regularly used the computer to keep in touch with friends, including those in Ireland.

Even on the day of her disappearance, she had been communicating with friends in Dublin where she left more than three years ago when her mother and brother Dean moved to Malaga.

But, in a new twist to the investigations, the police also asked her mother Audrey to provide DNA samples, which are believed to include Amy’s hairbrush.

They will use the DNA analysis to check against anything their searches turn up.

Amy’s mother, Audrey, and her partner Dave Mahon, were interviewed twice on Friday by investigating police in Fuengirola.

The family spokesperson, Franco Rey, said the questioning, the taking of DNA samples and the family computer did not mean they were suspects in the case.

“They are just helping the police put together a picture of Amy’s life and they want to be as helpful as possible in this.

“They are very happy with the way the Guardia Civil are carrying out their investigations,” he said.

The last people known to see Amy — Ashley and her mother Debbie Rose — have been interviewed at length by the police. Amy left their home at about 10pm on Tuesday January 1 to walk to her home about 20 minutes away.

She is believed to have taken a shortcut along a sparsely populated roadway and over a dirt track. The alarm was raised on Thursday after it became clear she was not with Ashley or at home.

Ms Fitzpatrick has denied friends’ suggestions that Amy was unhappy and had run away from home a number of times in the past. She had not been at school in more than a year.

The Spanish police are keeping an open mind on whether the girl was snatched or ran away. They asked gardaí to check if she was in Ireland and to contact other members of her family. Her father, Christopher, and aunt Christine Kenny, are in Malaga.