Internet runaway 'back in Britain without marine'
Detectives in Greater Manchester, where Shevaun lived, believe the 12-year-old girl and ex-US Marine Toby Studabaker, 31, flew to Paris together on Saturday.
But last night French police said Shevaun flew back to Britain about an hour after arriving at Paris Charles De Gaulle airport.
Studabaker was not on the Easyjet flight back to Liverpool, a spokesman said.
"We believe Shevaun took the flight with five other people to Liverpool.
"It was an Easyjet flight and left at 22.40. Shevaun would have stayed in the international zone for one hour before returning to the UK," the French police spokesman said.
A French police spokeswoman later said officers were continuing to investigate the movements of Studabaker as they had not yet found a match for his name on flight records.
A spokeswoman for Greater Manchester police said: "We are going to investigate the allegations that have come from France to see if there is any substance to them."
It was thought detectives in Greater Manchester had not been aware of the development until told of the news by reporters.
An hour earlier the French authorities had still been insisting there was no evidence to say Shevaun had ever arrived in the country.
Earlier yesterday, detectives in Greater Manchester said they were looking at the possibility that the pair may have caught a connecting flight and not stayed in the French capital.
Greater Manchester Police stressed it was only one of a number of possibilities they were examining as the search was stepped up in Europe for the pair, who met on the internet.
The pair met up on Saturday and were thought to have caught a flight from Heathrow to Paris Charles de Gaulle airport that evening.
Detectives are also looking into reports that Studabaker, who left the marines last month, had faced sex assault accusations with an under-age girl in the US in the late 1990s.
The alleged case was not pursued.
It would not be the first time Studabaker has used connecting flights to reach his destination.
He is known to have flown to Britain via the Netherlands on Friday and arrived in Manchester early on Saturday morning before flying out, with the girl, from Heathrow.
Earlier yesterday his family urged the ex-soldier, who was based in North Carolina and had served in Afghanistan, to give himself up and return the youngster.
His brother Leo said he had told them he was going to meet a 19-year-old girl and had even talked of marriage and children.
He said: "If he had known she wasn't the age she said she was, he wouldn't have agreed to meet her."
He said his brother wanted to meet Shevaun to see if they could take their relationship "forward".
"Toby wanted to go on vacation to visit some of the countries he never got the chance to when he was in the marines.
Leo's wife Sherry added: "I would tell him that he needs to go to the nearest authorities and turn her in too."
Studabaker portrays himself as a devout Christian and attended the Rosedale Bible College in Irwin, Ohio, from 1993 to 1994.
He spoke on the college website of how he was able to "draw closer" to God.
Police forces across Europe are on the look-out for the pair. The alarm was first raised by Shevaun's parents on Saturday night after she disappeared.
A search of her belongings and computer files revealed she had been regularly corresponding with Studabaker.
Shevaun's parents, Stephen, 43, and Joanna, 42, made an emotional plea yesterday for their daughter to come home.
Mr Pennington, from Wigan, said he knew his daughter talked to people online but did not realise it was to any specific person.
Mrs Pennington, weeping, said: "Please, we just want you back, we're not angry with you, we love you very much and just want you to come home."
Studabaker's wife Jenny died from cancer last year, his family said, and the couple did not have any children.
