One year on: Jack O’Sullivan’s family speak out about their search for answers

Yesterday (2nd March) marked a year since student Jack O’Sullivan went missing after a night out in the Hotwells area of Bristol.

However, despite a year passing, his disappearance remains a “complete mystery”. 

Jack was last seen in the early hours of March 2nd 2024, heading back towards Hotwells along Bennett Way, with his phone later showing his last location at a property in Granby Hill. 

Initially starting as a normal night out, Jack had met with friends at 8.20pm the night before, spending time in Wetherspoons before heading to a house party in Hotwells around 11pm. 

He messaged his parents around 1am saying he planned on getting a taxi home and is thought to have left the party around 3am. 

CCTV footage and eyewitness accounts place him around the Cumberland Basin area, possibly looking for a taxi, before turning around and walking back towards the City Centre.  

Jack was last seen at 3:38am walking along Bennett Way slip road. His phone stayed active on the network until 6.44am, but has provided no further details of the night. 

Jack was wearing a Barbour jacket and navy chinos, and carried a car key, wallet, phone, AirTag and a watch on his person. None of these items have ever been found. 

A year on, Avon and Somerset police has renewed calls for eyewitnesses to come forward, asking the public to cast their minds back to that morning.  

Assistant Chief Constable Joanne Hall said: “Anniversaries provide an important opportunity to look back and reflect. A lot can happen in a year and things which didn’t appear significant at the time may look different with the passage of time.

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“As the year has progressed, we’ve exhausted multiple lines of enquiry, and we’d like to thank the public for their help so far in coming forward with information.”

Jack’s family has criticised the police’s handling of the case, finding sightings of Jack on CCTV that had been initially missed in the investigation when given access to footage investigators claimed was no longer valuable.  

CCTV showing the last confirmed sighting of Jack O’Sullivan via SWNS

They later found that the police had failed to keep large amounts of CCTV from the night and are only aware of one person who attended the party actually giving a police statement. 

Catherine O’Sullivan, Jack’s mother, has spearheaded her own campaign to find her son, raising £20,000 to be offered as a reward for information and crowdfunding the support of specialist charities to help. 

Calling the last 12 months “a year from hell”, Catherine has said the search has become “a full-time job”.

She explained: “From the time I get up to the time I go to bed, I’m doing something related to this. I don’t think anything on earth could prepare you for some of the things we’ve gone through.

“Despite the hell that we navigate our lives through we continue to try to gain answers.”

Multiple searches and a high profile campaign have so far failed to produce a single lead, with Catherine saying they are “no closer” to finding out what happened to Jack since the day he disappeared.

She further added that they won’t be marking the anniversary with anything special but says she will continue spending “all day every day” hunting for Jack as the search heads into its second year.

Catherine also said the past year has taken its toll on the family – but said they have no option but to keep going.

Jack’s family continue to appeal for information. They have said: “We are still, with external support, searching for Jack and urge anyone who knows anything about what may have happened to him or where he is now to come forward and provide us with the information they have.

“We still believe that someone must know something.”

If you have any information regarding Jack’s whereabouts or about the morning he went missing, you can email [email protected] to get in contact with his family’s campaign. 

You can also contact Avon and Somerset police on the number 101 and provide the call handler with the reference number 5224055172.