COPS searching for Nicola Bulley are looking at who had permits to fish the river around the time she vanished.
The 45-year-old disappeared without a trace while on a dog walk along the River Wyre in the village of St Michael’s, Lancs, on January 27.
But today it emerged that local fishing clubs have been approached by officers wanting information.
They are understood to have been asked about anglers who may have had tickets to fish the river and who may have been on its banks when she vanished.
One local angler told The Mirror: “It sounds like they are trying to work out if anyone was fishing on the river that day and saw something, but nobody was.
“The only people that were on the river that day were dog walkers. I can guarantee you that. The dog walkers were there.”
He said cops first called anglers the day after the mum-of-two’s disappearance.
But this was only to ask about the nature of the water where she went missing.
Fishing permits have been temporarily suspended as a mark of respect by the local fishing society since Nicola, from nearby Inskip, went missing.
It comes just days after a report from a potential witness who claims to have seen two men acting suspiciously on the river the day before and the morning Nicola vanished.
Details being probed by police include a report of two men trying to hide their faces near Nicola’s dog-walking route the day before she went missing.
A local said the pair were carrying fishing rods and appeared to be wearing hats or hoods.
The witness said: “It was very strange. It made me uneasy.”
He spotted one of the men again the following day but didn’t think much of it until he heard the news of Nicola’s disappearance.
On reflection, he said, it was odd that they didn’t appear to be carrying a tackle or bait box and were wrapped up warm when the weather was mild.
Cops are also trawling through security camera footage from the area and trying to trace the owner of a shabby-looking red van spotted outside a barn on the morning Nicola vanished.
Tree surgeon Denis Rowlandson, 47, said of the vehicle: “I don’t know anybody with a red van who should be parked outside that barn or near the entrance.
“There’s no reason to be there at all without my permission.”
And officers are said to be compiling a list of all registered sex offenders in the area as is protocol, according to a former Scotland Yard detective.
Source: The Sun