Mum of missing X Factor star Levi Davis breaks silence on new drowning theory and slams ‘slow’ Spanish cops
IT is the heartbeat of Barcelona – a bustling boulevard that captivates tourists and locals alike.
But for Julie Davis, La Ramblas was just a street in a foreign city that she desperately hoped would hold a clue to what had happened to her missing son.
Levi Davis, a talented rugby player and former X Factor performer, was last seen alive in the Hard Rock Cafe, moments from the Spanish city’s thoroughfare on October 29 last year.
Julie, who believes Levi was being blackmailed and his life was in danger, made her lonely pilgrimage a week last Sunday, to retrace his steps.
But the following day, Spanish police confirmed their belief that Levi likely drowned in the city’s port the morning after he was last seen.
His passport had been found in the area in November.
READ MORE ON LEVI DAVIS
Cops told Julie that four cruise ship staff saw a person in the water, shouting for help in English, wearing a light-coloured T-shirt like Levi was seen in at 6.30am on October 30 — eight hours after he was last spotted on CCTV.
A lifebuoy was thrown to him but a subsequent search by police and the coastguard found nothing.
The news stunned Julie.
Speaking for the first time about the revelation, she told The Sun: “Why is this information about the cruise ship staff only coming months later?
Most read in The Sun
‘Compromising positions’
“I don’t know what to believe anymore.
“I know the Spanish police can be slow but I can’t make head nor tail of it.
“There’s lots of answers to questions that I need to know.
“It’s disheartening when you ask police questions and get very limited feedback.
“They say, ‘We can’t tell you that because it will jeopardise the case.’
“It’s been a total emotional rollercoaster.
“The way the evidence is pointing isn’t good but without a body, there’s just no way of knowing what’s happened.”
Levi, whose 25th birthday was last month, appeared on the X-Factor in 2019 as part of the group Try Star with fellow rugby players Ben Foden and Thom Evans.
Already at the height of his rugby career with Bath, Levi signed a record deal and started playing small concerts and recording music.
A year later he appeared on E4’s Celebs Go Dating and became the first rugby union player to come out as bisexual.
Customer service advisor Julie, of Solihull, West Mids, said Levi had worried about telling the deeply Christian family about his sexuality but that “the acceptance we gave him made him feel so much more loved.”
Julie says that with a music career beckoning, Levi had everything to live for — making his sudden disappearance all the more mysterious.
It has provoked a slew of theories, including kidnap, drug debt and blackmail.
They took root after Levi posted a bizarre video before he vanished claiming he was a target after being pictured in “compromising positions”.
Then there’s the mystery over why a young man with a burgeoning music career would choose to post pictures of himself on the adult site OnlyFans the day before his trip to Barcelona.
Spanish police have added to the confusion by stating in February that Levi had “not gone missing voluntarily” before telling Julie her son has most likely drowned after wandering down to the port area.
Julie last saw him in October last year before he went to stay with his friend Richard Squire in Ibiza.
She said: “He wanted to get away and clear his head.
“He had a ligament injury from rugby and was a bit down.
“So he said, ‘Mum, I might as well use the time to catch up with some friends and I want to see a bit of ’.”
While in Ibiza on October 29, he suddenly announced to Richard that he wanted to go to meet friends in Barcelona and caught the ferry.
During the four-hour journey, he recorded a video on his phone which he sent to Julie.
Beaming with clear crystal waters behind him, he said: “Look mum — it’s beautiful.”
When he docked Levi headed for The Old Irish Pub — where the last CCTV footage showed him leaving alone with a rucksack.
Spanish police say there were subsequent sightings of him at the Hard Rock Cafe, which is a 12 minute walk away.
Julie, who was the last person to speak to him the night he disappeared, said: “I got a call from Levi at about 1am our time asking to borrow £30 for a room so he could spend the night in Barcelona.
“He said he would pay me back because he was waiting for wages.
“That was the last I heard from him.”
Three days later, Julie started to realise something was wrong.
She said: “I started to worry and after four days I just had a horrible feeling.
“I started calling friends who said they hadn’t heard from him either.”
Julie called West Midlands police and the British Embassy, while Levi’s friend Richard filed a missing person report with cops in Barcelona.
By February, the disappearance took a sinister twist.
An Instagram story on his page posted four days before he disappeared emerged with shocking claims.
The video — saved by a friend — opened with: “My name is Levi Davis and my life is in danger.”
He then spent 15 minutes talking about being blackmailed by unknown people who had taken pictures of him in “compromising positions”, claiming his life and his family’s life were under threat.
‘Family’s lives in danger’
Three weeks later cops announced that they did not think Levi had “gone missing voluntarily and doesn’t want to be found”.
A spokesman added: “We’re dealing with an adult male whose disappearance doesn’t have a logical explanation and which we’re therefore treating as disturbing.”
They also revealed that after leaving The Old Irish Pub he had sent a voice note to a friend describing Barcelona as “amazing”.
He added: “I’m literally just getting all my inspo. I love it. It’s so good.”
Julie insists that Levi was being blackmailed and that his mental health deteriorated under pressure.
She was so convinced her son was telling the truth about the sinister plot that they made a complaint to police in March 2021.
Julie says: “About a year before he went to Ibiza, he told me he was being blackmailed over a video.
“I remember him saying that his life, and possibly our lives as a family, were in danger.
“I’d been discussing it with him and trying to make sense of it.
“He said that (the video) happened around the time of The X Factor and when he met this person they became friends, but now realised that they were only acquaintances.
“I’ve been racking my brain to think who it could be.
“My feeling is he didn’t want to say too much in case it led to one of the family getting hurt.”
The day before Levi travelled to Barcelona he also posted pictures of himself on adult site OnlyFans.
But Julie says that sounds out of character and believes he only joined the site to have some control over the blackmail.
She says: “I remember Levi saying that he was being forced to go down that road.”
Reports that Levi owed £100,000 also emerged in Catalan newspaper La Vanguardia.
Gavin Burrows, a private investigator helping the family, revealed that Levi may have fled his flat two years ago to escape a Somali drug gang after accruing a “sizeable debt”.
But Julie said Levi was not a habitual drug user.
She said: “These conspiracy theories, they are not Levi.
“They don’t make any sense.”
Levi spent part of his life in foster care and went on to win a prestigious boarding school scholarship thanks to his rugby skills.
Julie revealed that Levi’s mental health deteriorated during lockdown after leaving Bath to join Ealing Trailfinders and Worthing Raiders, before suffering a ligament injury.
But she says it was made much worse by the blackmail threat.
Worried Julie said: “His deterioration was an accumulation of lockdown, the rugby, issues he had over getting paid while not playing, his injury and not being able to train.
“Then there was the blackmail and that I think was highest on the list of things that troubled him.
“I have no doubts at all he was being blackmailed, though to what extent I don’t know.
Julie now wants a judge to authorise Spanish Port Police to carry out a search of the waters and other inaccessible areas of the port.
Until she finds out exactly what has happened to Levi she says she will not lose hope.
She said: “It’s very difficult.
“I take it one day at a time.
“Levi would tell me to control what I can control and leave the rest alone.
“We’ve often said that to each other in dark moments.
“He would tell me to carry on as normal and look after the family ‘because without you mum, the family would fall apart’
READ MORE SUN STORIES
“I won’t ever give up hope.
“I don’t want to believe it and I won’t believe it until the police say, ‘Here’s the body’.”
A mystery unfolds
October 29, 2022: Levi is seen leaving The Old Irish Pub in Las Ramblas, Barcelona, alone with a rucksack on his back.
Later sightings place him at the Hard Rock Cafe.
October 30: At 6.30am – hours after Levi is last seen – cruise ship staff spot someone in the water as the vessel docks.
The person is wearing a light-coloured T-shirt like Levi’s and shouting for help in English.
A lifebuoy is thrown but a coastguard search finds nothing.
November 19: Levi’s passport is found in Barcelona’s port area near to a cargo shipment.
February 5, 2023: His chilling video emerges in which he claims he is being blackmailed.
February 28: Three weeks after Levi’s video became public, Spanish police said he may not have gone missing voluntarily.
They said: “With the information at our disposal, it doesn’t appear that this person has gone missing voluntarily and doesn’t want to to be found.”
March 3: Police say they are investigating whether he could have drowned after entering the port area.
April 20: Spanish cops say they have interviewed four cruise ship workers who saw someone in the water as the ship docked.
They tell Julie it was most likely Levi.