A CONVICTED drug dealer who took Jay Slater back to his Airbnb before he disappeared is part of the rapper’s entourage, The Sun can reveal.
Ayub Qassim (31) was sentenced to nine years in prison in 2015 as the ringleader of a London gang that dealt heroin and crack cocaine in Cardiff.
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Ayub is close friends with Potter Payper
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Ayub appears on stage with Potter PayperCredit: YOUTUBE
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Ayub in Potter Payper’s video for Love Me HowCredit: YouTube
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He grins as he appears on stage
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Ayub Qassim, 31, was sentenced to nine years in prison in 2015
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He hired Airbnb. Jay went with another last name
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Jay went with Ayub to his Airbnb on June 17 Credit: PA
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Officers searched Airbnb. Jay went to Credit: Doug Seeburg
The Sun can also reveal that he has close ties to a legal cannabis cafe in Tenerife owned by his childhood friend, acclaimed rapper Potter Payper.
A source told The Sun: “Ayub is one of Potter’s main guys. They were long gone and were friends in London.
“They both grew up in Barking and mixed in the same circles.
“Once Potter opened a cannabis cafe in Tenerife, he decided Ayub was the one to run it.”
Ayub – and another mystery man dubbed “Johnny Vegas” – have since been deemed “irrelevant” to the case by Spanish police.
But there are growing calls for them to step in and help in the search for Jay – who has been missing for two-and-a-half weeks.
It was initially claimed that Jay returned to the rental with two men he met that night, but Qassim told reporters that Jay was a “cool guy” he knew through a friend.
He said: “I let the jerk stay with me because he had nowhere to go.
“All his friends left him.
“I know Jay through a friend, I won’t return someone to my family if I don’t know him.
Jay Slater ‘fled Airbnb feeling TERRIFIED after admitting stealing £12k Rolex’
“I’m doing him a favor and now my face is all over the news. It’s a little mental. I didn’t even do anything.”
The apprentice bricklayer from Oswaldtwistle, Lancashire, was at the all-night Playa de las Americas rave.
Jay, 19, returned to the remote cottage – called Abuela Tina’s Case – around 5am on June 17, just hours before he disappeared.
Qassim, who booked on Airbnb under the surname Abdul, and his unnamed friend spoke to Spanish police after Jay went missing before flying back to the UK the next day.
Qassim added: “The only comment I have to make is that Jay came into the house alive and he left the house alive.
“If I had argued with him, would he have come to me at all?
It comes as…
“There was no problem. You saw the last pictures of him with the red blanket around him.
– I don’t know if he ate beef somewhere else because I don’t know him that well, I only know him through a friend.
But Jay’s dad Warren, 58, yesterday questioned why his teenage son ended up in a remote Airbnb with “two grown men”.
Qassim confirmed that he spoke to Spanish authorities in Tenerife, but says he was told by foreign police officers not to speak to anyone else.
Asked how well he knew Jay and what he thought of the theories surrounding his disappearance, Qassim said: “Everybody knows each other. I’m not going to slander anyone.
“He’s a cool guy, Jay. He doesn’t have a problem with me, I don’t have a problem with him or his friends.”
Qassim added that he and Jay’s friends were just talking to each other and that “everything was sweet.”
Jay ‘left Airbnb in fear’
by Katie Davis
JAY Slater left the Airbnb he went to with two men who felt “scared” after they admitted stealing a £12,000 Rolex, an investigator has claimed.
Former detective Mark Williams-Thomas said the 19-year-old did not want to return to the remote holiday spot in north-west Tenerife despite his phone’s low battery.
Apprentice bricklayer Jay, who had been at a rave all night in Playa de las Americas, traveled north to an Airbnb in the village of Masca in the early hours of June 17.
During the hour-long drive, Mark claims Jay posted a Snapchat saying he had taken a £12,000 Rolex from an unknown person.
Police were reviewing security cameras at the beach club and speaking with witnesses about the alleged theft of the Rolex in the hours before Jay went missing.
A brawl was reported to have broken out at the Papagayo Beach Club in the early hours of June 17 after an expensive watch was allegedly stolen from a “large” Eastern European man.
Mark said he and his team “couldn’t confirm” Jay’s request on Snapchat “in terms of reported theft.”
He added: “However, Jay’s friends said he wasn’t going to make it up and the watch was the subject of a later conversation between friends.”
According to Mark, the Airbnb host told Jay around 8 a.m. that a bus would arrive two hours later.
Jay then attempted to return to his holiday accommodation, facing an 11 hour walk.
Mark – who worked on the Madeleine McCann case – said Jay had spoken to at least three friends via text and phone on his way back, telling them he was lost.
At around 8.50am he made one last frantic call to his friend Lucy, saying he was in the “middle of nowhere” with no water and only one per cent of battery on his phone.
Mark said in a video update today: “Two people told him to go back to the rental.
“He said he couldn’t do it and he had already been walking for 30 minutes and now he had turned off the road and was walking on a path where there were stones.”
Mark claimed that Jay had run away from his holiday and was “scared”.
He said: “We have received information to suggest that Jay left the rental flat in fear and did not want to return to the rental flat, even though that would have been the most sensible course of action, and also where he could have charged his phone, got some water and got in touch with friends.
“We continue to investigate this aspect.”
Qassim spoke to the police the day after Jay disappeared, but cut their holiday short.
They gave their information to the police and fully cooperated in the investigation.
When The Sun called Qassim’s family home in Barking today, the relative said he “didn’t want to say anything” and insisted he had no questions to answer.
The Sun can reveal Qassim is close friends with MOBO award winner Potter Payper, 33.
The source said he even runs the rapper’s cannabis cafe in Tenerife, called Potter’s Garden, in Las Americas.
According to social media posts, the space was broken into and destroyed about six weeks ago.
Tourists posted on social media that they met Ayub at a local cafe in Tenerife.
One said: “Every day I’d go to the cafe and see him working and chatting to the club members to keep everyone cool and make sure everything was fine while people were in the club.
“We even went swimming at the beach a few times and went out together for a night out.”
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Jay pictured at the rave hours before he disappeared Credit: Facebook
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Inside the Airbnb that Jay went to
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Jay Slater with his mom Debbie Duncan Credit: Facebook
Another commented: “I know Ayub from working in cafes.
“Ayub is a nice guy and has time for everyone, always checking up on others.”
Qassim grew up with rapper Potter – real name Jamel Bousbaa – and even joined him on stage to receive his MOBO for Best Album.
He can be seen wearing a turtleneck and a chain with his friend’s name on it as the rapper gave his acceptance speech at the Utilita Arena in Sheffield earlier this year.
The record, Real Back in Style, climbed to number two in the UK album chart, making Bousbaa a household name.
Qassim also appears in Bousba’s video for the song “Love Me How” – which is on the album.
He can be seen awkwardly hugging a pair of scantily clad women while on a yacht in a video from 2024.
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A cannabis cafe, Potter’s Garden, is located on the island – not far from where Jay was last seen.
The bar is a private “social club” – where the consumption of cannabis is permitted under Spanish law.
Qassim – who grew up in Barking, east London, with Bousba – is said to have worked at the bar for several months.
Just three months ago, a video appeared showing young men breaking into and rummaging through a bar.
Since Slater’s disappearance, Potter’s Garden has taken down its Instagram page.
Bousbaa is also a convicted drug dealer, having pleaded guilty to running a crack and heroin supply operation in Clacton, Essex, in 2018, which saw him jailed for five years and four months.
The Sun has contacted Bousbau for comment.
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Jay’s dad Warren and brother Zak look for Jay in Tenerife Credit: Doug Seeburg
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Officers called off the official search on SundayCredit: Ian Whittaker
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