Pictured buying vodka during eight-hour manhunt: Tia Sharp's step-grandad held over her murder... but why did it take police a week and THREE searches to discover her body in granny's home?

• Stuart Hazell arrested in in Merton on suspicion of murder
• Week-long hunt by 100 police with dogs who searched home three times
• Body found in Tia's grandmother's home not yet identified

A body has found but police have refused to confirm if it is schoolgirl Tia Sharp

Police were accused of incredible blunders last night after the body of Tia Sharp was found hidden at her grandmother’s home.
They even allowed ‘step-grandfather’ Stuart Hazell to go missing for several hours before he was arrested following a tip-off from a member of the public.
He was being detained last night on suspicion of murder. Neighbours were left questioning why it took more than 100 officers seven days to locate Tia, 12, when her body had been in the house all along.
And last night police refused to discuss where in the property the discovery was made even though they used ladders to access the loft. Three searches had already been carried out and detectives are investigating whether the 12-year-old’s body was moved between the roof spaces of neighbouring properties.
Hazell was arrested by officers on Cannon Hill Common in Morden, South-West London, at 8.25pm.
Sources said he was the subject of a ‘controlled arrest’ after a member of the public had alerted them.
The arrest brought a relatively swift end to a manhunt into which the Met had poured vast resources.
Witnesses claimed Hazell appeared to be drunk and was calling out ‘Have you seen Tia?’ before he was held.
Chloe Bird, 11, said Hazell was in a mini market on Cannon Hill Lane, beside a hairdressers, buying a small bottle of vodka.
She said: 'He was crying and looked drunk. He just kept saying 'have you seen her - I want her back, I miss her so much'.'
Chloe recognised Hazell from the news. After the encounter at around 5.30pm she ran home and told her stepfather Nick Keeley, 40, who called the police.

Captured on camera: Stuart Hazell is seen in a shop shortly before his arrest tonight

CCTV: Stuart Hazell buys cigarettes from a shop in Mitcham

After he visited this shop Mr Hazell was arrested in a park in Merton by police on suspicion of murder

Bryoni Goodwin said Hazell walked into the salon where she worked smelling of alcohol saying a little girl was lost.
The hairdresser described the suspect, who was wearing a baseball hat, a white vest and a red jacket, as ‘all over the place’.
She said Hazell entered the Sculpture hair salon on Cannon Hill Lane at around 5.30pm, a short distance from the park where he was later arrested.
After walking into the salon he entered a neighbouring shop in which he was seen on CCTV buying a bottle of vodka and a lighter.
‘He came into the salon and my boss dealt with him. He said “Have you seen Tia?’’,’ said Miss Goodwin, 18.

Picture shows Stuart Hazell accompanying police from Christine Sharp's home in New Addington. Surrey

Emotional: Stuart Hazell, 37, claimed he 'loved Tia to bits'

Grief: Tributes and candles are laid near the home of Christine Sharp as 'inconsolable' neighbours suspect that the body found in the home is that of Tia

Tia has been missing since last Friday and police have found a corpse but will not confirm if it is her

‘He told us that he was her granddad and I did recognise him from the TV but at that stage I didn’t realise he was wanted. He said she was used to walking in the area as she went to school around here and that he was looking for her.
‘He had tears in his eyes the whole time but we thought that was normal. We told him we hadn’t seen her and then he walked out with tears in  his eyes.’
Staff in the salon realised Hazell was wanted in connection with the incident only after a customer checked the news on her phone.
The owner of the salon then phoned the police who, Miss Goodwin said, arrived five minutes later.
Neighbours expressed disbelief that the 37-year-old was able to disappear in the middle of Britain’s highest profile missing person inquiry.
There are fears that the week’s delay in discovering Tia could mean vital evidence inside her grandmother Christine’s home has been lost.
Dozens of people, including relatives, friends, media and police, entered the small terrace council home during the search for the missing girl. The tragic discovery of her body ended hopes that the schoolgirl could still be found alive one week after she disappeared from New Addington, near Croydon in South London.
Police were alerted to the possible presence of a body when sniffer dogs trained to detect decomposition returned to her grandmother’s home early yesterday.
A forensic team was sent in as a cordon was erected around the shabby property, followed by large screens. Officers will now undertake a painstaking examination of the house before removing the body for a post-mortem examination.

Combing for clues: Christine Sharp's house is searched by forensic officers after a body was discovered

Grim discovery: Christine Sharp, who has Tia's name tattooed on her foot, leaves her home where a body was discovered today

Mourning: Floral tributes and candles have been laid by neighbours in the belief that the body found is Tia's

Uncovered: The body was discovered in an attic (not pictured here)

A pathologist will be asked to determine how and when Tia died and whether she was physically or sexually assaulted.
It is understood that the roof spaces of the row of 1960s properties are only partially separated by dividing brick walls. Senior officers launched a huge manhunt when they realised Hazell was unaccounted for.
The jobless painter and decorator was last seen on Thursday evening after he fiercely denied harming Tia.
Senior officers held a series of emergency meetings as dozens of angry neighbours gathered around the house when news of the discovery spread.
Residents, including many who joined searches of streets and woodland, warned of a potential riot over police mistakes.

The eight day search.jpg

Ginny Oteng, 46, said: ‘I was praying their little girl would be found alive and well. I had suspicions but it is still such a shock.’
A former senior police officer also expressed his shock at the way the inquiry, a murder investigation in everything but name, was conducted. Colin Sutton, who caught Milly Dowler’s killer Levi Bellfield, said he was ‘surprised’ at how long the police operation had taken.
‘The first rule of a missing child inquiry is to search the home. I am desperately sad for the family and desperately angry  the house wasn’t cleared earlier,’ he said.
Criminologist Professor David Wilson said he could not understand why the house was not treated as a crime scene from day one.
Former Met detective Kevin Hurley said he was concerned police were scared of ‘robustly’ investigating crimes and should be allowed to act on instinct without fear of repercussions. Police revealed they had searched Mrs Sharp’s home three times in the past seven days, including a detailed search of Tia’s bedroom.
Commander Neil Basu, of the Metropolitan Police, said last night he wanted to  ‘clarify some of the speculation’ over how police missed the body,  suggesting it had been moved.

'I loved her to bits, like she is my own daughter'

Only the day before Tia’s body was found, Stuart Hazell gave a TV interview insisting he was innocent.
He broke down on Thursday afternoon as he complained people were ‘pointing fingers’ at him and claimed he ‘loved her to bits’.
He said: ‘Did I do anything to Tia? No, I bloody didn’t. I’d never think of it, I loved her to bits like she is my own daughter. She wanted it, she got it. She has got a loving home. I know deep down she walked down that path. What happened after that I don’t know.’
Hazell, who was interviewed by detectives as a witness for two hours on Wednesday, pleaded: ‘Tia come home babe, come home – come back and eat your dinner. I want things back to normal.’

Combing for clues: Police seal off the estate surrounding the home of Christine Sharp as they bring in sniffer dogs to the address

Tia Sharp's home is in New Addington and Stuart Hazell was arrested in Merton

Hazell gave what he claimed was a step-by-step account of his movements in the hours before Tia left.
He described how after meeting Tia in Croydon on Thursday afternoon they travelled home by tram and spent the evening playing computer games together, while Mrs Sharp was working overnight as a carer.
The following morning he claimed he made coffee and did some chores and told Tia to put her phone on charge which is why she did not have it on her when she went out.
'She was telling me what she was doing but I wasn’t really logging it into my head,’ he told ITV News. According to Hazell, he was vacuuming at 12.10pm when Tia said goodbye to him.
‘I said, “Make sure you’re back at six”, she went “yeah yeah yeah” and that was it and the door closed and she walks out.’
He said that Tia did not have a front door key or Oyster travel card and had instead gone into town using £10 he had given her for household chores and gardening.
Hazell, 37, added: ‘It’s not about me it’s about Tia – we have got to get her home.
‘She’s got no problems at all, she’s a happy go-lucky golden angel.
‘She’s perfect, there’s no arguments, nothing we can think of.’