Targeted by the internet trolls: Mum's heartbreak at sick messages pretending to be from four-year-old boy swept out to sea

• Dylan Cecil vanished from seaside jetty on Sunday evening
• Rescue operations have failed to find missing four-year-old
• Both his parents had jumped in the sea to try and recover him
• Boy's mother, Rachel McCollum, yesterday returned to spot where he vanished
• She says she needs 'closure' and that her son 'should be with me'
• Vile trolls post Facebook profile pretending to be missing boy
• Family released a statement urging the four-year-old to stop playing 'hide and seek' in the sea

Dylan Cecil, four, has been lost at sea since disappearing from Burnham-on-Sea on Sunday evening

The grieving mother of a four-year-old boy who was swept out to sea has hit out at internet trolls who set up a Facebook page containing fake messages from her son.
Dylan Cecil’s body has still not been found since he fell from a slipway into treacherous waters during a family visit to the seaside.
His parents, Darren Cecil and Rachel McCollum, both jumped in to the sea after their son fell but could not save him, and have since been keeping a vigil on the beach at Burnham-on-Sea in Somerset.
A page on the social networking site called ‘RIP Dylan Cecil’ contains a message from a user masquerading as Dylan that reads: ‘To my mum, my daddy and sisters and seaside grandparents I love you all. Am in heaven waiting on you all.’
It continues: ‘I’ll be looking down on you :-) x Sent from the rainbow and flowers and sunshine in heaven...X.’
Miss McCollum, 27, who had previously used her own Facebook account to say her ‘heart, soul and life [have been] ripped apart’, later responded to the false messages.
She wrote: ‘How low can people be? I tried saving my son and a page [is] set up speaking like they are him.
‘I’m distraught he is still missing at sea, I ain’t slept at all and to find someone pretending to be my son has destroyed me even more.’
Other internet users expressed their disgust at the Facebook group, with one responding: ‘I’m reporting this page – you are disrespectful trolls.’
Another added: ‘Take this page down, you insensitive ghoulish t**** – he is not your child to mourn and debate, the parents have enough anguish already.’

Last sighting: Dylan's mother Rachel McCollum, centre, returned to the spot where the boy was last seen with police community support officers

Distraught: Family members comfort Mrs McCollum as she goes through Dylan's last movements before he disappeared

Desperate search: Mrs McCollum (left) looks out from the jetty after returning to Burnham-on-Sea to help police with the search for Dylan

Before he was swept out to sea, Dylan and his sisters, Faith, three, and one-year-old Alice, had been staying with their grandparents, while Miss McCollum and Mr Cecil, 30, took a short break in Dorset.
The couple returned from their break on Sunday and took their children to the shore that evening, when Dylan fell off the slipway into the water, in an area which is notorious for its low visibility and powerful currents.
Miss McCollum said yesterday: ‘I can’t get closure. He is still lost. What can I do? I did all I could.
‘He was playing on the end of the jetty and he was less than a metre away from me and he slipped.
‘He lost his footing. He went under. I jumped in straight away, as did his dad, but we both got pulled by a whirlpool.
‘He went straight away. He never came back. I got dragged myself. I knew. I knew he was gone.’

Tragic: Dylan Cecil was playing on a slipway when he lost his footing

Bad taste: Ghoulish internet trolls posted this message pretending to be Dylan Cecil

Anger: Dylan's devastated mother Rachel McCollum immediately made her feelings known once the fake profile emerged

Looking out to sea, she added: ‘He was beautiful. He was absolutely beautiful. I couldn’t ask for a better kid.
‘He was polite, well-mannered, gorgeous. I don’t want him lost at sea. He needs to be with me.’ Placing an arm around her shoulder, her father told her: ‘He will come back.’
But she replied: ‘He won’t  come back.’
Yesterday a witness told how she helped pull Mr Cecil and Miss McCollum out of the water after they had frantically tried to save their son.
Claire Holbrook, 28, a nurse who had been visiting the beach with her seven-year-old daughter Leah, said: ‘I heard a scream [and] noticed two adults, who had walked past us earlier, in the water.

Outpouring of sympathy: Dozens of wellwishers have left candles and flowers at the scene where Dylan was last spotted on Sunday evening

Helpless: As more passers-by laid flowers at the scene, Dylan's desperate mother said her four-year-old son 'needs to be with me'.

‘The woman was yelling, “Help me, my little boy is dead” and the dad claimed he was stuck.
‘A group of people rushed to help the mum, and another man and myself helped the dad.
‘By that time he was nearly gone himself – he was just so exhausted – so we dragged him out and put him in the recovery position. It wasn’t until about ten minutes later that we realised that there was also a little boy in the water – there was just no sign of him.’
She continued: ‘[The] mum was frantic. She was just absolutely inconsolable – but they fought until the end.
‘I think deep down we all knew he was dead straight away because he never came back up. It was like he had gone somewhere.’

Floral tributes left at the scene in Burnham-on-Sea, Somerset, near where four-year-old disappeared

Miss McCollum has also placed a small Winnie the Pooh teddy bear among the numerous flowers in place on the sea wall, close to where a huge heart with Dylan’s name written in the middle has been carved into the sand.
An onlooker said: ‘She said that her daughter went up to her last night with the teddy and said that it was now called Dylan.

'She looked absolutely exhausted. She put a well-loved Winnie the Pooh teddy on the wall and told a police officer that it was her kids’ favourite show.’
An official search to find Dylan – involving the RAF, RNLI, coastguard and local hovercraft crews - was called off on Monday afternoon, but volunteers continued to scour the water yesterday.

Dylan Cecil, right, pictured with his parents Rachel McCollum and Darren Cecil, with his sister Faith, left, on his