ALEX Batty’s mother has been branded a Covid-19 conspiracy theorist by friends.
Pals knew Melanie as Rose, a therapeutic massage therapist.
She remains “on the run” from police after her son was found safe in France.
The 43-year-old lived at the La Forte campsite in an American-style camper, where she stayed for months and spent hours in front of her computer every day.
The site owner, who asked not to be identified, said: “She arrived in May and left at the end of September without warning.
“She called herself Rose and I only recently discovered that she is the mother of the missing one boy.
“I would see the woman every now and then and she would say, ‘Bonjour.’ But she doesn’t speak French and I don’t speak English, so we didn’t communicate further.
“She was typing on her computer all day. I don’t know what she did, but that’s what she did all day.
“I told her that I was going to turn off the hot water in the toilet block at the end of September. She left around that time.
According to the man, Melanie has not returned for more than two months and no one has seen her since she disappeared.
After arriving in France in 2021, Melanie went to live in a ‘spiritual community’, while Alex in Fred Hambye and Ingrid Beauve’s gite (cottage) – where his grandfather worked as a handyman.
Alex went by the name Zach as he worked with the French couple in exchange for food and shelter with his grandfather.
Her friend Susie Harrison last saw Melanie a few weeks ago and recently called her a “conspiracy theorist.”
Susie said: “She believed Covid-19 wasn’t real, that it had been created by the state to control people.
‘I don’t know what she did for money, but I do know she gave therapeutic massages.
“She really wanted to establish a spiritual community here in the south of France.”
“If I see Rose I will ask her, but maybe they are on the run now because they have been in France illegally all this time.”
Relative Stephen Devine, a cousin of Melanie, also had strong opinions about the woman.
He told The Sun: “Alex’s mother was involved in a cult.
“His grandmother became his guardian, but then his mother and grandfather offered to take him on vacation for a week and they were never seen again.
“It will be a big adjustment for him. He probably grew up without any formal education.”
Family friends claim his mother and grandfather had become obsessed with cult-like ideas and gave up their normal lives in Greater Manchester to fight ‘the establishment’, the banks and bailiffs.
Alex was picked up at 3am on Wednesday in the pouring rain by a truck driver, 50 kilometers from the gite.
Carrying a backpack and a skateboard, he claimed he had been hiking the foothills of the Pyrenees for four days.
But according to Google Maps, the skateboard ride should have taken 11 hours or less.
The boy finally returned to the home of his grandmother and legal guardian Susan Caruana, 68, in Oldham, Greater Manchester, on Saturday evening after escaping from the French community.
He told reporters: “I’m just happy to be home for Christmas.”
He had been missing for more than six years when he was found.
Toulouse Assistant Public Prosecutor Antoine Leroy said: “It is possible that the mother went to Finland as she had planned. The grandfather, who was always with his daughter and grandson, is said to have died about six months ago.”
Speaking about Alex’s lifestyle over the past six years, Mr Leroy said: “They worked on the ego, there was meditation work – there was no connection with the real world. They believed in reincarnation.”
Mr Leroy said Alex was tired but in good health after being reunited with his guardians. He added: “He is said to be intelligent even though he never went to school during this period.
“He does not describe any form of physical violence without mentioning emotional violence. We cannot use the term ‘cult’ as such, but it speaks of a spiritual community.”
Mr. Leroy suggested that the group is fascinated by solar panels, and that Melanie is afraid of them.
He added: “They traveled from house to house with solar panels. They only used car sharing, they did not have their own car.”