Little Morsals

Belle Famille “Nice Family” – a novel by Arthur Drefus

2012-01-09T13:06:00.003Z

Sometimes there comes a book where the root of the storyline doesn’t need any explanation. This is one of those books.

The synopsis ends on a teaser that will - no doubt - help to sell the book if only to learn the secret: "Little by little it will be understood why she hides her child’s body" (Please note that the book is written in French)

Many thanks to Anna Andress for her kind permission to reproduce her article and the synopsis on Little Morsals.

First seen on Anna Andress Blog

'Belle Famille,' a novel in French by Arthur Dreyfus, in which a French family by the name of Macand, the parents both doctors, go on holiday to Tuscany, and lose one of their children, whose name is Madec Macand. Madec dies accidentally in the kitchen of the parents' holiday accommodation, while the parents are dining at a restaurant with friends.

Brief description featured in the online magazine Cultura:

A strange, uncommunicative and lonely child, Madec lives in Granville with his parents and his two brothers.

While the family is on holiday in Tuscany with a couple of friends, Madec almost drowns in the swimming pool. He is saved by an Englishman, Ron Murdoch, an ex-convict who served a long sentence in England for paedophilia.

One evening, while his parents are dining at a restaurant with their friends, Madec dies accidentally in the kitchen of the bungalow.

Going back, for some reason, in the middle of the meal, Laurence finds her son dead on the tiled floor. Without a second thought, she takes the body and gets rid of it, before rejoining the others in the restaurant as though nothing has happened.

On their return to the bungalow, the disappearance sets off a general alert. Searches, more searches, police investigation, paparazzi: within a few days, the parents become celebrities.

The child’s uncle orchestrates a press campaign which gets world-wide attention – reaching Pope Jean-Paul II. Led by an Italian inspector, the investigation is followed closely in high places in France.

The Englishman Murdoch is soon accused of having abducted and killed Madec. His past works against him..Drawing inspiration from a recent news item, Arthur Dreyfus describes that family, set in their silence and spinelessness, with an often cruel irony and Madec’s solitude with entrancing poetry.

Progressively, a climate close to madness sets in, in which the mother, mysterious and silent, plays a central role. Little by little it will be understood why she hides her child’s body.

Published by Gallimard on January 5th 2012, the book is available from Amazon France

Stephen Lawrence Forensic to be used in Madeleine McCann case

2012-01-06T11:45:00.001Z

According to the Daily Express

“SCIENTIFIC advances used in the Stephen Lawrence case could solve the mysteries of Madeleine McCann and Jill Dando.

Forensic experts working on the racist murder devised new techniques to discover microscopic clues that convicted two of the killers.

Now Scotland Yard hopes the same revolutionary approach could help find the truth behind the disappearance of three-year-old Madeleine in 2007 and the killing of BBC Crimewatch presenter Miss Dando in 1999.”

The forensic experts the Daily Express mention is LGC Forensics who not only provided key evidence in the Stephen Lawrence case but also for Joana Yeates, Rachel Nickell, Damilola Taylor as well as others, details of each can be read here. Most of these cases were previously overseen by Birmingham forensic Science Service (FSS) who, so it would seem, overlooked vital clues, ones which LGC picked up on and consequently brought the respective murderers to justice. As you may recall it was FSS who were also involved with the Madeleine McCann case. If they overlooked vital clues in other cases is it possible they also overlook clues in Madeleine’s?

Madeleine McCann case

Even though LGC appear to have an excellent track record, it’s difficult to understand how they will be of use in the McCann case.

In previous cold cases handled by LGC they had the benefit of clothing and/or footwear from possible suspects and/or items from the deceased, but in the McCann case there is nothing from the supposed ‘abductor’ to test forensically (least of all any evidence that there was ever an intruder, except for the word of the McCann couple), nor has Madeleine’s body been found...as yet...if she is indeed dead of course.

However, if Scotland Yard is willing to put aside the McCann abduction scenario, then LGC could work on the only items available...those alerted to by Eddie and Keela. But then that is dependent on whether or not Kate’s trousers and other personal items belonging to the McCann couple have been kept in storage. If they have then it seems possible that LGC could use them as a starting block and re-examine them for possible clues.

But what if those personal items have since been returned? What is left to examine? Nearly five years have gone by since Madeleine’s disappearance so it’s unlikely that the car hired by the McCann couple (also alerted to by Eddie) will be of any use... unless it is true that the lining of the car boot was securely locked away in the Birmingham forensic Science Service (FSS) – which, incidentally, is due for complete closure by March 2012 – and is still available for further tests.

It doesn’t matter which way I look at the possibility of LGC re-examining the McCann case I can’t seem to pin down anything which they could use...or am I overlooking something? Perhaps the perishable forensics (saliva and blood) originally sent to FSS by the Portuguese police has not been destroyed as we have been led to believe?

We can only hope that if there is any truth in the Daily Express article, then there is something left to be examined.

The real reason the McCann couple 'won' an out of court settlement

2011-12-22T10:57:00.002Z

Sources:
Leveson Inquiry: Transcript of David Pilditch
Leveson Inquiry: David Pilditch statement

Questions by Mr Jay to David Pilditch (General News Journalist for Daily Express)

Cutting through the Leveson Inquiry cat-and-mouse questioning and getting down to the nitty gritties, during the questioning it came to light that Mr Pilditch was indirectly receiving information from the Portuguese police (PJ) via the Portuguese journalists. Mr Jay seemed to suggest that information gleamed from these sources were unreliable because Mr Pilditch had not been in direct contact with the PJ.

However, this part of the questioning brings something of importance to the surface:

David Pilditch: “So basically, every day when I'd speak to the news desk, normally you'd say, "Look, this is what we know, this is what the police are saying, and that's taken as being fact", but the conversations I was having with the news desk were explaining the information I had with all the caveats that were attached to it.”

Mr Jay: Did you tell your news desk that which we see in paragraph 23 of your statement, namely:
"Due to the restrictions of the Portuguese law, anyone who was unhappy about something that had been written or said about them and wished to take legal action would almost certainly have been successful." Was that sentiment shared with your news desk at the time?

David Pilditch: Well, this is what I felt on the ground. I'm not a legal expert, but I felt that just the situation as it presented itself, that that was the case, and I'm certain that the news desk would have had conversations with lawyers about this, and there would have been discussions, ongoing discussions, and that was the situation we were in and there was no way around it.

Mr Jay: I must persist with the question.

Pilditch: Sorry, yes.

Jay: Yes. Did you share your discomfiture with your news desk?

Pilditch: Yes. I said "If we're going to have any problems, we may not be able to defend these things because we just cannot get any confirmation", and that was the difficulty.

So basically because of the Portuguese secrecy laws, the British journalists were unable to name the Portuguese police as their actual sources and as a result could be liable for court action if challenged.

But did the News articles have any substance to them? The statement made by David Pilditch for the Leveson Inquiry seems to suggest that what was printed was the truth:

“It was only months later, in July 2008 that Portugal’s Attorney General formally closed the investigation into Madeleine McCann’s disappearance. Under the Portuguese system, the authorities released the official police file - more than 10,000 documents including photographs, official reports and witness statements including those of the McCanns. Through the release of those documents and subsequent legal actions in Portugal it is now a matter of public record that the reports I was writing between September 2007 and January 2008 were truthful and accurate."

It appears that the reason the McCann couple won an out of court settlement was not due to lies being printed, but that at the time the sources could not be confirmed due to the Portuguese secrecy laws. A fact I’m sure the top lawyers working for the McCann couple would have been very much aware of and able to use in their favour...at the time. No doubt they felt safe in the knowledge that due to the secrecy laws the police files would not see the light of day. It seems they hadn't banked on the fact that the shelving of the case would allow those files to be released and eventually end up in the public domain for anyone to read.

It’s often been said in the past that the ‘truth will out’ eventually.

Meaning of Portuguese Arguido Status

2011-12-22T09:06:00.000Z

Source: Mediabeak

The arguido status

In Portuguese law a person is constitued as an arguido when she or he is suspected of having committed a crime.

A person can request to be made "arguida" because he or she will benefit from rights that he/she does not have as a witness. Apart of the obligation of being accompanied by a lawyer when giving depositions in front of police authorities, the arguido has the right to remain silent and not reply to any questions. This means that as a potential suspect he or she is acting in their own defence. A witness by law is obliged to reply to all questions.

A person is constituted arguido during the investigation phase when sufficient evidence is collected to formulate an accusation. At that time, the less serious of the coercive sanctions which is the "term of identity and residence" is applied to the arguido. This term can be translated as a kind of conditional liberty where the arguido is obliged to inform the police authorities whenever he/she is absent for more than 5 days. An arguido can also be submitted to other coercion measures, the most severe being the "preventive arrest", which is usually applied when there is the danger of escape, disturbance of the investigation, possibility of destroying evidence, etc.

Secrecy of justice

The notion of secrecy of justice means a special jurisdiction obligation that applies to any person with direct knowledge of an act or document of the penal procedure. That person must comply to that secrecy, meaning he/she is forbidden to talk or reveal the content of that act or document.

The secrecy of the inquiry or investigation aims to satisfy the functionality of the juridical machine in the preliminary phases of the process. The arguido cannot be granted access to clues and evidence collected during the investigation since there might be over-riding interests such as: national security, witnesses protection, efficacy of the investigation and the obtaining of evidence.

The aim of the secrecy of justice is to ensure the secrecy of the criminal procedure, and allows also the guarantee that justice is made in an independent and unbiased way without the interference of other sovereign organs. Interference is also prevented from pressure groups or persons with personal (or institutional) power able to spread erroneous information campaigns through the media, harming the discovery and preservation of evidence and thus hindering the conclusions of the penal procedure.

More leads in Maddie case or just a load of bumpkin?

2011-12-15T15:15:00.001Z

Daily Mail's headlines: "Maddie investigators 'looking at eight important new leads' from tranche of Spanish evidence"

“Scotland Yard detectives investigating the disappearance of Madeleine McCann are examining eight ‘important’ new leads, it was claimed yesterday.”

I’m glad they said ‘claimed’ because the truth of the matter is that Scotland Yard are not divulging their reason for visiting Metodo3 or why they removed documents from their premises. But then it does beg the question why the Daily Mail is filling their space with what can only be classed as hearsay.

“Spanish private investigators have handed over 30 boxes of documents which could yield a breakthrough.”

Yield a breakthrough? Perhaps not in the way they expect.

“On Tuesday, four British officers visited the Barcelona HQ of Metodo 3, the detective agency employed to look for Madeleine by her parents Kate and Gerry for six months after she vanished at the age of three in 2007.

The agency’s director, Francisco Marco, said there were ‘six, seven or eight very important leads’ within the files.”

Ah! Francisco “We’ll have Madeleine home by Christmas” Marco. For anyone who cannot remember this astonishing statement made by Francisco Marco, here’s the original Daily Mail article entitled “McCann’s Private Detectives: ‘We know who took Madeleine – and she’ll be home by Christmas.”
Was Madeleine home by Christmas? No. So obviously they didn’t know who had ‘taken’ her.

“But sources close to the British investigation played down the significance of the material yesterday.”

“It is the second time that Metropolitan Police detectives have flown to Spain as part of their review of her disappearance.

At last, an ounce of truth!

Last month they spent three days with the Spanish National Police and Civil Guard force as part of inquiries into whether she was abducted and smuggled across the border from Portugal.

Abducted and smuggled across the border no less! Says who? Wasn’t Scotland Yard because apparently they’re not saying anything about their investigation, so where did the Daily Mail get this gem from?

British detectives have also recently collected documents from the Portuguese police, Leicestershire police and the McCanns.

Have they really? I do hope that is true..

Yesterday Mr Marco said on Spanish TV: ‘We have provided [British police] with all the documents and information we have collated worldwide about Madeleine’s disappearance.’

He told The Ana Rosa Programme: ‘[The leads] were passed at the time to Portuguese police who ignored them because it was a very politicised issue.’

So why then didn’t Mr Marco pass these documents to Dave Edgar and his team (the current Private Investigators of the McCann couple)? More to the point, if there are leads to Madeleine’s whereabouts then why didn’t Dave Edgar collect the documents? How on earth can the McCann couple’s Private Investigators operate any kind of coordinated search for Madeleine if they can’t so much as ensure that they are in receipt of all available evidence?

Madeleine, of Rothley in Leicestershire, disappeared from her parents’ holiday apartment in Praia da Luz on the Algarve in Portugal in May 2007.

Her parents hired Metodo 3 to find her four months after she vanished.

The agency sent a team to Morocco to follow leads that she might have been smuggled out of Portugal.

And? Did they find anything in Morocco from those leads? Obviously not otherwise we would have heard about it surely? So why add this piece if not to try and bolster the already flagging reputation of Metodo3.

Mr Marco said he still believed that was ‘very possibly’ what happened to her but refused to give more details.

Yes, but in December 2007 he also said he knew who took Madeleine and would have her home by Christmas.

It seems that Mr Marco was desperate to get his side out on national Spanish TV. Perhaps there is another reason for Scotland Yard visiting Metodo3 and removing files? Is it possible they are investigating Metodo3?

The files taken by Scotland Yard include investigations the agency carried out into Raymond Hewlett, a convicted British paedophile who was in Portugal when Madeleine went missing and left for Morocco three weeks later.

Hewlett died of throat cancer aged 64 in Germany last year having refused to talk to detectives about Madeleine’s disappearance.

If all else fails, return to Mr Hewlett who is dead and unable to defend himself. The Daily Mail seems to forget that the ‘detectives’ he refused to talk with was none other than the McCann private investigators, and that Mr Hewlett had already been questioned by official police officers. As he wasn’t convicted, we can safely assume he was cleared of any involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance.

Prime Minister David Cameron asked the Met to examine Madeleine’s case in May. Operation Grange, led by Detective Chief Inspector John Redwood, will consider whether there are any grounds for the Portuguese police to re-open their original inquiry, which was shelved in 2008.

Here’s hoping!

A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police refused to comment yesterday. The McCann family also declined to comment.

Absolutely and rightly so too...at least while the investigation is ongoing. So now we’ve gone full circle and still no closer to knowing why Scotland Yard visited Metodo3 or why they removed boxes of documentation.

Considering the word of Metodo3 can’t be taken seriously surely they shouldn’t be permitted any space to muddy the already murky waters. If the Daily Mail stuck to the facts it would save typing time and culminating in one paragraph:

Scotland Yard flew out to Spain on Tuesday where they removed boxes of documentation from the premises of Metodo3. Scotland Yard decline to comment.

Gonçalo Amaral: "Justice works in Silence"

2011-12-09T21:05:00.000Z

Source: Algarve123

Gonçalo Amaral
“Justice works in Silence”

His life has been ripped apart since he led the police investigation into the Millennium’s greatest mystery, and came into legal confrontation with Kate and Gerry McCann. Gonçalo Amaral has lost his family, his business, his assets and the income from his controversial book that states all the reasons why he believes three-year-old Madeleine McCann died in apartment 5A in Praia da Luz back in May of 2007. Now, four-and-a-half years down the line, he faces another hurdle: a trial for defamation of the McCanns – due to start in Lisbon in February – in which the couple are claiming 1.2 million euros in damages. Does he think he can win? “Of course”, he says. This is the man whose maxim is “justice works in silence”. He still believes the case of the world’s most famous missing person will be solved. And he told Algarve123 what he thinks is needed to get there…

You wouldn’t miss him in a crowd. Gonçalo Amaral, 52, is strikingly tall with a penchant for hats. He was wearing a long black coat, a black fedora and a bright red scarf when we met him on the terrace of Casa Inglesa in Portimão. He looked much more like an intellectual than a former police officer, but these days his life is spent largely writing - an activity he’s come to love as much as the police work that used to fill his days.

Our first question: “How’s life?” elicited the reply “Bad!” so any further niceties went by the board.

What Amaral has always maintained is that the McCanns’ zeal for litigation “will not bring their daughter back”. He claims various legal suits against him, and a number of other Portuguese public figures who have verbalised “anti-McCann-story” sentiments, are totally out of keeping with the Catholic faith so fervently embraced by Madeleine’s mother Kate.

“Is it Catholic to hold sentiments of vengeance? To seek to destroy a family as mine has been destroyed?” he asks.

“This litigation will carry a heavy price – but I have faith that the mystery will be resolved. “Even if I “disappear” in the process - as Kate McCann has written that she wishes I would in her book - I have a daughter and lots of friends who will make sure justice is done”.

It may sound theatrical - but Amaral is not about theatre. He is about truth – hard facts, solid investigative work.

“The case has to be re-opened, and I have faith that it will be,” he said. “It will either be when this current “procurador” leaves, or when the current chief of police leaves. It’s not something I am pushing for - even if I could - it’s just something I feel certain will happen. And when it does, the first, most essential thing to be done will be a reconstruction of that very first night – the night Madeleine disappeared. Because that’s what happened: she literally disappeared! The reconstruction will have to involve all the parties: the McCanns and their friends. You see, there are so many inconsistencies in these people’s statements that a reconstruction will very quickly highlight where they have not told the truth”.

An example of the power of reconstructions came only weeks ago in Spain where a father claimed his two children were abducted from a park. A police reconstruction quickly proved that the father had never taken his children to the park: witnesses who had seen him arrive in his car but hadn’t noticed the children in the back seat, were surprised to discover that in the reconstruction the child-sized dummies in the back were clearly visible. The children’s father is now in jail – although the children are still missing.

Amaral explained that when Madeleine disappeared police didn’t organise a reconstruction in Praia da Luz “because there were so many journalists on the ground” – and once the heat had died down, “the McCanns refused. They said any reconstruction should be made by actors – but the whole reason for reconstructions is to use the people involved, and see where their stories don’t add up!”

Going back to that first night is logical: the initial 48-hours after any disappearance are crucial. They can literally mean the difference between life and death – but in Madeleine’s case, Amaral is convinced of the latter. The theory that has led to his prosecution by the McCanns for defamation is clearly set out in his book “A Verdade de Mentira” (The Truth of the Lie) – banned from sale in 2009, and then “released” by the Appeals Court a year later. We say “released” because the books were actually never returned to publishers Guerra & Paz, and thus they and Amaral have had nothing to sell…

“It’s another part of the whole plot to assassinate my civil position,” Amaral says matter-of-factly. “I’ve been left with no chances; no way of paying my debts; liens on my property. I’ve had to move away from my family in order to protect them. My marriage, well, it’s not so good. Not good at all, really. My life seems to be all about divorce…”

So how does he find the strength to move forwards?

“Well, I put the McCanns in a metaphorical box and I am not really thinking too much about the trial in February. I think I will win, and then they will appeal – but I have to have a path. I want to open another consultancy. I had one when I left the police force, but that was destroyed when the McCanns went after me over “A Verdade de Mentira”.

So that’s one thing - and the other is writing. I have recently brought out a new book: “Vidas sem Defesa” about missing children cases in Portugal, and I have another one almost ready (I am not going to tell you what it is about!). After that, I would like to take police “mysteries” and study them and write stories, not novels; stories based on facts to show what I believe really happened. There’s a real lack of books of this type.”
So he’s not angry over the agonies and frustrations he’s endured from what came from essentially doing his job?

“I have my anger well-guarded. No feelings for revenge. Like I say, they will pay for what they have done to me and my family – but through the courts. Even after everything that has happened, I still have faith in the Portuguese justice system”.

And does he have any clues as to what catapulted the Madeleine case into the stratosphere of media attention? Why did the McCanns receive so much help from the British authorities right from the very beginning? And why were they and the so-called Tapas 7 never taken to task for child neglect – considering that they all left their children alone at night during the ill-fated holiday?

“Ah, now there we’re getting into politics – and quite honestly, those are questions for the British public to ask. I don’t have to have theories about them. My job was to find Madeleine”.

A job handed to him nearly five years ago – and one that he will never forget.

Pat Brown to sue Gerry and Kate McCann

2011-11-04T10:46:00.000Z

Pat Brown will be suing Kate and Gerry McCann for libel and tortious interference with business in the very near future. Anne Bremner of the law firm of Stafford Frey Cooper will be representing Pat in the upcoming legal actions.

Anne Bremner has performed legal work on a number of high-profile cases, including the murder of Meredith Kercher in Italy as legal counsel and a spokesperson for the Friends of Amanda Knox, and as the lawyer for the family of Rebecca Zahau following her death in California.

Pat says “It is a Freedom of Speech issue: we cannot live in a world where questions cannot be asked or varying opinions voiced.”

Pat Brown will be in Portugal February 2012 for Mr Amaral’s libel trial.

Joana Morais: McCann libel trial hearings to start in February 2012

2011-10-11T22:22:00.001+01:00

Original Source: Joana Morais
Article reproduced here with the kind permission of Joana.

The civil complaint filed by the McCanns against Gonçalo Amaral, over his book "Maddie - A Verdade da Mentira" (The Truth of the Lie) will start to be tried in February 2012.

The first two hearings have been scheduled for the 9th and 10th of February, 2012, at 9.30 a.m., at the Civil Court of Lisbon.

The defence fund that supports Mr Amaral by helping to finance the legal expenses related to this trial, is still in operation. Donations are very welcome. Please refer to Projecto Justiça Gonçalo Amaral for contributions. Thank you.

Tony Bennett takes Madeleine McCann Dossier to Scotland Yard

2011-10-03T23:32:00.002+01:00

Tony Bennett, of the Madeleine Foundation, took a dossier containing information regarding the Madeleine McCann case to Scotland Yard earlier today.

Full details of the day can be read at McCann Exposure

The dossier

Tony Bennett about to hand in the dossier to Operation Grange detective D.I. Tim Dobson at Belgravi Police Station, where Operation Grange is based

Earlier in the day at Scotland Yard headquarters, on the way to Belgravia Police Station

Kate McCann inspirational? Difficult to see how.

2011-10-03T06:56:00.002+01:00

According to Metro, Kate McCann has been named one of the 20 most inspirational women in Britain by the Woman and Home magazine.

I have to admit that I doubted the authenticity of such a claim and my doubts seemed to be backed when I couldn’t find Kate’s name in the recent edition of the magazine. While waiting for a reply from Sue James, editorial director of Woman & Home magazine, I searched the internet to see if anyone could shine some light on this mystery and, as is often the case, I found the answer at the Missing Madeleine Forum. If it hadn’t been for the hard working members there I doubt that I would have found the article.

The ‘Woman and Home’ magazine has this to say:

“This year, w&h has launched the Power List, a celebration of 35+ women who have most inspired us over the past year.

Kate McCann, 43, the campaigner

This year’s success In May this year, Kate published her memoir, Madeleine, which painfully charted her daughter’s disappearance and the continuing search to find her. In June, Kate gave evidence at a parliamentary inquiry into the treatment of parents of missing children.

Since her daughter disappeared in May 2007, Kate McCann has worked tirelessly, through her Find Madeleine campaign, to keep her daughter’s face in the public consciousness and to discover what happened.”

Well, they haven’t exactly lied, she did indeed publish her book (albeit it one that’s been written with artistic licence) and gave evidence at the enquiry, and to be fair the magazine did use the word ‘disappearance’ instead of the unfounded ‘abduction.’ But...

...To me ‘inspirational’ means someone who has unflawed qualities; someone who can be looked up to as a role model. A mother who has left her children alone on consecutive nights (even more difficult to swallow when they still left their children unattended the night after Madeleine said she and her sibling had been crying); a mother who can freely use the words ‘f****ing t***er' and describe her daughter’s lower regions in the fashion that Kate did in her book is not inspirational, especially when Kate has said she wrote the book for the twins. Is this the kind of woman I would want my children to look up to? The answer is a resounding no.

But then in a world that awards the Peace Prize to President Obama and the Liberty medal Award to former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, is it any wonder that the word ‘inspirational’ is losing it’s true meaning?!

So what is the word 'inspirational' supposed to mean? According to Biography Online, the characteristics for inspirational people means:

•    Self-Giving rather than selfish
•    Humility rather than pride. This is not a false humility which makes people stay in the background. But, when they act, it is with a sense of oneness and not a superiority or inferiority.
•    Courage. Courage to do the right thing, whatever society thinks
•    Principles - Acting out of principles for good rather than material gain.
•    Happiness - Inspirational people make the world a better place, and make people feel more positive.
•    Vision - Inspirational People have a vision and help turn hope into reality.

I rest my case.

Eddie true to his bark alert

2011-09-24T15:34:00.000+01:00

If there is anything that has made me doubt something then it was the reactions of Eddie the cadaver dog. I was puzzled by the way he sniffed around the bedroom, left it and returned several times before apparently barking at the cupboard/wardrobe. I wanted to know why – if there was indeed cadaver scent there for him to indicate – he didn’t bark immediately.

Having asked around if it was possible for Eddie to be ‘influenced’ by his handler I was simply told ‘no’. Telling me no without giving an explanation isn’t good enough, it simply keeps me wondering...and doubting.

I have now found the answer from Eddie and Keela’s handler Mr Martin Grimes. Now I’m more settled in the findings of these specialised dogs.

Transcript:

09-Processos Vol IX Pages 2462 to 2465
Martin Grimes transcript

“What we have to be able to understand in a situation such as this is in a hot climate with the apartment being closed down, the scent will build up in a particular area. If there isn't a scent source in here, i.e. a physical article where the scent is emitting from, any scent residue will collect in a particular place due to the air movement of the flat, the apartment and what I would say in this case is that there is enough scent in that area there for him to give me a bark indication but the source may not be in that cupboard, the source may well be in this room somewhere else but the air is actually pushing into that corner. But strong indication and I would say its positive for things that he is trained to find, which will be part of a separate debrief.”

So basically the scent is there but may have accumulated into the corner of the room via the air flow which means that the wardrobe/cupboard may not have been the original source of the cadaver scent as previously thought. Eddie’s apparent flitting in and out of the room was merely Eddie ensuring that he had located the strongest point and only when he was satisfied did he gave the alert.

That would also explain the clothing. Eddie ran up and down the line of clothes, passing Kate’s trousers several times before finally throwing them into the air and giving the alert.

It appears Eddie was merely making sure.

Something else which Martin Grimes’ statement revealed:

“The second dog that we've seen work today is the crime scene dog Keela. She will only indicate to me when she has found human blood, only human blood and it is only blood and there must be something there physically for her to be able to alert to me that's she has actually found something. At this point over here where the victim recovery dog has indicated, as you saw on the video, the crime scene dog had actually given me what we call a passive indication where she freezes in this spot here which would indicate to me that there is some human blood there. She will find blood that's historically very old and she will find anybody's blood, any human blood, which is important to make sure that everybody knows.

The fact that there is other scientific methods being used may stop you recovering any DNA but if you try we'll see what happens. But she is very, very good and when she indicates there is always blood there.”

Note the interesting quote in the last paragraph. “Other scientific methods being used may stop you recovering any DNA...”

But that aside...

It’s been asked why blood wasn’t found by the Portuguese Forensics when they examined the apartment after Madeleine’s disappearance. IF the speculation is true regarding Madeleine having died from a fatal accident while alone in apartment 5a, and IF the speculation is true that the apartment may have been cleaned after the suspected accident then it stands to reason that any traces of blood (missed by cleaning) will be found in obscure places such as under floor tiles...which is where Keela indicated as shown in the video.

Forensic report in the police files:

Service Information 1 August 2007
By Joao Direito, Inspector

Recovery of possible trace evidence

I bring to your attention in accordance with instructions received, that today, around 20h00, LPC Assistant Specialists Fernando Viegas and Lino Rodrigues, after seeing recorded images relating to the canine inspection conducted on 31 July 2007 in apartment 5A of the Ocean Club, duly explained in an official statement in the case file, they proceeded to collect [recover] the floor tiles where the dogs used in the activity indicated [alerted to] the possible existence of blood traces along with the position of a cadaver in that location.

Those tiles were lifted from the floor, in a way to preserve the possible traces intact for them to be subjected to examination by an authorised laboratory.

But what about Kate’s statement in her book?

“They had no proof that Madeleine was dead. All they actually had was the signal of a dog trying to please its instructor in an apartment from which Madeleine had been taken three months earlier. As we now know, the chemicals believed to create the ‘odour of death’, putrescence and cadaverine, last no longer than thirty days.”

Only 30 days? Not according to Canine Specialized Search Team who have completed controlled experiments/tests regarding the length of time that cadaver odour will linger in a building – please read their full report Residual scent According to their test results:

Results

Each dog participating in this project was able to find most or all of the locations where the decomposing scent articles had been. We saw dogs, which varied, from full alert and pinpointing to general interest in the room or area.

What we have found so far is; residual scent will last 1 year in a building with minimum environmental influence, or human disturbance. Even after the objects where the scent source had been were removed, the dogs were able to locate the rooms, general area, or pinpoint where it had been.

Also in her book, Kate McCann quotes Martin Grimes as saying:

‘No evidential or intelligence reliability can be made from these alerts unless it can be confirmed with corroborating evidence. The dog alert indications must be corroborated to establish their findings as evidence.’

Although this statement is in the police files, she failed to mention the full paragraphs from Martin Grimes report on Eddie and Keela In several places he states:

CANINE SEARCH OF MR McCANN'S VILLA, PRESENT OCCUPANCY

It is my view that it is possible that the EVRD is alerting to cadaver scent
contamination. No evidential or intelligence reliability can be made from this
alert unless it can be confirmed with corroborating evidence.

And...

BOXES OF CLOTHING 1 PROPERTY FORM MR McCANN'S RESIDENCE

It is my view that it is possible that the EVRD is alerting to 'a cadaver scent'
contaminant. No evidential or intelligence reliability can be made from this
alert unless it can be confirmed with corroborating evidence.

And...

CANINE VEHICLE SEARCHES

It is my view that it is possible that the EVRD is alerting to 'cadaver scent'
contaminant or human blood scent. No evidential or intelligence reliability can
be made from this alert unless it can be confirmed with corroborating
evidence. The remainder of the vehicles were screened by the EVRD withoutany interest being shown. Therefore the CSI dog was not further deployed

And finally...

SUMMARY

The tasking for this operation was as per my normal Standard Operating Procedures. The dogs are deployed as search assets to secure evidence and locate human remains or Human blood.

The dogs only alerted to property associated with the McCann family. The dog alert indications MUST be corroborated if to establish their findings as evidence.

Therefore in this particular case, as no human remains were located, the only alert indications that may become corroborated are those that the CSI dog indicated by forensic laboratory analysis.

My professional opinion as regards to the EVRD's alert indications is that it is suggestive that this is 'cadaver scent' contaminant. This does not however suggest a motive or suspect as cross contamination could be as a result of a number of given scenarios and in any event no evidential or intelligence reliability can be made from these alerts unless they can be confirmed with corroborating evidence.

As much as the McCann couple would like to believe that “No evidential or intelligence reliability can be made from this alert unless it can be confirmed with corroborating evidence” indicates that Eddie and Keela’s findings are flawed, to my mind it simply means that a body has not (as yet) been recovered to confirm their alerts/findings.

Besides, when these specialist dogs only alert to items belonging to the McCann couple and no one else's, and only alert to areas in the McCann apartment but no other apartments then it seems the evidence speaks for itself.

McCanns and their involvement in the phone-hacking scandal

2011-09-20T12:27:00.002+01:00

According to Clarence Mitchell “The McCanns records were probed and there was no evidence of suspicious activity”. So why have the McCann couple put themselves forward to be involved with the Murdoch phone-hacking scandal – especially considering it’s Murdoch’s hand that’s fed them in the past and given a great deal of page space to ensure the Sun’s readership got an exclusive preview of Kate’s book prior to its launch?

I say ‘put themselves forward’ because apparently that’s what they did. According to the BBC:

“The parents of missing Madeleine McCann want to participate in the judicial inquiry into the phone hacking scandal, a preliminary hearing has been told.”

And...

“The inquiry's first stage will examine relations between the press and public.

The investigation is one of a number of inquiries looking at the way the media operates in the UK.

The Commons Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee is conducting an inquiry into press standards.”

So the McCann couple haven’t really applied to be part of the phone-hacking scandal, they want to be part of the inquiry into press standards.

But still that doesn’t make sense considering Gerry McCann had already attended an enquiry (along with Clarence Mitchell and Adam Tudor) by the Commons Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee in March 2009 as a Press Standards, Privacy and Libel Witness. Surely the Commons Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee must have his previous statements to hand? If not then they can pull up the transcript from the UK Parliament site. Every Gerry McCann word has been stored there.

Perhaps his requested participation becomes clearer when reading what ‘This is Leicesterhsire’ has to say:

“Other people whose names were put forward for core participant status yesterday were former Formula 1 boss Max Mosley and Chris Jefferies, the former landlord of alleged murder victim Jo Yeates.

Barrister David Sherborne said he also represented another group of more than 100 "victims'' whose voicemail had allegedly been intercepted.

He said many of those had already launched legal action against News of the World publisher News Group Newspapers, which is part of News International.”

Money could be involved then? Going by today’s Daily Mail report that's certainly true for the victims of the phone-hacking:

“The family of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler have been offered £3million compensation by the publishers of the News of the World to settle their phone-hacking claim.”

But at least the family of Milly Dowler are giving £1million to charity – although the article doesn’t state which charity.

And...

“Pay-outs to others whose phones were hacked include a reported £700,000 to Professional Footballers Association boss Gordon Taylor and £100,000 to actress Sienna Miller.”

So is it possible that those who involve themselves with the inquiry into press standards will also have the opportunity of being compensated? Perhaps there lays the real reason for certain parties wanting to involve themselves? Should they be awarded compensation then we can all take a stab at which ~~charity~~ fund they will choose.

For some of the victims of the phone hacking it’s understandable, especially in Miller Dowlers case when private investigator Glenn Mulcaire allegedly deleted some of her text messages to make room for more recordings, leading police to believe that Milly had deleted them herself, raising false hopes that she was still alive. This must have caused the Dowler family immense stress and heartache.

I’ve sidetracked! Back to the McCann couple’s involvement...the most surprising news out of all this to come to light so far is from the BBC:

“The parents of missing Madeleine McCann want to participate in the judicial inquiry into the phone hacking scandal, a preliminary hearing has been told.

They are among alleged victims who want to be "core participants" in the first part of the Leveson Inquiry.

Core participant status means a person is deemed to be specially interested in the subject and may apply for public funding for legal representation”.

Public funding no less! Surely the McCann couple – who have already received millions over the years through donations from the public – wouldn’t dream of applying for more?!

Sites which cover various aspects of the phone hacking in great detail

Many thanks to SteelMagnolia for the following links and information:

Hackergate In 1999 Steven Nott tried to raise the alarm to the British authorities about the possible interception of voicemail otherwise known as phone hacking.

Transcripts from 6 September Core Participant hearing (Leveson Enquiry) in PDF (279kb) and Word Document (253kb)

HACKGATE day 120: The McCanns spokesman, Andy Coulson, David Cameron and 3.5 million of Public Money.

Kate and Gerry McCann in Germany (Updated)

2011-09-19T13:42:00.003+01:00

Source: Daily Star
Date: 18th September 2011
By: Jonathan Corke

GERRY McCann has revealed how during his darkest days he began to understand why people took their own lives.

The doting dad has been to hell and back since his daughter Madeleine vanished on holiday in Portugal.

I don't doubt Gerry McCann was a doting father in his own way. The family photos I've seen certainly paint a picture of a happy family with Madeleine as a contented child. But darkest days? Hell and back after Madeleine disappeared?

By Impartial69

Even Kate's book is littered with snippets of how quickly Gerry McCann was able to return to normal.

The Daily Star continues:

Gerry McCann and wife Kate were made official suspects by Portuguese police.

But they were both later cleared and now British officers are studying Portuguese police files in the hope of finding fresh clues about Madeleine.

Their arguido (suspect) status was removed, but does that mean they were cleared?

The assistant Chief Constable for Leicester made it clear in a statement written for the court (taken from page 316 of Kate’s book...) “While one or both of them may be innocent there is no clear evidence that eliminates them from involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance.”

And the Legal Summary of the police files states:

But therefore we do not possess any minimally solid and rigorous foundation in order to be able to state, with the safety that is requested, which was or were the exact and precise crime(s) that was or were practised on the person of the minor Madeleine McCann - apart from the supposed but dismissed crime of exposure or abandonment - or to hold anyone responsible over its authorship.

And...

- Despite all of this, it was not possible to obtain any piece of evidence that would allow for a medium man, under the light of the criteria of logics, of normality and of the general rules of experience, to formulate any lucid, sensate, serious and honest conclusion about the circumstances under which the child was removed from the apartment (whether dead or alive, whether killed in a neglectful homicide or an intended homicide, whether the victim of a targeted abduction or an opportunistic abduction), nor even to produce a consistent prognosis about her destiny and inclusively - the most dramatic - to establish whether she is still alive or if she is dead, as seems more likely.

b) The archiving of the Process concerning Arguidos Gerald Patrick McCann and Kate Marie Healy, because there are no indications of the practise of any crime under the dispositions of article 277 number 1 of the Penal Process Code.

So going by the previous paragraphs, it seems the case has been archived because no conclusive evidence could be established either way and if no conclusive evidence could be established then their arguido status should be removed until such time new evidence comes forward...if at all.

But there still appears to be enough to suggest that Madeleine died in apartment 5a but nothing substantial for police to reach an absolute conclusion of how or by whom.

Martin Grimes, the handler for Eddie and Keela, gives detailed explanations of what was found where in his report

Further information from the: Police Files: Final Report:

*Gerald Patrick McCann, identified and questioned at fls. 2569.

*Kate Marie Healy, identified and questioned at fls. 2557.

Witnesses/Persons inquired – see Index

Type of Crime – Unknown

Some problems with the case as outlined by the Final Report of the police files:

Addressing now, and specifically, the question relative to the diligence known as the "reconstitution of the facts" (Article 150º of the Penal Process Code), which was not performed due to the refusal of some of the integral members of the holiday group to return to our country (as documented in the Inquiry), the same would have clarified, duly and in the location of the disappearance, the following extremely important details, amongst others:

. The physical, real and effective, proximity between JANE TANNER, GERALD McCANN and JEREMY WILKINS, at the moment when the former passed them, and which coincided with the sighting of the supposed suspect, carrying a child. It results, from our understanding, as unusual that neither GERALD McCANN nor JEREMY WILKINS did not see her, nor the alleged abductor, despite the small dimensions of the space;

. The situation that concerns the window of the bedroom where MADELEINE slept, together with the twins, which was open, according to KATE. It would be necessary to clarify whether there was a draft, due to the fact that movement of the curtains and pressure under the bedroom door are mentioned, which would eventually be clarified through the reconstitution.

. The establishing of a timeline and of the effective checking of the minors that were left alone inside the apartments, given the fact that, believing that said checking was as tight as the witnesses and the arguidos describe it, it would be, to say the least, very difficult that the conditions were reunited for the introduction of an abductor in the residence and the posterior exit of said individual, with the child, namely through a window with little space. It is added that the supposed abductor could only pass that window holding the minor in a different position (vertical) from the one that was visualized by witness JANE TANNER (horizontal).

. What happened during the time lapse between 5.30 p.m. (the time at which MADELEINE was seen for the last time by a person that differs from her parents or siblings) and the time at which the disappearance is reported by KATE HEALY (at around 10 p.m.).

Concerning the result of the diligences that were requested from the British authorities, as earlier mentioned, despite the fact that they were almost completely carried out, nothing new was added to the process and, consequentially, to the investigation.

The questioning of the holiday group merely corroborated what had already been established during the investigation, without any detail that could have been reputed as especially relevant being brought forward.

In conclusion, it results from everything that has been done, despite the efforts that were made and all investigation lines being explored, that it is not possible to obtain a solid and objective conclusion about what really happened that night, and about the present location of the missing minor.

On the other hand, it should be referred that this investigation moved itself under conditions of exceptional media exposure, with the publication of many "news" of imprecise, inexact or even false contents, which did not help, in the least, the discovery of the truth and created, many times, a climate of unusual commotion and of lack of serenity.

Therefore, as we do not envision, at the present moment, the execution of any other diligence within the process that might produce any useful result for the process, I submit it to your consideration, for you to determine whatever you may see as convenient.

* * C O N C L U S I O N * *
Portimao, 20th of June 2008

The Inspector

Back to the article:

The couple travelled to Germany last week in a bid to spark new information from German tourists in Portugal at the time.

Which is really odd considering they had already made a thorough appeal in Germany in 2007 when memories of the German public were at their best. Or is the Daily Star avoiding the most obvious reason for the McCann couple’s visit to Germany! The Algarve Resident isn't shy:

Meanwhile, Madeleine, the book written by Kate McCann about the disappearance of her daughter has now been released in Brazil and is due for release in Germany today (Friday) [16 September 2011]

The Daily Star continues:

The couple revealed the anguish of coming under suspicion and the tactics used to try to force them to confess.

Some evidence of this accusation would be welcomed.

In one interview Gerry said he and Kate had been put under “incredible psychological pressure” and had been asked to admit hiding Madeleine’s body.

Asked? By whom? Names are conveniently forgotten.

He said: ‘We were in front of the world, portrayed as being guilty. That was certainly the worst moment after we discovered that Madeleine had disappeared.

“This tactic is used, not only in Portugal, there are such cases in the UK.
“But everybody who uses this tactic and participates has to be clear they can destroy lives.

By quoting the police files and/or the book apparently written by Kate?

“I can now understand why people admit to things they haven’t done. I can understand why people kill themselves after such an experience.”

See video above.

Kate said she believed police were desperate to nail someone for the crime.

She said: “They were very obviously under pressure and could not cope well with this pressure. They had to find a solution.

The police files are filled with pages upon pages of what was actually done to find Madeleine based on the McCann couples abduction scenario.It wasn't until the dogs, Eddie and Keela, (on the suggestion of Mark Harrison, National Policing Improvement Agency) were flown in that the direction changed.

In the interview with Stern newspaper Gerry said they deeply regretted leaving Madeleine alone in the holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in May 2007.

But he said: “At that time we felt incredibly safe. We had dinner about 50 yards from our apartment.”

50 yards no less!

However, it is 50 yards (give or take) directly in eye line ('as the crow flies')

But as no one can walk across water or through brick walls then 50 yards is not the route they took to check on the children and is therefore a misleading statement to make.

Madeleine Mcann - the name that sells newspapers and books.

Gonçalo Amaral's Book Ban Overturned -McCanns Not Returned Books

2011-09-14T08:54:00.001+01:00

By HiDeHo4

"Gonçalo Amaral's Book Ban - imposed by the McCanns was overturned October 2010 but the McCanns have not yet returned the 7500 books that were entrusted to them."

Madeleine McCann Book: Maddie129 by Hernani Carvalho

2011-09-10T11:30:00.004+01:00

To buy the book please click the link: Maddie 129 (English Version - only available through RCP Edições)

Author: Hernâni Carvalho e Luís Maia
ISBN: 978-989-95786-1-6
Published: April/2008
Colection: MAIS NET
Publisher: RCP Edições

Stock: Available (correct at the time of publishing this article)
Format: PDF format
Price: €9.09 (Buy now online and get an EXTRA DISCOUNT - 25%) - Correct at the time of publishing this article

Free Excerpt: (PDF)

NO EXPECTATIONS

If the reader is expecting a work where a public indictment is made or a plot against somebody is schemed, then this is not the right book to buy. When accepting the challenge posed by the editors, we immediately envisaged it only as a journalistic work, easy to read, without any literary, academic, police-related or erudite expectations. It is only the publication, in the form of a book, of a long journalistic work. Whether mediocre or sufficient, it is for the reader to assess, as we do every day with the material published in the media, when we earn our daily bread. Beyond doubt, as in any other journalistic work, nothing can stir us. And it is on doubt that we base our approach. Precisely because today the Maddie case still remains a strange and intricate mystery.

“What is extraordinary”, explains Ben Ando, reporter of the BBC, “is the time this story has been going round”. According to this crime expert, one of the factors which made this case significant worldwide, is the degree of uncertainty that its investigation put forward. The role that the internet played in spreading out Maddie’s images and her family’s to a global scale is another matter that Ben Ando underlines. The physical beauty of the McCann family is, for this journalist, of particular importance. So much so that Maddie has been classified as “tragically beautiful”. Different specialists within the media believe that Maddie’s case meets all the necessary requirements for keeping the public as interested as at the beginning.

It is clear right away that this is “just” about the disappearance of one child among many others, but “a British, beautiful blue-eyed child, who disappeared in a British tourist settlement, in Algarve, a holiday destination regarded as safe by people from her country is a theme that offers a range of media opportunities” says the renowned Brazilian advertising executive Edson Athayde. If they were a poor family, ugly, not white, in a third world country, the case would be already forgotten”. “It is a soap opera story, without a predictable end: there is always new data. The good ones, probably are mean. The mean ones, probably, are victims…they are feuilleton ingredients”, concludes the man who lead António Guterres to the Prime Minister seat.

Yet for University Professor Rui Cádima, when the McCann family became “the best self-advisors of their own, they trespassed the line of being the parents who lost trace of their child to become the advisors of parents who lost trace of their children”. Paulo Moura speaks about a MWCS (“Missing White Child Syndrome”). This journalist states that there is a scale for news importance. “Nobody would ever admit that this scale exists, although it is applied every day”. “In the middle, are the blond and young boys then brunette girls, and so on. Somehow like the scale in force for the number of deaths in catastrophes: an American citizen is worth a hundred Arabs, a thousand Chinese citizens, ten thousand African citizens”.

In fact, the scenario is Portuguese, but the child, her parents, friends, the hotel owners, some of the staff at the Ocean Club resort and even a good portion of the population of Praia da Luz, are not. As well as the retired policemen, private detectives, dogs and forensic tests, alleged to be “vital for the information”.

In the interpretation of Professor and Investigator Cristina Ponte, this case gathers all the necessary elements for a melodrama: a good-looking child, the victim, and a couple with a fine image. It even has aspects which merge with the unconscious, like the figure of “the bogeyman” – as the man alleged to be seen by a witness, carrying a child wrapped in a blanket. The investigator understands that the campaign held by the parents has an undeniable significance, was very well prepared and included the intervention of football players and going out on the street with the child’s teddy bear…”

In order to understand how the disappearance of a child expanded into unprecedented dimensions, it may be necessary to consider the parent’s attitude and the media campaign around them. However, the connection of the McCann family to the British Government, not yet completely known, as well as the machinery they had at their disposal, could not be disregarded. Besides the four press advisors (one of them, the mythical Alex Woolfall, who managed to “banish” a scandal of genetic manipulation from the British media), Kate McCann’s uncle, Brian Kennedy, has played an important role as the couple’s spokesman.

This whole army of advisors is commanded by Clarence Mitchell, ex-journalist for the BBC and, until recently, Director of the Government’s Media Monitoring Unit at the Cabinet Office of the British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. Some regard him as a witty man, some as a dandy. Certainly, Clarence Mitchell has defined very well the strategies for approaching the media. Nobody can contact the McCann’s without his permission. Coordinated with the contacts and information he acquired during his time at Downing Street, the rest is easy to deduce. Clarence Mitchell is the true owner of the information - in the broad sense of the word, so maybe because of that he has made so much ink flow - before, during and after the McCann’s leave Portugal. First, he was in Portugal as “appointed” by Gordon Brown’s Cabinet, then he returned to London, but his liaisons with the process remain intimate, in such a way that, after 17th September, as soon as the McCann’s returned to the UK, Clarence Mitchell officially resigned from his job at the British Government in order to assume functions as advisor to the McCann family. On Clearence Mitchell’s return to the scene, TVI’s journalist Hugo Matias gathers, like us, that “it seems to be more gratifying to work for the McCann’s than for the British Government”. Although most of the “success” of Maddie’s case is attributed to the strategies adopted by the media, or to the telegenic features of the couple, one thing is definitely true: the disappearance of any child has never, out of the million and two hundred thousand that vanish every year, obtained the same visibility and air time that this one already has. And we are still halfway through it...

However, in this case as with anybody else, everything started as “just” the disappearance of a child. We can’t see any difference between the disappearance of Maddie and that of any other child. We are sorry for all of them.

This said, we need to make clear to the reader that, as much as we regret it, the solution to the mystery - or at least a hint as to where Madeleine Beth McCann is, will not be found here.

As a matter of fact, in the light of national law, to which all of us are formally bound, solving this puzzle is the responsibility of the police. There are reports by those who some days want to wear the uniform and some other days want to attack the work of those wearing it. There are even reports that those who did it have passed scot-free, but that’s a different kettle of fish. It is clear that we couldn’t express here all the facts or hypotheses which took place during the period when the parents were in Portugal. In fact, to get at least a reference to all that has been already published would be an enormous effort and is not our aim, especially with the timetable we were given to perform it. In the future, surely, other names, big names in journalism and other areas will do it. This task we now undertake is in a way to help us not to forget certain doubts that in the future will certainly become clear but, as of now, are relevant.

We accepted the challenge posed by Prime Book, Portugal, and Rui Costa Pinto Edições, International rights, - signed with their word -, and not other precisely because these editors accepted our condition that this had to be only a journalistic work, simple and unpretentious. What we write about here is therefore, some of the incoherencies we found throughout these months.

Hernâni Carvalho and Luís Maia

About the authors:

HERNÂNI CARVALHO

He was born in Lisbon, in 1960. Journalist, he was known to the great public through reports he signed from East-Timor and the Afghanistan, works that brought along the recognition of his peers, who granted him the two greater rewards of journalism in Portugal. He is journalist-auditor of National Defense. For the public network, he has produced reports of war in Bosnia, Honduras, Timor, Ghana, Pakistan and Afghanistan. He has made a little of everything, from agenda service to great features. He has integrated the teams Ponto por Ponto, 24 Horas, Histórias da Noite and Telejornal, being dedicated to the areas of Defense and Home Administration. He sets out in 2003 to publish news articles in O Independent, Sábado e Correio da Manhã. He returns to the television through the door of SIC, where he signs police chronicles in the morning programs. Later, he accepted an invitation to set up a publishing project in Angola, but he quickly understands to have fallen in a hoax. In early 2007, at the invitation of Jose Eduardo Moniz, he returns to the TV. For TVI, he signs the chronicle Crime, he says, co-operates with the editorial staff and several programs of the network. With a degree in Psychology, he made further studies in the area of Sciences of Religion. He is married and has two children. He owns the professional card of journalist nr. 2371.

LUIS MAIA

At an age of thirty one, he admits owing to his profession some of the best experiences of his life. Journalist since 1999, he started in the television. From feeling rivers of sweat under the burning heat of the Sahara, to the almost paralyzing coldness of the Alps, he has reported a little of everything in the twenty countries where has already been in reporting task. No more than eight years of work were enough to have interviewed so different people as Jorge Sampaio, António Guterres, Claudia Schiffer, Paulo Coelho or Rui Costa, among many others. Disciplined and rigorous, he accepts challenges as a football player in a final. In the British press, he works for the Football Business, the Racing Post and the ALONE Fisher's Travel. Started in RTP, then TVI, has been in the diary 24 Horas, then moved to the morning programs of SIC and returned to TVI, where he is reporter of the program Você na TV! teaming up with Hernâni Carvalho in Crime, Disse Ele. A bachelor, he grew up between Sesimbra and Seixal. Took a degree in Social Communication in the Superior Institute of Social and Policy Sciences. Owns the professional card of journalist nr. 4875.

Madeleine McCann review police hold talks in Portugal

2011-09-09T21:01:00.000+01:00

Source: BBC News

British detectives reviewing the search for Madeleine McCann have held their first face-to-face meetings with Portuguese police chiefs.

The Metropolitan Police (Met) confirmed senior officers from a 30-strong squad examining the case travelled to Portugal in early August.

Scotland Yard said officers discussed ways of taking the review forward.

Madeleine, from Rothley in Leicestershire, went missing while on holiday in the Algarve in May 2007.

The review was launched in May at the request of Home Secretary Theresa May, with the backing of Prime Minister David Cameron.

A Metropolitan Police Services (MPS) spokesman said: "MPS officers travelled to Portugal at the beginning of August and had their first formal meeting with Portuguese authorities to discuss ways to progress the investigative review."

The investigation by Portuguese detectives was formally shelved in July 2008 and since then no police force has been actively looking for Madeleine, who was nearly four years old when she went missing.

Hundreds of possible sightings have been reported around the world since she disappeared, but so far they have all come to nothing.

The Met review is being led by Det Ch Insp Andy Redwood from the force's Homicide and Serious Crime Command.

Where does it state that Kate McCann attended six dead bodies?

2011-09-07T23:41:00.000+01:00

Regarding Kate McCann apparently stating that she had attended six dead bodies prior to holidaying in Portugal – can someone tell me where that information came from please? I’ve been through the police files and cannot find anything to suggest this is true!

Pat Brown interview with Jim Bohannon. Video and transcript (PART 2)

2011-08-22T23:38:00.001+01:00

Video and transcript to the first part of this interview can be viewed here

Many thanks to HiDeHo4 for the video

Starts at approx 0:16

Jim Bohannon: Welcome back, this is the Jim Bohannon show, we’re talking with Pat Brown, she’s the founder of the Pat Brown profiling agency online at patbrownprofiling.com and for those who haven’t heard your previous appearances on this and many other programs er what is it that you do?

Pat Brown: Well er, my main job is to do criminal profiling which I look at cold cases and I do crime reconstruction and deter...try to determine what might have happened and that’s what the police can use as a lead or to start looking in a certain direction, er, to try and get a focus on a case er and of course I do a lot of television which is commentary and not profiling, but er, I enjoy that as well as a good educational route.

Jim Bohannon: I’m wondering since er apparently a a lot of this er this focus is, is based in Britain. We tend to think I guess of the British is almost just quote us. Well, we have a common language and we have two free societies but there are differences, significant differences, and I, I understand that the libel laws maybe one area where there are differences.

Pat Brown: Ooooh...extremely. They’re extremely vicious right now in Britain which is why er there’s been a lot...pretty much a shut down of a lot of the media, especially in this case and I’ve had a lot of letters coming in from, from er people living in er UK and they’re like, please do, please speak out because we can’t speak out any longer in, in Britain, it’s just not allowed and they’re very frustrated with the fact they don’t have that freedom – I think there’s something recently afoot where they’re trying to ease up on that because they’re getting, it’s getting to be like a totalitarian society where you can’t say anything, and while it’s true we may be uncomfortable with what somebody says about us and certainly I know because I’ve been on the receiving end of all kinds of interesting commentary, and I, as long as it’s opinion I have to live with it, I think its people’s right to speak with their opinion but when you shut down a society and say you can longer say anything that somebody doesn’t like you’ve got a problem.

Jim Bohannon: What do you put forward in the Profile of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, what er conclusions do you reach?

Pat Brown: Well erm, again it’s a theory so I have to start with that so...

Jim Bohannon: And I understand you’re not at all shy about pointing that out, it is all theory...

Pat Brown:...I have to point that out ...and it really is er

Jim Bohannon: I mean you weren’t, you weren’t shy about doing it before you [can’t make this out] isn’t that true?

Pat Brown: Well, the point being that it is a theory and it is my theory, er, it doesn’t mean it’s a fact, it doesn’t mean it’s true, it doesn’t mean that’s what happened, it’s a theory of what could have happened. Er and one of the, the most important thing to be pointed out right away is that there is no evidence of an abduction and that’s where the whole thing started to go wrong in people’s minds that maybe we’re not getting a straight story here, erm, right after Madeleine went missing er, the...Kate and Gerry called over to England, well actually Gerry did, and he told a number of relatives that Madeleine had been abducted and somebody had jemmied the shutters of the window, essentially crawling in and taking Madeleine away. Well, what turned out, there was no evidence of anybody coming in that window.

Jim Bohannon: Hmmm...

Pat Brown: And when...and I’ve always wondered you know with the McCanns said the police did a poor job on this, they were lying about this, but when Kate wrote her book she admitted there was no evidence of anybody coming through that window

Jim Bohannon: Then how do they propose that the break-in occurred?

Pat Brown: Well, now kind of what they, what they’ve set up is everyday of the week they said they locked the doors to that apartment – now wouldn’t you, if you’re in an apartment, in a strange country and you have an apartment that’s on a corner, there’s a road going right behind it and there’s a carpark behind it...I don’t think you’d leave the doors unlocked when you’re...well, it’s bad enough that you leave three children alone so most of us wouldn’t do that either, but would you leave your three children alone AND leave the doors unlocked so that anybody could just come in?

Jim Bohannon: Don’t think so

Pat Brown: We wouldn’t think so, well neither did the McCanns so for four days they locked the doors. The fifth day comes along and they say they left the sliding door open in the back so that somebody could go check on their child.. children when they were busy, and that’s never been done before. So suddenly on the, the last day supposedly someone else checks on their children.. child.. and the door’s left open. So you have to wonder is that really what happened or was the place really locked because if it was locked down then Madeleine was not abducted, something happened to her in the apartment in an accident that was then covered up. Er, so you have to have a way for her to get out of that apartment so you have to have an open door.

Jim Bohannon: What have the authorities had to say? Obviously they have long since investigated this adding for item.

Pat Brown: er yeah, Detective Amaral believed...he was the one that believed strongly that Madeleine McCann died in the apartment, they brought in dogs, er one dog identified decomposition behind the sofa, which is where Amaral believes Madeleine died, er the other dog found blood, these are sniffer dogs so this is not something we can see, found blood in the same location and so Amaral believed that Madeleine had an accident while they were out at the, at the restaurant. He believes to this day that they were responsible for what happened to their daughter and that’s why he wrote the book which got ... you know...they sued him for.

Jim Bohannon: Uhhmm...but they’re not suing you?... yet.

Pat Brown: Not that I know of.

Jim Bohannon: Not that you know of.

Pat Brown: I have not received a cease and desist notice nor has anybody approached me on that.

Jim Bohannon: Do you think that you have had a chip on your shoulder er that you just had it in for err...the McCanns...

Pat Brown: For the McCanns?

Jim Bohannon: Yeah, I mean that’s the gist of this email which was piteously dropped on me

Pat Brown: Right. Erm, I have a thing for justice. I have a thing for the truth, and I, as a profiler I’m very bugged by things when I say, wait a minute, something’s fishy about this, something is ...something seems off here, it seems like the truth is not coming out. I have spoken up very strongly in certain crimes where I believe that we’re not getting the full story, and this was one of them, and because of the... the McCanns had a very high profile they did a lot of media er appearances, and every time I saw them things rang wrong again. I’m thinking, why are you saying that? Why are you doing that? So I think if they hadn’t been in the media so much and I hadn’t been so aware of what they were saying I wouldn’t have commented so often, so they made themselves, you know, they put themselves out there and when you do – just like me, I’m going to get people who have things to say about me.

Jim Bohannon: Well, erm, unfortunately I guess it sort of goes with the nature of your work that if you don’t like Pat Brown; get in line.

Pat Brown: Yeah, well, pretty much. Yeah.

Jim Bohannon: I mean, I mean, there, there have to be just by the nature of what you have done er, a lot of folks who don’t think kindly of you.

Pat Brown: Well, what will happen is, is... when, when you speak out ...when you’re outspoken and, and I’ve never been accused of not being outspoken ....

Jim Bohannon: That’s true

Pat Brown: Er, you know, there are some people who go on television for example and talk about a case and they’ll be very careful about it, well this could happen; or that could happen; maybe she did; maybe she didn’t...and you think: Well, what do you think? Well, when I talk about a case I’m pretty blunt about what I think. Here’s what the evidence here is and here’s what I think happened.

Jim Bohannon: Pat Brown our guest, the founder of the Pat Brown profiling agency online at patbrownprofiling.com...her profile of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann is available at Barnes & Noble bn.com and also at smashwords

Pat Brown interview with Jim Bohannon. Video and transcript (Part 1)

2011-08-17T12:01:00.002+01:00

The video and transcript for the second part of this interview can be viewed here

Video by HiDeHo4

Interview starts at approx 0:18

Jim Bohannon: Hello there and good evening and welcome to the Jim Bohannon show from Westwood One Radio. We find that Pat Brown is making a return visit to talk about her latest book; the different slide is that you may have trouble buying it. It’s an ebook called ‘Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann’. Recently you could buy it from amazon.com but, er, no more. We understand that the book is available from Barnes & Noble online, with their initials BN.com for their Nook, enook reader. Pat Brown, er, two stories who I guess...number one: The story of Madeleine McCann. And number two: the story of you and er, and er amazon. Er look, for those, let’s just start at the beginning, what is the Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann all about, let’s assume the people here have forgotten who exactly Madeleine McCann is.

Pat Brown: Right, er, Madeleine McCann was a little three year old girl who was on vacation with her parents, erm, Gerry and Kate McCann and their friends, seven of them, and there were also the brother and sister who were two years old and er, the McCanns and friends had a habit of leaving the children unattended in their vacation apartments while they went over to the bar restaurant for a few hours every evening and, the last evening, Madeleine disappeared and she has not been seen since, it’s been four years now and no one knows what happened to Madeleine.

Jim Bohannon: now you put together er, an ebook, a profile of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. Before we get into all that you have put forward, deposit about the disappearance, what happened with Amazon?

Pat Brown: Well, what happened was... there’s a kind of controversy going on concerning the McCanns over the four years, er the controversy is: Did the McCanns have anything to do with the disappearance of their daughter or was the child abducted by some predator or child sex ring or somebody who wanted a little child. Er, there’s two camps over this and there are a lot of suspicious circumstances, an abduction was never proved to have happened, so the McCanns became suspects in Portugal, what is called Arguidos, and then they left Portugal and since then they’ve been looking for their daughter, they, they, they established a fund to search for their daughter and this was all going quite well, er but when people started speaking up saying, you know, some of us actually think that the parents might be involved, they were shut down because the McCanns hired Carter Ruck, which is like the biggest libel solicitors in, I don’t...maybe the whole world, but certainly in Britain, and they would sort of stick this law firm on anybody who said, hey you know, I question whether they could be involved. They sued the detective on the case when he put his book out and got an injunction to get it off the market and so people have stopped speaking out whether, you know, about their opinions because they’re afraid of Cater Ruck, they’re going to get sued and so the media has no longer said anything negative about the McCanns, they never...they question nothing any more er, and so Kate just put out her book called ‘Madeleine’ and after I read her book I decided I would do what people wanted me to and put out a profile of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann and, put out a theory of what I think happened based on the evidence that exists. And I did so and about five weeks after I put it up on Amazon it vanished and it vanished off of amazon.com and amazon.co.uk, that’s the British one, and of, out of Germay as well. So it vanished everywhere and people said, what happened to your, your, your er profile, your book? And so I wrote to Amazon and said what happened? Where’d it go? And they said they took it off for legal conflicts and I said well what legal conflicts are you talking about, and they said, well we need you to change the title and all the contents [both laugh]

Jim Bohannon: Otherwise it’s just what we were looking for

Pat Brown: Exactly and so, okay, er do you want to explain this a little further? And then sent me the letter that said they had been received a er letter from Carter Ruck, the solicitors of Gerry and Kat McCann, who said I had libelled their clients and therefore until we worked it out, the McCanns and I, and agreed that the book was not libellous they were no longer going to sell it. So that’s when it disappeared off of the market

Jim Bohannon: Wow!

Pat Brown: yeah! That’s rather interesting.

Jim Bohannon: You know, I was trying to think of another instance of something similar to this and I’m at a loss, I er, I don’t really know of anything quite like this.

Pat Brown: Yeah, well I think this is kind of a new problem with the sub publishing world, now I have two other books on the market published through...the last one came through Hyperion Voice and when I wrote that one which is called the Profile of My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths, came out in 2010, I did a lot of cases in that book and before they published it, their lawyers went through it with a fine toothcomb, they made me turn over all my files so that they made sure that the book was acceptable and couldn’t risk...everybody can be sued over it... so when Amazon saw that they already had Hyperion Voice saying it’s an okay book because our lawyers have already been through it, besides, you’re not going to get sued, we will. But with self publishing, where’s the gate keeper? So Amazon’s like ha, you know, your not, nobody’s looked over this book, there’s no publisher except you so quite frankly we’re running a business and we don’t want to take a chance with Carter Ruck. So it’s kinda funny people say when Cater Ruck comes after you, you’ve been ‘Carter-Rucked.’

Jim Bohannon: Interesting, so in this day and age what you’re essentially saying is that, that as we enter this whole new brave new world of the non ‘Gate Keepers’ that if you’ve got enough money and enough lawyers and a willingness to throw your weight around that you can essentially shut down your critics.

Pat Brown: Exactly and that’s what...that’s what’s been happening with the McCanns, they’ve effectively shut down anybody with an opinion that they do not like. And they don’t like mine.

Jim Bohannon: I er, I must tell you that I got an email.

Pat Brown: Yes you did, I’m sure

Jim Bohannon: I did, with a dot uk address attached to it...errrr...

Pat Brown: Mmm?

Jim Bohannon: [quoting part of the email]: “ ...Please be aware that the ebook Ms Brown is promoting is full of misinformation, contradictions and an imagined scenario. Ms Brown has a well known dislike of the McCanns, particularly Kate McCann, and for the past four years has made regular inappropriate and acidic comments about them on social networking sites”

Pat Brown: Well that’s actually accurate. Sometimes you can’t disagree with people who hate you. But yes, I have blogged for four years. I have a blog called the Daily Profiler, it’s not very daily any more because I’m too busy but it’s more a monthly profiler now but I haven’t changed the name, er but I often talk about cases like I do when I do television, I do commentary, and I analyse different cases and I try to stick with: look at the evidence and here’s what I’m thinking and I try to put it, I always say it’s a theory, this is not fact, this is theory which is what all profiling is and it doesn’t say anybody’s guilty of anything. Yes, I have been fairly critical because from the very beginning there was something rather peculiar about the story and of course it starts with leaving three little children alone in an apartment unattended, which is called child neglect, so it’s kind of hard to be nice about that in my opinion.

Jim Bohannon: Well, it, it is hard I suppose to do that ...er...among other things this email er they claim that your book is done in an effort to convince people that Madeleine is dead

Pat Brown: Well I...

Jim Bohannon: What are the odds? What are the odds?

Pat Brown: Well this is kinda funny because on a very sad way, one of the reasons Kate McCann supposedly sues people is because she says no one has the right to say Madeleine is dead because that keeps people from looking for her, which sounds like, you know, if you’re a mother you can sorta see where she’s coming from. But the fact is, the chances of Madeleine being alive – even if she didn’t die of an accident in the apartment which is what the police believe and what I think the evidence lends to, er, she would likely be dead because if she was abducted by somebody it would be like a sex predator, a child sex predator and they usually kill a child within an hour, and the concept that a child is going to be targeted to go into a sex ring and be taken around the world is not very likely, and on top of it the McCanns put together a campaign which featured her... the eye defect that Madeleine has... which is called a coloboma, which is, you know which is kind of a defect in the eye, a dark line coming out of the pupil. They put that as part of their publicity, well you know if I were a child kidnapper and I had this kid with this very obvious defect I’d get rid of the child very quickly because she could be identified so I ...

Jim Bohannon: Very easily...

Pat Brown: If she wasn’t dead, you’re going to make her dead by doing that.

End of Part One...Continued in Part two.

I will post the second half of the interview here when HiDeHo has completed it.

A Madeleine McCann petiton by David Bret

2011-08-12T23:10:00.001+01:00

A petition created by David Bret:

The McCanns tried to stop me from doing this.

It's an OFFICIAL enquiry that I was given permission to head, and has been sanctioned by the Home Office.

Public Enquiry Into Unanswered Questions Relating To The Disappearance Of Madeleine McCann

Responsible department: Home Office

Kate and Gerry McCann have steadfastly refused to answer pertinent questions relating to the disappearance of their daughter. Recently, a sighting in Leh, India, was supported by themselves and their spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, while the Leh Chief of Police denied that the event had taken place. Both parties cannot be right, and the fund-raising public needs to know the truth. Questions must also be asked regarding the use of money from the Find Madeleine Fund, following reports that the McCanns have used this for mortgage payments, and to fund lawyers for libel cases. Therefore I feel the need for a full public equiry into these issues.

To sign the petition please click here

Looking for Madeleine McCann – Sunday Night. Video and transcript

2011-08-11T09:52:00.000+01:00

...but first, for four years Kate and Gerry McCann have lived a never ending ordeal and they still don’t know when or if it will ever end. It began on a family holiday in Portugal when Madeleine, their four year daughter, simply vanished. She hasn’t been seen since. Tonight, the mystery deepens. You’re about to see home video never shown before and learn the vital clue Madeleine left behind. Here’s Rahni Sadler.

[Cuts into Video of Madeleine McCann dressed a pink fairy outfit:
Gerry McCann: Okay, spin around darling. Right round. Oh yes, I can see your wings.
Kate McCann: Big smile. Kate laughs.
Gerry McCann: Oh yes. One more. Big smile. That’s pretty.]

Gerry McCann: She was incredibly beautiful baby actually.

Kate McCann: We sound like the most biased parents on the planet now but she was just really compact and was just really the really nice, round, perfect head...and......you know...and then she, she opened her mouth ...the whole world knew she was with us...

Gerry McCann: She’d McCann level volume, there’s no doubt about that.

[Cuts into Video of Madeleine sitting on the stairs with her twin siblings singing:
Madeleine: Clap your hands together one two three. Clap your hands...
Gerry McCann: Yay well done. Okay, let’s sing another one.]

Kate McCann: I always wanted to be a mother, erm, I don’t know, maybe that stemmed from being an only child and sort of, you know, wanting that feeling of family.

Voice over: Madeleine was the daughter Kate and Gerry McCann always wanted. For years Kate struggled to fall pregnant so when Madeleine came along they felt blessed. They loved to photograph her and she loved being photographed.

Voice over: this is the last picture of Madeleine taken seven hours before she disappeared.

Gerry McCann: There’s a photo of her that afternoon that was taken at 2:29 (laughs) I think, we’ve got it recorded on the digital camera and er she was just sitting by the pool er with myself and we’ve both got our feet just paddling and she’s so happy.

Voice over: It’s been one thousand, five hundred and forty-three days since Madeleine McCann vanished. To keep Madeleine’s case alive this private couple has revealed more of themselves than ever before. Kate and Gerry are both doctors. They married in 1998 and in 2001, after three years of failing to conceive naturally they began IVF. Eighteen months later, on the eve of another hospital appointment, Kate did a home pregnancy test.

Kate McCann: A little line appeared on the test, you know, I’m a doctor, it says on the box any kind of line is a positive but I said, Oh, I’m not sure, I’m not sure, but there’s that faint kind of...mmm...maybe...

Gerry McCann cuts in: She showed it to me and I’m like, it’s definitely..[laughs]...It’s definitely!

[All laugh together and speak at once]

Kate McCann: And obviously we had a scan and er there’s a little beating heart and that was our little Madeleine you know...so.

[cuts into video of Madeleine at the coffee table looking at a Christmas present:
Gerry McCann: Who’s that present for?
Madeleine: That’s for Aunty Clare
Gerry McCann: Are we gonna post it today?
Madeleine: No
Kate McCann: We are
Madeleine: It isn’t a letter]

[cuts into a different video of Madeleine sitting on the settee eating:
Gerry McCann: Who says ‘aha’
Madeleine: Aha
Gerry McCann: Say ‘yes daddy.’
Madeleine: Yes daddy
Gerry McCann: Okay]

Voice over: And then, in May 2003, three became five.

Gerry McCann: When she first saw the twins she was just ecstatic. Absolutely ecstatic

[cuts into video of Madeleine and Sean on their knees playing with a train set:
Madeleine: Oooh. This is a very big Thomas (I can’t make out what Madeleine is saying, something about toys)]

Gerry McCann: I felt blessed really that at that time.

Interviewer: You said the family felt really complete

Kate McCann: You know, we did feel incredibly lucky

Voice over: In late April 2007, the McCanns decided to travel to Portugal for a family holiday.

[Cuts into a video of Madeleine climbing the flight stairs to the aeroplane where she stumbles on the steps:
Voice over: In the pink pants climbing the stairs to the plane is Madeleine
Gerry McCann on the video: Oop day...you alright?]

Voice over: It was the McCanns first holiday overseas as a family and they went with three other couples
[video on airports shuttle bus pans in Gerry’s direction...‘cheer up Gerry, we’re on holiday.’ Gerry:‘F**k off']

Gerry McCann: It’s a small resort out of season, end of April beginning of May and it was incredibly quiet er, we felt very relaxed there, very relaxed.

Voice over: In the evening the children were put to bed by half past seven before the adults had dinner together down at the pool. From where they ate, Kate and Gerry could see the back of their apartment and left the door unlocked.

Gerry McCann: If you measured it directly from the back of the apartment there’s a straight line to where we’re dining, it’s only 50 metres

Interviewer: 50 Meters?

Gerry McCann: Er..that, that’s a direct line...

Kate McCann interrupts: 49 point 4 on Google if you want to be really specific

Gerry McCann: But the proximity was very close

Voice over: Madeleine and the twins slept in a room at the front of villa 5A. Kate and Gerry believed their shuttered bedroom window, overlooking the car park and street, was closed and locked. Every half an hour the parents would take turns to check on each other’s children.

Gerry McCann: We thought that was the best thing erm, and it seemed to work absolutely fine and we didn’t have any problems right until the Thursday morning when Madeleine said “why didn’t you come when we cried last night?” We thought that’s odd

Interviewer: You now think somebody had either tried to get into the room or was in the room and woke them up the night before

Kate McCann: Er it seems too much of a coincidence that she made that comment and then that happened that night.

Interviewer: Looking back now, you think that could have been your one chance...to save her

Kate McCann: Well as soon as ermm I’d discovered that Madeleine had been taken it..it just hit me straight away what she said that morning and I just thought, my god, someone tried the night before.

voice over: On Thursday night, Kate put her daughter to bed for the last time.

Kate McCann: My memory of that evening, it’s really vivid, I mean she was really tired but she was just cuddled up on my knee and we read a story and we also had some treats, some crisps and biscuits erm and then after they’d done the usual kind of, toilet, teeth erm we went through to the bedroom and read another story: If your happy and your know it...ermm...[looks at the interviewer then away and back again] ...yep.

Voice over: At 9pm Gerry checked on Madeleine and the twins

Gerry McCann: I’d actually stuck my head around the door and I, I just lingered for a few seconds and thought how beautiful she was erm and that’s the last time I saw her.

Interviewer: Last time you saw her

Gerry McCann closes eyes and swallows: Mmmm

Interviewer: You thought how lucky you were

Gerry McCann: Exactly. Your world’s shattered within an hour

voice over: At 10pm it was Kate’s turn to look in on the kids

Kate McCann: The bedroom door where the three children were sleeping was open much further than we’d left it. I went to close it to about here, and then as I got to about here it suddenly ...slammed. And then as I opened it, it was then that I just thought, I’ll just look at the children. And literally as I went back in the curtains of the bedroom which were drawn, were closed ...whoooosh...it was like a gust of wind kind of blew them open.

Kate McCann: And the curtains which had been closed just swung open into the room and reveal that the shutter was all the way up and the window had been pushed right across and then I just knew...I just knew she’d been taken.

voice over: Kate says that after a quick frantic search of the apartment she ran back towards Gerry who was still with their friends at the table by the pool.

Gerry McCann: I know exactly where the table was. It was kinda this bit, so it would be about around here. And er, I was kinda sitting in this bit.

Gerry McCann: Kate was clearly distraught and I jumped up but, kind of disbelief. She can’t be gone. She can’t...she can’t possibly be...how can she be gone? And I was saying that to Kate as we were both running

Voice over: Police were called within fifteen minutes. But they didn’t arrive for nearly an hour. It took them another two hours before they bothered to seal off Madeleine’s bedroom. British investigators later called it the worst preserved crime screen they’d ever encountered. Road blocks and checks weren’t put on Portugal’s borders for a full twelve hours and in days hundreds of guests, potential witnesses and suspects had checked out and left without ever having been interviewed.

Kate McCann: The night seemed so long, every second was excruciating and it was dark and er, you just want there to be light and everybody searching and Madeleine found.

Voice over: It’s thought Madeleine was taken shortly after nine O’clock. In the following forty-five minutes there were two significant sightings of a man carrying a young girl. The first by Jane Tanner, one of the McCanns friends.

Jane Tanner: I was walking up here, probably as I got to ...it’s hard to know exactly where, but probably about here, I saw the man walk across the road there carrying a child.

Gerry McCann: Jane had seen a man carrying a child away at, at 9:10, 9:15

Voice over: But no one took any notice because no one knew then that Madeleine was missing. They thought the man was a local father carrying his own sleeping child. Two different witnesses reported seeing a man watching the McCanns apartment in the days leading up to Madeleine’s disappearance, but the Portuguese police turned their focus on Gerry and Kate. In September, four months after she went missing, the McCanns returned to the UK as suspects.

Interviewer: Did you kill your daughter?

Gerry McCann: No. That’s an emphatic no. I mean the ludicrous thing is erm what, I suppose what’s been purported from Portugal is that Madeleine died in the apartment by an accident and we hid her body. Well when did she have the accident and died, because, the only time she was left unattended was when we were at dinner so ...if she died then, how could we of disposed – hidden her body. You know, when there’s an immediate [inaudible but sounds like he was about to say ‘search’] it’s just nonsense. And if she died when we were in the apartment or fell and di...why would we ...why would we cover that up?

Kate McCann: It gets even more ludicrous that we’ve obviously hidden her somewhere incredibly well where nobody’s found her ...

Interviewer: Incredibly well

Kate McCann: and we’d hidden her so well that we’d decided we’d move her in the car which we hired weeks later and you know, it’s just ridiculous

Interviewer: When you come back to Portugal do you feel closer to Madeleine?

Kate McCann: Although I don’t know where Madeleine is that is the last place that, you know, I saw her, held her, and I guess there’s a part of me that still feels connected to her there so.

Voice over: If Madeleine is alive she’d now be eight years old and possibly looks like this. And the reason for not giving up hope comes from this young woman. When Natascha Kampucsh was ten she was abducted near her home in Vienna, like with Madeleine, the police were slow to act and as the years passed they believed she’d either been smuggled across the border by a paedophile ring or killed, but all the while, the whole eight and a half years she was living in a cellar under this house, just fifteen kilometres from her own home. Natascha was kept in a purpose build dungeon. She was given up for dead by virtually everyone except her Mum.

Natascha: My mother always thought that I be alive

Voice over: Then after nearly nine years in captivity her kidnapper finally let his guard down and Natasha escaped

Interviewer to Natascha: Do you still have nightmares?

Natascha: Sometimes, but I’m looking forward. Mostly I am looking in the future and not back

Interviewer: Are you confident that you can now live a normal and happy life?

Natascha: I think so. Yes, I hope so

Kate McCann: I think kids can be written off, you know, missing kids can be written off too easily. You cannot do that, you cannot give up on a child.

Voice over: With no police force currently investigating Madeleine’s case, the McCanns are using their own money, including royalties from Kate’s book to hire investigators and former police to continue the search for Madeleine.

Gerry McCann: Kids are survivors

Kate McCann: You know, Madeleine means tower of strength. Wherever she was, whoever she’s been with, whatever’s happened, we will get her through it

Interviewer: You will not rest until you find your daughter, until you wrap your arms around her

Kate McCann: I don’t believe any parent could, you know, and I don’t believe we could ever reach the point where we just think oh wel we’ve done everything now, you know. Whilst the situation remains as it is, you know, Madeleine’s out there and she needs us to find her

Gerry McCann: Mmmm

Interviewer: You’ll keep looking forever

Kate McCann: We will

Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns and those scurrilous CURRY Munchers! by Spudgun

2011-08-04T22:19:00.000+01:00

Many thanks to Spudgun for his kind permission to reproduce his article "Mitchell, the McCanns and those scurrilous CURRY Munchers!" on Little Morsals.

"Our private investigators are aware of the reports from India over the weekend about a possible sighting of Madeleine” Clarence Mitchell, McCann spokesperson.

"We have confirmed and re-confirmed from our officers on the ground in Leh and there is no report of the missing girl having been found" Deputy Inspector General of police, Abdul Gani Mir.

"We are liaising with the Indian authorities over the incident and await the results of the DNA test." Clarence Mitchell.

"This incident is not in my knowledge and I have not sent any request to anyone for this. We have not taken any swabs for DNA testing. We have not even been approached for any help by anyone in this case. If anyone wants our help, we are willing to help but as of now, we have not been approached. My men are not at all involved in any such investigation." Leh police chief Vivek Gupt.

"Kate and Gerry do not believe the child seen in India was Madeleine. They have seen photographic evidence and concluded that it was not her” Clarence Mitchell

"This fake story will give the Indian police a bad name....we will be perceived as inefficient, when in the fact the first WE heard about this story was when we read the fictitious account in the Tribune. I mean, where are the PHOTOGRAPHS to corroborate this story? There are none, because it was all made up. No child believed to be Madeleine McCann was ever seen in Leh, no one was taken into custody, no photographs were taken, no one was contacted in England. The entire episode was a hoax. Why Mr Singh wrote the story, or if he was paid to do so, and by whom, I do not know." Sanjay Guptil, Leh Police

Clarence?? Your call..........

Looking isn’t the same as seeing!

2011-07-29T23:00:00.001+01:00

Sometimes we may believe we’re looking at everything when in fact we’re possibly missing what is staring us right in the face.

I would like you to watch the following videos in sequence (no sound needed).

Selective Attention Test

Now try this one (no sound needed for this one either):

But the most obvious in everyday situations can be missed even when it’s right in front of us. Watch the following short documentary to see an example of how a switch often goes unnoticed even if we're looking directly at it (sound needed for this one)

Change Blindness – two completely different men

Having watched the videos...Now think of a little girl in a crèche...

1. Is it possible to mistake one girl wearing pink for another even though the first had attended most days?
2. What if she was only present for one day and switched for the following days – would the change be noticed when the attentions of the nannies are split between several children?
3. If the register was deliberately signed for a child who wasn’t really there on a particular day – would the nannies simply assume she was present because the register was signed that day? Perhaps confusing memories from previous days?

“We know when we’ve noticed something unexpected but we’re not aware of the times when we’ve missed something unexpected” – Dan Simmons

The mind is a complex thing.

Kate and Gerry McCann don't believe the girl in India is Madeleine

2011-07-28T22:51:00.003+01:00

Wales Online has reported that:

"Kate and Gerry McCann do not believe a young girl seen in India is their missing daughter Madeleine, their spokesman said."

No surprises there since the message that there is no 'look-alike Madeleine' in India had already been swiftly spread via various News reporters on Twitter. What is somewhat surprising is the response message by Mr Mitchell:

"Kate and Gerry do not believe the child seen in India was Madeleine. They have seen photographic evidence and concluded that it was not her."

And what photographic evidence would that be? Given the fact that the police in India knew nothing of the sighting -- until reporters for Sky and ITV contacted them -- it can be assumed that the ‘look-alike Madeleine’ never existed and therefore there can't possibly be any photographic evidence to offer.

To my mind, if News reporters can pick up a phone and get the rumours wrapped up in minutes then so could the McCann so-called Private Investigators who, apparently, have the sales from Kate’s book to do just that. So what exactly is the Madeleine McCann Fund being spent on? It seems it wasn’t a phone call to the police in India nor indeed to get the truth out to the public as soon as possible. Mr Mitchell should get himslef a Twitter account so that he too can wrap up any cotton-wool stories within minutes before they get out of hand.

Just as an after thought...Is the truthful ‘twittering’ (or should that be 'tweeting') from Sky and ITV a sign that things are shifting in certain quarters? Something has changed in the air recently. Perhaps the whole truth will come out by the end of the year after all.

There is no sighting of a Madeleine look-alike in India

2011-07-28T15:38:00.001+01:00

The Daily Mail is currently reporting on a new ‘sighting’ of Madeleine McCann in the northern city of Leh, India:

“Investigators searching for Madeleine McCann are examining a report from India that a young girl matching her description was spotted in the market of a Himalayan city”

And Clarence Mitchell has something positive to say about this sighting:

Clarence Mitchell, spokesman for Madeleine’s parents Gerry and Kate McCann, said: 'Our private investigators are aware of the reports from India over the weekend about a possible sighting of Madeleine.

'We are liaising with the Indian authorities over the incident and await the results of the DNA test.'

There's one slight problem though... the sighting has turned out to be another red herring.Thank goodness for Twitter - At least some are able to get the truth out beyond the apparent smoke and mirrors of Team McCann. Perhaps Mr Mitchell would like skip the McCann private investigators and liaison with the various News reporters on Twitter instead:

Sarah H – News Editor for ITV

For the above screenshot: "Leh police us the have no knowledge of incident like the reported sighting of Madeleine McCann in the Tribune India (& in Daily Mail)

Leh police tell ITV News there is no child resembling #Madeleine #McCann in their custody and they are not aware of any such incident

Sky News Reporter Pippa Hall:

Our producer in Delhi as spoken to police, who say they’ve not heard about the DNA test or sighting of Madeleine #mccann

ITV News:

Despite reports that a Madeleine McCann lookalike has been spotted in Leh, India, police there say they aren’t aware of any such incident.

Nigel Henry Doran

BBC Delhi: Chief of Police in Leh, Vivek Gupta: claims of sighting of Madeleine #McCann ‘false’, not been approached by anyone for DNA

It seems it would be in the best interests of Team McCann (and more specifically - in the unlikely event she is alive - Madeleine) to report only when/if a positive ID has been made. They have cried wolf so many times now that people see "new Madeleine sighting" and naturally assume it's a hoax before it gets off the starting block.