Yesterday saw some of the most prolific authors of McCann articles giving testimony at the Leveson Inquiry. Padraic Flanagan’s Witness statement addressed this question:
Question 3: Why did you not seek comment from the McCanns before these stories were
published?
14. Seeking comment from the McCanns was a routine part of our working day. When I first
arrived, a woman called Justine McGuinness worked as press liaison for the family.
During the early days of Madeleine’s disappearance it was regarded as a straightforward
missing person story. It was quite normal to call relatives of the McCanns and talk to
them about the latest developments, and they would be happy to speak in order to aid
the search. During the early days, it felt as though we were able to he!p them as much
as they could help us, as they were back in Britain: and desperate for news, and we were
on the ground in Portugal.
15. That changed with the increasing volume of calls that the family began to receive. Several people were used by the McCann’s to field press calls until Clarence Mitchell became the official spokesman. More often than not when I tried to call Mr Mitchell for comment – which was done for every story – I was only able to get through to his voicemaiL I would of course ask for comments, and sometimes he’d call back. Othertimes there would be no reply. Later, when he based himself in England, it became the
norm for our Midlands reporter who had deve!oped a working relationship with Mr Mitchell to put our requests for comment. The responses were not always forthcoming, and often our calls would not be returned. But it was an established part of our system that the stories were always put to Mr Mitchell.
16, On the occasions that we received no call from the McCanns’ representatives, it meant the story would have to run without a comment from the family. It’s understandable that the McCanns could not respond in person when they became ’arguidos’. It meant they were not supposed to talk about the case at all, but the convention was that, although unidentified specifical!y in the article, Mr Mitchell would at times, and on his request, be referred to as a ’friend close to the McCanns’ or ’a family spokesman’ when our quotes were attributed.
In David Pilditch’s oral testimony, this routine of asking for comment from the McCanns was also confirmed.
Questions not asked
On those occasions when the McCann spokesman did respond, did they ever ask you to change the tenor of your story or influence how the parents were portrayed in your story?
Did the McCann spokesman ever suggest that your descriptions of alleged events were defaming his clients?
As Peter Hill (then Editor of Daily Express) pointed out in an article last February:
“It was a huge story, and every adult in the country had an opinion on it. I admit it helped to sell the paper. There were many factors involved, such as the way Maddy’s parents sought publicity in an unprecedented way.“
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/feb/21/peter-hill-daily-express-madeleine-mccann
So the journalists had a hard time – parents who were seeking publicity in an unprecedented way on the one hand and on the other a spokesman who was always contacted for comment, but often passed no comment at all. Of course, ‘no comment’ does not equate to ‘no objection’. This gives rise to another question worth asking:
Q What steps did the McCanns spokesman/PR person take to protect his clients’ reputation in the face adverse press articles?
Or was that not part of his role? If not, what was his role in relation to the McCanns?
1 December 2007
Gerry and Kate ‘still the prime suspects’
From Nick Fagge and David Pilditch in Praia da Luz
KATE and Gerry McCann are still regarded as the prime suspects in the disappearance of their daughter Madeleine despite inconclusive findings from DNA evidence.
Portuguese police will come to Britain next week to re-interview the seven friends who were dining with the couple on the night the little girl vanished, a highly placed source claimed yesterday.
It shatters the couple’s hopes that they will be cleared by Christmas.
Investigators say that while findings revealed at a DNA summit this week did not give them enough evidence to bring charges, they do provide the legal basis to demand further interviews of the McCanns’ friends and relatives on British soil.
Leaks in Portugal claim tests on DNA samples support Portuguese detectives’ theory that the couple were involved in Madeleine’s disappearance. Portuguese daily newspaper 24 Horas reported that a police source said: “The existing evidence up until now is far from clearing the McCann couple in the case.
“There are more and more indicators that they were involved in the disappearance of the child, but it has been difficult to prove this fact. We will continue to follow all hypotheses.” Investigators still cling to the theory that Madeleine died as the result of an accident in the family’s holiday flat in Praia da Luz, and that her parents hid and later disposed of the body with the help of their friends. Respected Portuguese daily newspaper Correio da Manha reported: “The main theory is still the accidental death of the child on the afternoon of May 3, specifically in the two hours when the parents were alone with their children.
“That is when the McCanns say they gave her a bath and put the three children to bed before 8.30pm and then met their friends for dinner.” Detectives are understood to be intrigued by “certain inconsistencies” in the statements made by the McCanns’ seven dining companions.
They also want to know who Kate was referring to when she cried “they’ve taken her” when she found Madeleine was missing. These are among “100 questions” detectives want to put to the McCanns and their friends, police sources claim.
Yesterday British ambassador Alex Ellis and Algarve official Angela Morado met Paulo Rebelo, who heads the investigation, and Portimao District Attorney Jose Magalhaes e Meneses at police headquarters in Faro. The British Embassy in Lisbon said the timing was a coincidence but confirmed the McCann case had been discussed.
A team recently returned from the UK where it was told what the Forensic Science Services lab had learned from analysis of blood and hair found at the McCanns’ holiday apartment and in their hire car.
But yesterday sources close to the investigation said the tests “are only one of the pieces of the puzzle” and “other operations were being done”.
Yesterday Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns’ spokesman, said: “Kate and Gerry’s friends are happy to be reinterviewed by police if necessary, indeed are keen to help if it clears up any inconsistencies. They, like Gerry and Kate, have nothing to hide.” The McCanns, both 39, of Rothley, Leics, were named as suspects on September 7. Gerry wrote in his blog yesterday of his hopes of being free of suspicion by Christmas.
3 December 2007
Quiz on 10 ‘fingers of suspicion’
From David Pilditch in Praia da Luz
KATE and Gerry McCann face being quizzed about 10 “fingers of suspicion” pointing at them over the disappearance of their daughter Madeleine.
Portuguese detectives could fly to Britain to sit in on make-orbreak interviews as early as this week, a police source last night.
They want to put more questions to the couple’s friends – the Tapas Nine – before interrogating the McCanns.
Portuguese prosecutor Jose Cunha de Magalhaes e Menezes will this week seek permission from the Home Office.
Detectives want to focus on the 10 issues that have haunted them since Madeleine was reported missing from the family’s Algarve holiday apartment in May:
Inconsistencies in timings given by the Tapas Nine.
Kate’s immediate insistence that her child had been abducted.
Why Kate asked for the phone number of a priest in Liverpool.
The couple’s apparently “controlled” behaviour.
The high mileage they ran up in hired Renault Scenic.
The reaction of sniffer dogs to the hire car and apartment.
Forensic findings – though not conclusive – that Madeleine’s body was in the spare tyre well in the boot of the Renault.
The McCanns’ apparent change in attitude towards the Portuguese priest who gave them the keys to his church after Madeleine disappeared.
Why the couple’s Spanish investigators are focusing on Robert Murat and his German girlfriend Michaela Walczuch.
Kate’s diary, which suggests she was depressed by caring for three children on her own while Gerry played tennis and golf.
The source added: “Once interviews have been conducted the file will be passed to the judge to decide if anyone should face charges. It could go either way.”
10 December 2007
Madeleine: British police should turn screws on parents say the Portuguese
From David Pilditch in Praia da Luz
PORTUGUESE police want British officers to get tough on Madeleine McCann’s parents to make them “targets of pressure” and avert a whitewash in the UK, it is claimed.
Senior Portuguese detectives last night raised concerns that British police will not get at the truth with Kate and Gerry McCann because interrogations will not be tough enough.
The Portuguese fear that during “make-or-break” interviews, British police will “go easy” on the McCanns and the friends they were on holiday with in the Algarve when fouryear-old Madeleine vanished.
Portuguese law allows suspects and witnesses to be quizzed more confrontationally.
Yesterday it was reported that Portuguese detectives have raised questions over the “competence” of British officers. They are said to be frustrated that they are not being allowed to carry out the interviews themselves because they have no jurisdiction in the UK.
A formal request for the McCanns and their friends to face new interviews is expected to be passed to the Home Office early this week.
The group will be questioned by Leicestershire police – the McCanns’ home force – in meetings that Portuguese officers can sit in on.
The Portuguese visitors will hand a list of 100 questions to prosecutors, which will be passed on to the British police.
Yesterday, Portuguese newspaper 24 Horas quoted an unnamed senior officer saying:
“The Portuguese investigators may only sit in and make some suggestions. It would be different if those involved were interrogated by our investigators and targets of pressure.”
But it was reported yesterday that the interviews may not take place till after Christmas because they will be held up by a mass of red tape.
The Portuguese may also ask for the McCanns and their friends to return to the Algarve to take part in identity parades and face-to-face showdowns with witnesses.
Yesterday, the McCanns’ spokesman Clarence Mitchell said: “This is a matter for Leicestershire police but we have seen nothing that has ever given us any cause for concern. There is nothing to suggest that they will not approach this with anything other than utter professionalism and competency.”
Meanwhile, the McCanns have been refused a meeting with Gordon Brown amid fears that their plight is being snubbed by the Government.
They are said to have been offered only a meeting with a junior official.
12 December 2007
PRIEST ‘BANS’ MADELEINE
From David Pilditch in Praia da Luz
THE priest who once gave comfort to Kate and Gerry McCann has had his church stripped of all memories of their missing daughter.
Father Jose Manuel Pacheco ordered the removal of scores of green and yellow ribbons which were put up as a symbol of hope in the days after Madeleine vanished.
Posters and photographs of Madeleine which used to fill the windows of every restaurant, bar and business in the village of Praia da Luz have also been taken down.
Residents of the Algarve resort are finally trying to move on from the tragedy more than seven months ago and every trace of Madeleine has been wiped away.
But the most devastating turnaround has come from Father Jose, the Roman Catholic priest whom the couple turned to in their hour of need.
Friends fear for the priest’s health and tell how his life has been ruined after he offered the couple solace.
Father Jose, 46, came under police scrutiny after he gave the couple the keys to his church so they could pray round the clock.
He was questioned twice by detectives, and the church and its grounds were searched by police as they followed up leads into possible hiding places for Madeleine’s body.
Investigators became convinced Kate had confessed to him but the tormented priest insisted he would stand by his vow to take the secrets of the confessional to the grave.
He was given a dressing-down by his superior, Algarve Bishop Manuel Quintas, and allegedly tried to shift the focus on to worshippers who had advised him to provide the McCanns with all the help he could.
In the days after Madeleine went missing, locals flocked to the church to show their support for the McCanns. They laid a sea of floral tributes outside, while pictures of Madeleine and messages of support were pinned to the wooden doors.
Now all that is left are two faded green ribbons the symbol of hope in Portugal still tied to the noticeboard outside the church.
Last night a close friend of the priest told the Daily Express: “Father Jose can’t even hear the Madeleine case mentioned without becoming irate.
“Even his closest friends must tread carefully when dealing with anything connected to the McCanns. When they broach the subject he immediately changes it.
“He says that it is an extremely unpleasant situation and that the McCann family only ever brought him problems. He told one friend they ruined his life.
“As soon as it was made public that he had given the key of the church to the McCanns, everything changed.
“He said it had been his flock’s decision. That was a mistake the parish didn’t react well. He no longer goes to the coffee shops that were part of his daily routine.
“He just wants to get on with his peaceful life before the McCann whirlwind raped his world. He just wants it all to go away. This has all been a very bad experience for him.
“There are things he would like to tell and can’t, therefore he refuses to speak of it at all so as not to be tempted into letting out more than he should. I feel greatly for him. All he did was his best for souls in need and this is his payment.” Another friend said: “All this family brought him were problems.
Talking about Madeleine is a sure way to spoil his day. There are two completely different Pachecos, the one before the McCanns and this shell of a man after the McCanns.
“He’s a nervous wreck. He’s hiding secrets that are destroying him.” Last night Father Jose refused to comment.
The McCanns began to face local hostility after the Portuguese media pointed the finger of suspicion at them in a smear campaign fuelled by leaks from the police.
They were dubbed the “Bloody McCanns” by locals who insisted they had had enough of all the attention the case was bringing.
Opposition towards the couple intensified after they were named as official suspects. The couple left the country within days, raising further suspicions among locals.
Others believe the search for Madeleine had become a charade because they are convinced she is no longer alive. Residents who relied on tourism to make a living raised concerns that the high-profile case was turning away visitors.
Now locals say they want to return to the lives they had before.
Canadian Meri Hanlin, who has been in Portugal for four years and runs a health food shop in the resort, said: “It was like a dark cloud hanging over us for so long.
“It’s not that the locals don’t care about what happened, but they just want to get the village back to how it was. For the locals it got a little too much.
“I’m sure there are a lot of businesses who have lost a lot of money because people have stopped going.” Local resident Rui Rodriquez, 34, said: “We’re sick of hearing about Madeleine. It is time for everyone to move on.” A cashier at the Alisuper convenience store opposite the church said: “I took down the posters and I no longer wear the bracelet that the child’s father gave me.
“It no longer makes sense to display symbols of the child’s disappearance when the parents are suspects.” Another shopkeeper said: “Opinions hardened when the McCanns went back to England and things have changed since then. It’s not just the Portuguese, the views of the English people also changed.
“People started taking the posters down because they did not believe anything any more. There are too many doubts about the case, it is best forgotten.” Last night the McCanns’ spokesman, Clarence Mitchell insisted the couple had gained strength from the support of the local community during their four months in Portugal.
He said: “The people were incredibly supportive and we believe that affection and support is still there.
“Kate and Gerry have nothing but fond memories and remain very grateful to the people of Praia da Luz. At some point the community in Praia da Luz has to move on, just as it has in Rothley.
“The tributes to Madeleine in Kate and Gerry’s home town were taken down some time ago.
“They cannot help how people feel but they hope everyone will continue to be vigilant in looking out for Madeleine. They believe she is still alive and is out there somewhere.” The couple and their holiday friends, dubbed the Tapas Nine, are set to be questioned by British police in the presence of Portuguese detectives.
Meanwhile, it was reported that Robert Murat the first official suspect has complained that British diplomats gave favourable treatment to the McCanns.
1 October 2007
Now police say she fell down the steps
From David Pilditch and Martin Evans in Praia da Luz
MADELEINE McCann’s parents faced new smears yesterday after it was reported their daughter died falling down stairs.
It is claimed Portuguese police are “100 per cent certain” Madeleine was killed in an accident at her family’s holiday apartment – and Kate and Gerry covered-up the tragedy.
The theory is Madeleine, four, wandered out and stumbled before hitting her head on a ceramic tile staircase leading from their patio to the street.
A child’s stairgate shuts off the 10 steps and was in place when the family stayed. What is not known is if the gate was closed.
Sources in Portugal said police are convinced the McCanns enlisted friends to help dispose of Madeleine’s body.
Portugal’s 24 Hours newspaper said some or all of the McCanns’ seven holiday companions face being named as official suspects. It claimed they will be re-interviewed by detectives in Britain.
Last night the couple’s friends accused police of inventing theories.
One said: “How can you tell what anyone died of without a body, it flies in the face of reason. There appears to be leak after leak to smear the name of the McCanns.”
The couple’s spokesman Clarence Mitchell, said: “It’s ludicrous, all of these reports are unsourced and unsubstantiated. Kate and Gerry have got nothing to hide.”
He added: “Some of the leaks that appear on a daily basis are hurtful, surely it’s time to stop.”
Yesterday it was alleged the new line of inquiry was being pursued after the final report from British police who flew to Portugal to help solve the case.
In July British police sniffer dogs discovered the scent of a corpse and traces of blood in the McCanns’ flat in the Algarve resort of Praia da Luz.
The scent was also allegedly found on Kate’s clothing and in the back of the Renault Scenic car the couple hired 25 days after Madeleine vanished.
A separate report yesterday said the couple, both 39, first fell under suspicion after the British team were called in.
It is claimed the new National Police Improvement Agency gave a checklist of what should be done – including re-focusing on the McCanns and new forensics. A police source said: “There is a mantra British detectives use in big investigations: ‘Clear the ground from under your feet’.
“In this case it meant look at the apartment and the closest circle to Madeleine – her family.
They should’ve been the first people to be looked at properly, and police failed to do so.”
Police in Portugal are still following the line that Madeleine was given sedatives to help her sleep before her parents went to a nearby tapas restaurant.
But they now believe she woke up and went to look for them.
The newspaper said two senior officers revealed investigators concluded with “absolute certainty” that she died at the flat.
It said: “The death was due to a traumatic shock to the back of the head.”
It added: “One of the facts given as proven is that Madeleine’s parents are still suspects, not in the form of murder but in the form of manslaughter, added to the suspicion that they hid the body.”
The 24 Hours report said police have not ruled out that the only other named suspect, British ex-pat Robert Murat, helped hide the body.
The McCanns’ friends believe the “black propaganda” has been fuelled by desperate Portuguese police after their bungled investigation.
Last night it was revealed in the first days after Madeleine went missing, Scotland Yard offered help for an official review – standard practice in Britain.
The Portuguese not only rejected the offer, but failed even to respond.
Virgin’s Sir Richard Branson, donor of 100,000 for legal costs last night defended the McCanns.
He said: “The Portuguese press have behaved abysmally, fed inaccurate stories by the Portuguese police, which all turned out to be a load of garbage.
“I’ve never doubted their innocence. I knew that senior lawyers in Portugal thought what was going on was ghastly so getting the most senior QC in Portugal on their side I think is very important.”
17 October 2007
PARENTS’ CAR HID A CORPSE
From David Pilditch in Praia da Luz
BODILY fluids found in the car hired by Madeleine McCann’s parents could only have come from a corpse, it was claimed yesterday.
Forensic tests prove a body was placed in the Renault Scenic, a Portuguese police source alleged.
The fluids were on the underside of a carpet over the spare tyre well in the boot of the car hired by Kate and Gerry McCann 25 days after Madeleine disappeared on May 3, aged three.
The traces could not have been transferred from Madeleine’s clothes as the McCanns have claimed, the source said.
He added: “Police are being told the fluids come from a dead body.
“These are bodily fluids that could only come from a corpse. Police are waiting for the results to confirm the identity of the DNA.” Forensic tests are being carried out in Britain. The fluid was previously claimed to show an 88 per cent match to Madeleine’s DNA.
Friends of the McCanns yesterday dismissed the claims, which they said were the latest in a series of smears as part of a “black propaganda campaign” waged against the couple by elements in the Portuguese police.
They insisted there are “wholly innocent” explanations for any evidence that might have been found in the couple’s car.
Last night a source close to the McCanns’ legal team insisted the couple were “entirely innocent” and there was “no way” any evidence of a body in their hire car could have been found.
He said: “They have nothing to hide.
They did not kill their daughter or dispose of her body in a car they hired three weeks later.
“So there is no way the police can have any evidence there was a body in the car.
We simply do not believe this.
“Every time spurious leaks like this emerge from Portugal it hits Kate and Gerry hard. They are entirely innocent and going through hell.
“If evidence like this had been found the implications would be serious. Let’s just say they would not be sitting at their home in Leicestershire.
“Kate and Gerry have had no contact from Portuguese police since they left the country.
“The ordeal weighs heavily on them but they continue to draw strength from each other and there’s not a chink of light between them.
“Of course they feel guilty about what has happened. No-one could feel more guilty.
“But the decisions they made at the time were joint ones and no-one could have foreseen the tragic consequences.”
The McCanns’ spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, said: “We simply cannot comment on unsubstantiated reports. We have heard nothing official from the relevant authorities. What I can say is there is a wholly innocent explanation for any evidence found anywhere.”
The new head of the investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance has reopened lines of inquiry since taking over the case last week.
But sources have said he is still treating the McCanns as chief suspects.
Detectives have accused part-time GP Kate, 39, of accidentally killing Madeleine after giving her sedatives to help her sleep. They believe she died in the family’s Ocean Club holiday apartment in the Algarve resort of Praia da Luz.
They are working on the theory that consultant cardiologist Gerry, also 39, helped his wife dispose of their daughter’s body using their hire car.
During her police interview Kate was repeatedly shown video footage of sniffer dogs trained to detect death and blood reacting in the apartment and the hire car.
A bloody footprint allegedly found in the apartment matched a print of a shoe recovered from the car’s bumper.
The McCanns, now at home in Rothley, claim they are being framed by police desperate to close a case they have bungled.
The Forensic Science Service laboratory in Birmingham has conducted a series of tests on evidence found in the apartment and the Renault car and police are still awaiting the final results.
22 January 2008
New manhunt ‘another diversion by McCanns’
Padraic Flanagan in Praia da Luz and Nick Fagge
THE manhunt by Madeleine investigators prompted by a drawing of a possible abductor is designed to divert suspicion from Kate and Gerry McCann, the Portuguese police believe.
Last night, sources in the Policia Judiciaria revealed reports of a dishevelled man lurking around Praia da Luz were investigated months ago and found to be groundless.
One stormed: “The purpose of this latest exercise by the McCanns is the same as always. It’s another diversionary tactic.”
On Sunday, private investigators searching for the four-year-old released a sketch based on the evidence of a British tourist who said she had seen a “creepy man”.
Grandmother Gail Cooper, who was staying 600 yards from the McCanns’ apartment, said she saw him three times, once trying to collect money for a fake orphanage.
Based on her descriptions, an FBI-trained artist drew a likeness.
Detectives in Portugal believe Madeleine is dead and that her parents were involved in disposing of the body.
Former PJ inspector and now criminologist Francisco Moita Flores said the timing of the McCanns releasing the image was curious, coming only days before the McCanns’ dining companions are due to face further questioning.
He said: “This is maybe the most critical moment in the investigation. They know there is evidence that the girl died and we are on the eve of interrogating witnesses who may undo all the theories.”
It was reported the only other official suspect, Robert Murat, was seen chatting to a man resembling the sketch suspect last May.
Nanny Charlotte Pennington, 20, told the police she saw Murat, 34, talking to “a man 27 to 35, average height, very dark eyes, Portuguese or Spanish appearance”.
After Madeleine was snatched on May 3, the McCanns’ dining companion Jane Tanner, 36, said she had seen a man walking away from the Ocean Club carrying a child.
Yesterday, despite never seeing his face, Ms Tanner, from Exeter, said she was “80 per cent certain” it was the man in the drawing.
Last night, Amanda Mills, 34, from Basildon, Essex, claimed she saw a man resembling the sketch suspect trying to break into a ground-floor apartment in the Ocean Club, similar to the one the McCanns occupied, a week later.
Last night the McCanns’ spokesman Clarence Mitchell said the McCanns’ sleuth agency’s 50,000-a-week contract is up next month but could be extended if the mystery man was still at large.
DNA samples ‘too small’ to be conclusive evidence
Nick Fagge 10 September 2007
DOUBTS over the forensic evidence used to implicate Kate and Gerry McCann in the disappearance of their daughter Madeleine emerged last night.
Samples of DNA, taken from two places, led police to question the couple and later make them formal suspects, or arguidos, in the case on Friday.
One is thought to be the Algarve apartment from where the fouryearold vanished, and the other is believed to be a car hired by the McCanns 25 days after her disappearance.
The samples were analysed by forensic scientists in Britain and led directly to the aggressive questioning by detectives in Portugal of Madeleine’s parents.
But forensic experts last night warned that any samples linking the McCanns with Madeleine days after she went missing should be treated with caution until the full facts of the case are known.
Sources at the Forensic Science Service in Birmingham, which carried out the tests on swabs taken from the hire car, are understood to have dismissed as “simply wrong” some of the speculation surrounding the nature of the DNA evidence.
The DNA samples were so small and degraded that only an incomplete match could be made with Madeleine’s genetic profile, the sources have claimed.
Only 15 out of the 20 genetic markers usually used for such analysis could be identified, raising doubts about the value of the evidence. Only by obtaining 19 matches is a result regarded as conclusive. Independent experts also questioned the quality of the forensic evidence.
Forensic scientist Alan Baker said the type of sample found was vital in interpreting any potential match whether it is hair, blood or only traces.
And if the match is less than perfect it is more likely that the DNA is not Madeleine’s but that of her brother, sister or parents.
Mr Baker said: “In most crime scenes the individuals in question are not related so the DNA is completely different. But in this case you have got members of the McCann family involved and they would have shared DNA with their offspring.”
Madeleine’s DNA could also have been transferred from anything she had touched in the days before she went missing.
HEARTBREAK
From Nick Fagge in Morocco and Martin Evans in Portugal 27 September 2007
HOPES that Madeleine McCann is still alive were dealt a severe blow last night after the most promising sighting yet was proved false.
A photograph of a blonde girl taken in Morocco turned out to be a local farmer’s five-year-old daughter.
The picture of the child, who bears a striking resemblance to Madeleine and was being carried on the back of an Arab-looking woman, was taken three weeks ago.
It had provided Kate and Gerry McCann with their greatest hope that their four-year-old daughter had been abducted and was still alive.
Within hours of it emerging, the photograph was being analysed by experts, yet Portuguese detectives refused to take it seriously and stressed that they think Madeleine is dead. While a Policia Judiciaria spokesman insisted they had b een considering the new lead, privately sources said the photograph had long been dismissed, claiming the shape of the girl’s head was different to that of Madeleine’s.
Last night the child in the picture and her f amily were tracked down to a village in the Rif M ountains in northern Morocco. The child is Bushra Binhisa, whose family have a smallholdi ng in the area. They have lived and worked t here for several generations.
Speaking through an interpreter, her father Hamid Binhisa said: “Bushra is my little girl. She i s not Madeleine. I do feel sorry for her parents, I hope they find Madeleine.”
Bushra’s mother Hafida, who had been carrying her daughter in the photograph, said she was surprised at all the fuss. But she said her heart went out to Kate and Gerry.
“Even in this remote backwater people have heard of Madeleine McCann, ” she said.
Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns’ spokesman said: “That is obviously a terrible blow. Clearly if it’s not her it’s very disappointing.” The latest sighting the fourth to take place in Morocco was the most positive yet because of the photograph. Spanish holidaymaker Clara Torres took it on August 31.
After returning to Spain at the weekend she learned of other apparent Madeleine sightings in Morocco and took a closer look at the picture.
Mustafa Hadid, a friend of the Binhisa family, explained it was not unusual for certain North African tribes to have blonde-haired children.
He said: “We are all shocked that people could think Bushra was Madeleine. She does have a resemblance, but blonde and red-haired children are not that rare in this part of Morocco.” Bushra’s older sister Mariam also appeared in the photograph along with several of her aunts and uncles who live close to the town of Zinat.
A petrol station attendant in the town said: “We’ve heard of Madeleine. But we don’t get many British people coming through here. If she was here then everybody would have known about it and it would have been impossible to keep it a secret.
“We have seen her parents on the news and we feel upset for them. We hope she is found soon. I don’t think any people here would have taken her.” This latest sighting follows three earlier reports that Madeleine had been spotted in Morocco.
A Norwegian woman believes she saw the girl at a petrol station in Marrakech in May, while a British tourist reported seeing her at a hotel nearby around the same time.
Another woman from northern Morocco has also come forward to claim that at the end of May she saw the youngster, who was aged three when she went missing on May 3.
There have also been numerous other reported sightings including in Malta, Belgium and Spain.
The McCanns, who remain official suspects, have always placed great emphasis on the North African connection, believing Madeleine could have been stolen to order before being whisked across the border into Spain and on into Morocco.
Police are now focusing on finding Madeleine’s body after being warned by prosecutors the couple will “escape” if it is not recovered.
Kate and Gerry have denied the allegations and say they will not give up hope of finding their daughter alive.
Nearly 300,000 of the 1million donated by the public has been spent on the search for Madeleine, it was revealed last night.
Costs include the launch of the Find Madeleine campaign, advertising, yellow and green wristbands and the employment of former campaign manager Justine McGuinness.
Directors of a fighting fund met yesterday to discuss how the cash is spent.
STOLEN BY PEOPLE SMUGGLERS
EXCLUSIVE From Nick Fagge in Morocco and Martin Evans in Portugal 29 September 2007
MISSING Madeleine McCann may b e in the hands of North African people smugglers.
Police in Morocco, investigating a reported sighting, believe they have identified a link with a ruthless gang of traffickers.
A nationwide hunt has been launched for the smugglers who operate between North Africa and Spain, ferrying people and tons of marijuana into Europe each year. The breakthrough came a few weeks after Madeleine went missing when a Spanish tourist reported seeing a blonde girl matching her description being dragged along by a scruffy, Arab-looking woman in the town of Zaio.
The sighting was immediately dismissed by Portuguese police, who believe the little girl is already dead. But when details were passed to the Moroccan secret police, a major hunt was launched by the antismuggling task force.
Senior officers believe the sighting is highly plausible and are now closing in on the gang.
They are confident they know the identity of the woman and claim that she slips in and out of Morocco using underground contacts.
Police chief Abdelkada Chouhou told the Daily Express: “We believe the woman involved is a known Spanish smuggler who has links with Zaio.” She lives in the Spanish enclave of Melilla not far away, he added.
“We launched an operation to find this little girl when we were told about the sighting but we found nothing. This woman holds the key and we continue to look for her, ” he said.
Although there is no photo to support the Zaio sighting, Moroccan police are taking the report very seriously. The alarm was raised in May by 60-year-old Spanish tourist Isabel Gonzalez who said: “The girl I saw was blonde, with pale skin, whereas everyone else in the area is darkskinned and dark-haired.
“A gust of wind blew her hat up as she crossed the road in front of us and I saw her little face looking scared and worried.” Mrs Gonzalez, said she was certain the youngster was Madeleine and contacted Spanish police as soon as she got home. The report was passed to the Policia Judiciaria in Portugal but little was done. However, the Moroccan secret police were intrigued.
Chief Chouhou said its officers were ordered to search for the youngster and the woman, who was described as short and stocky, and wearing a black headscarf and brown full-length Arabic dress. “If she comes back then we will question her, ” he added.
There have been four separate reported sightings of Madeleine in Morocco, including one backed up by a photo published earlier this week near the town of Zinat.
However, these hopes were dashed when the youngster was identified as Bushra Binhisa, the three-year-old daughter of a farmer.
An earlier Moroccan sighting took place in Marrakech just days after Madeleine went missing from Praia da Luz on May 3.
Norwegian tourist Mari Pollard said she saw a girl who looked like Madeleine with a man at a petrol station in the city on May 9.
And a British tourist also reported seeing a youngster with a strong likeness the same day outside the Ibis Hotel next to a petrol station. Although the smugglers’ main trade is in drugs, they are also known to have links with people-trafficking gangs.
The sophisticated teams charge desperate African migrants a fortune to sneak into the EU across the porous borders of countries like Spain and Portugal.
The same gangs also sell children to desperate European couples via a shadowy network. Gangsters use fleets of powerful speedboats to out-run navy and coastguard ships and deliver their cargoes to isolated beaches in Spain.
Gendarme Commander Mohammed Hamed said police across Morocco were given regular updates on the McCann case and were ready and willing to help.
“We are still looking.We will follow any line of inquiry, ” he added.
“We are very pleased to help, not just for the little girl and her parents, but to uphold our nation’s honour. If a crime has been committed in Morocco then we will do all we can to bring those responsible to justice.”
IS MADELEINE A CHILD SLAVE IN MOROCCO?
From Nick Fagge in Morocco 1 November 2007
MADELEINE McCann may have been condemned to a life of slavery working as a “little maid” for a rich Arab family in Morocco, child trafficking experts claimed yesterday.
But as a child slave, Madeleine could be regularly abused by her host family or by visitors invited to meet the blonde-haired “curiosity”.
The north African country has a shocking child welfare record, with sex tourism rife and little protection given to young victims.
The system, which is widespread throughout north Africa and the Arab world, could explain how fouryear-old Madeleine has remained undetected since she vanished in Portugal on May 3. “If Madeleine McCann is in Morocco she is probably working as a little maid, ” said Inspector Hicham Alaoui of the Moroccan Police in El Hajeb near Fez.
“This could explain how she managed to get into the country undetected and how she has gone undetected.
“We have been working very hard recently to clamp down on child prostitution in El Hajeb but sadly the problem continues elsewhere.
“These perverts find that because of the terrible poverty in Morocco, children are easy pickings for the promise of a small amount of money.
“Other people recruit servants we call them little maids not just for domestic work. They look for children to abuse and for their friends to abuse.
“We are aware of the case of Madeleine McCann and are willing to offer any assistance.
“We have not been contacted by the Spanish private detectives who are now in Morocco looking for her. But we are determined in our desire to help solve this crime. If we come across this poor little girl, or receive any information about her, we will act immediately.”
Private detectives hired by Madeleine’s parents Kate and Gerry are in the Rif Mountains in the north of Morocco, following up 10 sightings of a blonde-haired girl matching her description with a woman in her 60s.
The detectives, from the Spanish company Metodo 3, believe Madeleine is being held by a middle class Arab woman on the orders of others after she was smuggled out of Portugal and into Morocco.
The firm claims to have found a blonde English-speaking girl in the Rif Mountains. Sources at Metodo 3 said Interpol was now investigating the discovery of the little girl, thought to be an American.
One theory is that she may have been snatched to order to face a lifetime in slavery and investigators believe the same fate may have befallen Madeleine.
Collected by rich families as “curiosities” as well as servants, little maids can live with their host families their whole lives, receiving a pittance in wages which is sent to their family.
Without the protection of relatives, these young girls are often abused physically, emotionally and sexually.
An estimated two and a half million children are currently working fulltime, with hundreds of thousands of girls under the age of 10 working as little maids.
Christine Beddoes, of international child welfare organisation Ecpatuk, said yesterday: “Away from their family and the eyes of the law, these children become highly vulnerable to abuse.
They simply do not have anyone to look out for them.” But while the idea that Madeleine is still alive will give hope to Kate and Gerry, both 39, a United Nations report into child prostitution and trafficking recently painted a distressing picture of the widespead abuse of youngsters across the country.
The study found paedophile networks operating in all of the major cities including Casablanca, Tangier and Agadir, as well as the existence of child brothels. Local support groups and charities claim most of the abuse is carried out by Moroccans but there is a worrying rise in child sex tourism.
And while Europeans usually target young boys, predators from the rich Gulf states prefer young girls.
The Moroccan government has recently made attempts to clamp down on this trade in human misery, including increasing prison sentences to 30 years for child pimps and brothel owners. But these have been hampered by the scale of the problem and by widespread indifference to the children’s plight.
A hotline established for child abuse victims receives more than 10,000 calls a month, many from children.
But the country has only one centre to treat abused and abandoned girls, which is more akin to a borstal than a hospital.
And the unit tasked with protecting children from foreign sexual predators is the Tourist Police, whose main aim is naturally to promote tourism. In 2003, a huge paedophile ring that was trafficking young children and operating in all of the country’s major cities was smashed by Moroccan police, with 26 people arrested.
They were linked to established criminal gangs, and girls under 14 were their primary target. The UN report into child protection claims that Moroccan men are most often the abusers.
But it adds: “Where foreigners are involved in prostitution, tourists from western countries seem more likely to seek out boys, while men from other Arab countries, particularly the Gulf states, look for girl prostitutes.” It continues: “The widespread abuse of young girls working as household maids, known as little maids, is one of the most serious problems confronting Moroccan children.”
I looked her in the eyes
From Nick Fagge in Morocco and Padraic Flanagan in Spain 2 November 2007
THE search for Madeleine McCann received a major boost yesterday following the most compelling sighting yet in Morocco.
A Spanish tourist claims she saw the girl get into a taxi with a middle class Arab woman before being whisked away into the lawless Rif mountains on North Africa’s Mediterranean coast.
Naouval Malhi is convinced it was Madeleine because the youngster had the distinctive flash in her right eye, where the pupil merges with the blue-green iris.
But when she tried to challenge the Arab woman, the tourist was forced away and could only report her concerns to the police.
Last night Ms Malhi, 24, who was born in Morocco but is now a Spanish citizen living near Marbella, southern Spain, said: “I am certain it was Madeleine. She had the same mark I have seen in the posters and looked exactly like her.” She immediately informed police about her dramatic attempt to save the child from being taken away.
Last night, in an exclusive interview with the Daily Express, Ms Malhi told how she was in Morocco visiting relatives in early September when she saw a girl she is certain was Madeleine.
She reported seeing a girl who had the “mark of Madeleine”, referring to her distinctive right eye.
The woman was in the village of Fnidek on the north coast of Morocco when she saw a middleaged woman with the girl. She said last night: “I looked into her eyes and was certain it was Madeleine, there was no mistaking that mark.
“Her blonde hair was cut shorter but she had a big bruise on her forehead and looked very unhappy.
“The woman, who was about 40 or 50, was gripping her tightly and didn’t want to make eye contact with me. As soon as she realised I had looked closely into her eye, she started dragging Madeleine away and flagged down a taxi.
“I rushed to try and get in. I wanted to stop her taking the child away but she pushed me away and yelled at the taxi to leave. I managed to grab a business card from the driver before he sped off.
“Later I was so convinced at what I had seen I called the company and they told me where they had taken her.
“After that I told Moroccan police and then police in Spain when I got home. Nobody who saw what I saw would have any doubt that it was Madeleine. Ever since I saw her in September it has haunted me. I can’t get her out of my mind.
“I’m desperate for someone to find that girl and bring her back to her family. The little girl was wearing an orange top and had a dummy in her mouth.” Ms Malhi, who speaks Arabic fluently, added: “I asked the taxi driver where he had taken them. He told me he had taken the woman and the child to the town of Al Hoceima which is a large port on the Mediterranean hundreds of kilometres away.
Private detectives hired by Kate and Gerry McCann believe the woman is a “carer” who is looking after the four-year-old in a remote mountainous region of northern Morocco, where the sightings have centred.
They think the blonde girl was stolen to order, possibly by a Portuguese paedophile, and is now being kept alive in the Rif Mountains in northern Morocco. The information was quickly passed to the Metodo 3 private detective agency who despatched a team of agents to the area to look for her.
Metodo 3′s director Francisco Marco said: “We can’t be certain it’s Madeleine but several unconnected people have told our informers of the same girl with the same woman.
“The only difference is that she has slightly shorter hair than Madeleine had when she disappeared. Everything else matches.
“They’ve been seen over a wide area but always within the confines of the Rif mountains.” Photographs of Madeleine are being distributed in the region, with an appeal for people to call a Moroccan phone number with information.
The new sighting has been hailed as a major breakthrough and has formed the basis of a huge manhunt throughout the country.
It is one of 10 sightings in Morocco that has returned the focus of the hunt to the most isolated areas of this Arab state.
Barcelona-based Metodo 3 is believed to be using contacts linked to Morocco’s powerful drug barons who are based in the Rif mountains and control smuggling routes from the North African coast into Europe.
However, the search is far from over as the taxi driver did not have the proper police accreditation to undertake such a long journey, the Daily Express has learnt.
This suggests that either the driver was bought off by his female passenger or was threatened with violence to break the law.
Last night traffic police officer Rachid El Addar in Fnidek told the Daily Express: “To travel outside their normal area taxi drivers need a special travel document which is issued here at the police station.
“But there were no permits issued to travel from Fnidek to Al Hoceima that day, the day before or after.” Yesterday at the windy Fnidek border post, dozens of battered old Mercedes cars stood on the tarmac just yards from the frontier waiting for fares. Hundreds of drivers operate this route one of the main land routes from Europe into Morocco.
Last night drivers revealed their shock on learning that Madeleine may have passed among them.
Ali Ahmed, 35, said: “It is not impossible for the driver to get to Al Hoceima without the proper documents but it is very unlikely. If he did so he did it for a reason. Either he was threatened or offered a lot of money. No one has spoken about taking a high-paying customer to Al Hoceima this summer, but if it was illegal that is not surprising.” Meanwhile, in Al Hoceima the trail appears to have gone cold.
Police and security officials say they have not been contacted by either private detectives from Spain or police officers from anywhere else.
The head of the Moroccan secret police in Al Hoceima said: “There is no little British girl here. Not in the town or in the province. You must be mistaken.”
MADELEINE, THE HOPE NEVER DIES
Adrian Lee and Nick Fagge in Morocco 3 November 2007
HIGH in the Rif mountains of Morocco the village marketplaces are in a frenzy of activity. Scruffy Berber children play in the street, flies buzz round the carcass of a goat on a stall, and a brokentoothed man wearing a hooded robe haggles over a few household items. The cool air is heavy with the scent of spices.
The northernmost part of Africa, it is within spitting distance of the Spanish mainland visible on a clear day from the craggy limestone peaks but they are two very different worlds. Cut off from the tourist trail, the mountains are renowned for their illicit hashish growing, and a dialect that can barely be understood by other Arabic speakers.
This rough, lawless region has become the focus of the search for Madeleine McCann, which has been re-energised this week.
A small team of Spanish private detectives, driving a conspicuous black 4×4 vehicle, are scouring these ramshackle villages. Clutching mobile telephones and photographs of the missing four-year-old, they have been hired by Kate and Gerry McCann with the instruction to leave no stone unturned.
In the past few days, there have been several tantalising sightings of a girl matching Madeleine’s description. Another blonde child, who is believed to be American, was found by the McCanns’ detectives in this area.
She is said to have been stolen to order and held by a Moroccan family who treated her as a slave.
Francisco Marco, director of the Metodo 3 agency, is convinced the same fate has befallen Madeleine but boldly predicts that she will be reunited with her parents within five months. “My view is that the most likely place to find her is Morocco, ” he says.
Morocco has become a haven for European paedophiles, and sex tourism is on the rise. Interpol has documented a long history of enslavement, with girls of European descent in high demand.
MARCO believes Madeleine was snatched from the Ocean Club complex in Praia da Luz after a tip-off from a worker there that the McCanns left their children alone while they went out for dinner.
The abductor took the girl over the border into Spain, then across the Strait of Gibraltar into Morocco and the Rif mountains.
Back home in Rothley, Leicestershire, the carefree day the McCanns boarded a plane to Portugal for a holiday must seem like a lifetime ago. They are preparing to mark six months without Madeleine today by saying prayers at the parish church, St Mary and St John, at the time she vanished, 9.30pm. Villagers will be invited to join the service.
The McCanns feel they have done all they can. Now, hope is all they have and they can only wait for a phone call. Gerry returned to work a few days ago as the McCanns try to restore normality for the sake of their other children, Amelie and Sean. There are also the practicalities to consider, since Madeleine disappeared:
careers and salaries have suffered.
The private detectives, said to have good police contacts, have the expertise that the McCanns lack. “We feel we have the proper infrastructure in place to find her, ” Gerry said this week, explaining why they were no longer actively involved in the hunt.
There is also a sense of optimism that there has been a shift in emphasis in the police investigation in Portugal. Evidence against the McCanns appears to be either weak or nonexistent and detectives in Portugal are once again looking for the girl.
They have no further plans to interview Gerry or Kate, raising expectations that the couple could soon have their suspect status officially removed.
The previously cynical approach of former lead investigator Goncalo Amaral, who believed Madeleine died by accident and her parents disposed of her body, has been replaced by a more open-minded investigation. The old police adage of investigating all lines of inquiry, and not simply doggedly pursuing a hunch, is providing fresh impetus.
At one stage, not so long ago, it seemed that all the Portuguese police were waiting for was the discovery of Madeleine’s body, but a McCann family source said this week: “Kate and Gerry are a lot happier with the way the investigation is being run under the new Portuguese police team.
As far as we understand, the U-turn has resulted in the new team revisiting all the evidence that was already out there and coming to a vastly different conclusion to that of Amaral.” The feeling that they are being treated as parents coping with the awful loss of their daughter, rather than suspects, makes them feel less alone. The new head of the investigation, Paul Rebelo, has added members to his team who will help search for loose ends which may have been missed. Detectives are working through a list of about 15 known sex offenders who left Portugal shortly after May 3, when Madeleine vanished.
Rebello ordered a re-enactment of events on the night Madeleine went missing, with close attention being paid to the bedroom window through which she is thought to have been spirited away. For her family, it is another sign that abduction is firmly back on the police agenda, and the search for Madeleine is at last back on track.
The McCanns despaired when possible sightings went ignored by police, who were certain Madeleine was dead. Now, they are said to be vigorously checking new leads and her parents can only pray it is not too late.
Police chiefs in Portugal have also given their blessing to a hotline launched by the McCanns. It is manned round the clock by private detectives, allowing potential witnesses to report sightings of the four-year-old.
IN THEIR latest television interview, in Spain, Gerry and Kate spoke of their conviction that their daughter is still alive, despite the passage of time.
There are many precedents of abducted and missing children being reunited with their families sometimes after many years.
Perhaps the most astonishing was the case of Natascha Kampusch, 18, who survived eight years in an underground cell, in Austria. She was seized by a 44year-old telecoms worker, Wolfgang Priklopil, who threw himself under a train soon after the teenager escaped last year.
After being reunited with her daughter her mother, Brigitte Sirny-Kampusch, said she never gave up hope: “We fell into each other’s arms. I recognised her from her way of being, her face. I always thought she was alive.” During captivity, the girl was given access to books and TV.
Danielle Cramer, 15, who disappeared in June 2006, in Bloomfield, Connecticut, was found locked in a hidden room under a staircase in the home of Adam Gault and Ann Murphy. She had spent nearly a year in captivity.
SHAWN HORNBECK, who was missing for four years after being kidnapped aged 11, in October 2002, recalled how he took comfort from knowing his parents would never give up hope. Shawn, who was snatched while riding his bicycle, said: “I prayed every day that my parents would find me. I knew my parents weren’t giving up and neither would I.” His captor managed to pass the boy off as his son before being caught.
In several high-profile abduction cases there is evidence that victims develop a misplaced sense of loyalty to their kidnappers, however much they suffer.
Ross Miller of the charity Missing People, which highlights the cases of 140,000 missing children in the UK every year, says:
“Families do need to keep hope alive. Even after many years, there might be that telephone call with good news.” Anniversaries and landmarks are a “double-edged sword”, according to Miller, who adds:
“Although they represent a chance for renewed publicity they are also a real reminder of loss. The hardest part for most families is not knowing, and trying to get on with their lives.
Some families refuse to move house because it’s a link with the missing child.” The charity works with a forensic artist to produce age progression images of missing children to show how they might look as they grow up. Madeleine’s family will be offered the service if she is not found within a year.
Valerie Nettles, 55, from the Isle of Wight, whose son Damien went missing 11 years ago this weekend, says: “Even though it has been 11 years it’s like yesterday and keeps replaying in my mind.” Damien, then 16, had dinner with his family, went out to visit friends and has not been seen since. The final image of Damien showed him, late at night, walking along Cowes High Street.
His mother, who has moved to Texas with her husband Ed and their three other children, adds:
“We have a foot in two worlds one where life goes on, the other a very dark place. Moving to the States was the hardest decision of my life but my husband was made redundant so we had no choice. I can’t give up looking for Damien. Someone knows what happened that night. Common sense tells me it’s not going to happen but I always hope he will walk through the door.” For Valerie, the McCanns and the parents of every missing child, hope will never be extinguished.
WE’RE CLOSING IN ON M0R0CC0 HIDEAWAY
EXCLUSIVE From Nick Fagge in the Rif Mountains, Morocco 3 November 2007
DETECTIVES are closing in on the secret hideaway where they are convinced Madeleine McCann is being held.
The Daily Express can reveal that the private investigators are concentrating their search on a remote region in the north of Morocco.
A highly-placed source close to the team said last night: “We are confident we are near to finding Madeleine alive we’re on our way to get her.” The agents are combing villages in the Rif Mountains for the four-yearold, who disappeared six months ago.
The source told the Daily Express: “We have investigators on the ground scouring the countryside. They have been chasing up leads for the past five weeks.
“We are following up new sightings of a girl looking like Madeleine which have come in recently. We have been concentrating on one particular area but I cannot say where it is because I don’t want to damage the trust we have built up there. We are on our way to get Madeleine out alive.” The latest lead follows two fresh sightings of a blonde girl by peasants. The new reports confirm earlier claims that she is living with a middle-class Arab family who may be holding her on the orders of others.
Investigators from the highlyrespected Spanish agency Metodo 3 began working on the information after a Moroccan teacher called the Madeleine hotline.
Majid Jazoili, 43, told the Daily Express: “Two people I know saw a picture I carry with me of Madeleine McCann.
“They told me they had seen her with a family who live in a tiny village in the Rif Mountains. There are three women with daughters who each have a family of their own.
“There is also a grandfather who lives with them in the same house and lots of children.
“I don’t know what the blonde girl is doing with them. I called the number I had seen on the poster.” He added: “I am a father and will do anything I can to get this little girl back for her parents.”
This information, and a “false Madeleine” sighting in the mountain village of Zinat in September, are contained in a dossier held by Moroccan police.
But the dossier, which has been seen by the Daily Express, remains painfully thin, despite at least 10 separate accounts from people claiming that they have seen Madeleine in recent weeks.
The scant information is held in a manilla folder, with the words Information de l’Affaire Madeleine McCann hand-written in French in black ink.
The A4 folder holds about a dozen pieces of white paper, containing statements and observations typed in Arabic and stamped with an official police seal.
The deputy chief of police at Tetouan, Said Aloua, said: “We are in contact with Interpol and other police forces.” The breakthrough came on the eve of the six-month anniversary of Madeleine’s disappearance. Her parents will today attend a church service at Rothley, Leics, being held at the exact time they believe she was abducted on May 3.
Similar services will be held in Kate McCann’s home city of Liverpool and in Praia da Luz.
To coincide with the heartbreaking anniversary, parents Kate and Gerry McCann have issued a photograph of Madeleine playing on a slide near her home a week before their family holiday.
In an emotional appeal, Kate said: “We believe that our Madeleine is out there somewhere and retain hope that we can be reunited. If you have any information please pass it on to 0034902300213.” The breakthrough follows claims that a little girl with the “mark of Madeleine” was spotted getting into a taxi with an Arab man at the bustling border post at Fnidek, which is linked to Spain’s African enclave Ceuta.
Tourist Naoual Malhi is convinced it was Madeleine because the youngster had the distinctive fleck in her eye, where the pupil merges with the blue-green iris. But when she tried to challenge the Arab, Ms Malhi, 30, from Malaga in Spain, was forced to watch in horror as the taxi drove away.
She said: “I am certain it was Madeleine. She had the same mark of Madeleine that I have seen in the posters and looked exactly like her.” Mrs Malhi said she was told by police that more than 100 people had called them to report seeing the missing four-year-old in the same mountain area. She alerted police about a month ago that she had seen Madeleine with an older woman, who tried to hide the girl as she whisked her away in a battered Mercedes taxi.
Ms Malhi, who has a four-year-old daughter, was shopping in the coastal town of Fnidek during a holiday when she spotted the girl with a middle-aged woman.
“I went to Morocco on August 19. I saw Madeleine between August 22 and September 7, ” she said last night.
“I was trying to get a taxi in Fnidek at around 3pm and wanted to travel to El Housima. I saw Madeleine in the arms of a Moroccan woman who was about 50.
“I couldn’t help but notice the girl because she was so blonde and pretty. Her hair had been cut shorter but I saw her eye. I am sure it was Madeleine.” Ms Malhi said the woman hailed a taxi, which in remote areas of Morocco is often shared between passengers as a form of semi-public transport.
“The woman would not let me share the taxi, ” she said. “The driver told me she wanted it to herself.
“It was around 180 miles I wanted to travel so it would have been cheaper to share, but the woman was insistent.” Ms Malhi added that she noticed the child looked as if she had been injured recently. “She had a bruise on her forehead, ” she said.
Last month the Daily Express revealed Madeleine may have been smuggled into Africa by Moroccan traffickers using their underground network of drug runners.
Chase for 1m Madeleine bounty
From Nick Fagge in the Rif Mountains, Morocco 5 November 2007
A BRITISH businessman is offering bountyhunters a reward to find Madeleine McCann in Morocco, the Daily Express can reveal.
Unofficial tourist guides, off-duty policemen and drug dealers are scouring the country after doubleglazing millionaire Brian Kennedy put up the cash.
One of those hunting for Madeleine said he understood the reward could be up to 1million.
The businessman, from Manchester, flew to Tangier in Morocco in his private jet two months ago after a photograph taken by a Spanish tourist showed a girl strikingly similar to Madeleine being carried by a peasant woman in the north of the country.
But the sighting, in the village of Zinat in the Rif Mountains, proved to be false.
The girl, although a similar age and looking very much like Madeleine, was actually the daughter of an olive farmer.
Ali El Bouazaout, who normally works as a guide to tourists, has already travelled more than 1,000 miles in the search for the missing fouryear-old girl since meeting Mr Kennedy in September.
Speaking exclusively to the Daily Express, he said: “I have been all over Morocco looking for Madeleine – to Marrakesh, to Fez, even to the Sahara, showing her pictures to people, hoping someone will recognise her.
“And if I find her I will be rich. I have been promised I will never have to work again, maybe 1million.”
Fluent in seven languages including English, 34-year-old Ali normally makes a living translating for tourists and haggling for them at market stalls and shops and organising taxis and buses.
But the guide has become transfixed by the plight of the McCann family since working with the Find Madeleine campaign.
Ali became recruited to the hunt for Madeleine after he chanced upon Mr Kennedy, who is bankrolling the campaign to find her.
Ali said: “Brian flew into Morocco in his private jet looking for Madeleine.
“I was waiting outside the Hertz rental car company office by the airport and that is where I met him.
“I worked as his guide and translator. I went with him to Zinat to look for Madeleine but it was not her.
“Then I went with him to Rabat to the British Embassy. I know him very well.”
Mr Kennedy, 47, told the Daily Express last night: “I know Ali. He is a sweet guy.
Yes, I promised him a reward but that is not the reason he is doing this. He really wants to help. He was the guy who was involved with the first sighting in Morocco.
“He was the man who went with us to find the girl in Zinat, who turned out to look like Madeleine but was actually a Moroccan girl.”
However, after the sighting proved false, Ali continued with his personal quest to find Madeleine.
He has criss-crossed the country, travelling deep into the Sahara in the far south of the country, as well as all the major towns and cities, showing Madeleine’s picture.
He said: “I have been all over the country, more than 1,400 kilometres, showing Madeleine’s picture.”
Ali said a reward would be a happy benefit to the cause of reuniting Madeleine with her parents Kate and Gerry.
However, for other investigators in the search, it is purely a cash affair.
They include some of the many drug peddlars who offer hashish to almost every tourist who stops at petrol stations and cafes throughout the Rif Mountains.
But some of those involved in the hunt – and hoping to stake a claim to the reward – include high-ranking officers in the Moroccan police.
The police chief of one major town in the north of the country said: “And how much will you give me if I find her?
“I think she must be worth two or three million pounds, don’t you think?”
FARM TO BE SEARCHED AFTER NEW SIGHTINGS
From Nick Fagge in Karia Ba Mohamed, Morocco 5 November 2007
THE hunt for Madeleine McCann intensified last night as investigators prepared to search a farm in the Rif Mountains of Morocco.
A “little blonde girl” was said to have been spotted inside the remote walled farming compound outside the town of Karia Ba Mohamed.
Detectives called the sightings “highly credible”. The child was said to be living with an Arab woman of about 40 and a teenage girl.
Teacher Majid Jazouli, 43, told the Daily Express yesterday: “The little blonde girl was seen about a month ago at a farm on the outskirts of Karia. I sent a boy inside the compound to verify it, and he said there was a blonde girl there. I could not go in there myself because I am a stranger and that would be against our culture.”
Mr Jazouli claimed that 15 of his neighbours can back up his story.
Desperate to help find the missing four-year-old girl, he phoned the Madeleine hotline with the information.
Private detectives working for the McCanns are understood to have classed the sightings as “highly credible” and potentially crucial, particularly as they follow other sightings of the youngster entering Morocco from Spain.
But Mr Jazouli said Moroccan police failed to act swiftly to investigate the sightings.
Karia’s police chief insisted his officers had conducted a thorough search of the town’s 2,000 houses and had found nothing.
Commandant Abdul Khalik Houde said: “She is not here. We have checked for her. Why would she be here? We would know if she was. We would have been told.”
Karia Ba Mohamed is a farming town where blonde hair and Western faces are rarely seen.
Mr Houde said everyone in the town of 18,000 inabitants knows each other. However, more than 120,000 people live in the remote communities surrounding it, including many isolated farmhouses.
The police chief said he had a dossier on the search for Madeleine, who went missing from Praia da Luz in Portugal on May 3, aged three, and insisted his officers were “looking for her every day”.
But he said the investigation should focus on her parents. “We have a dossier on her and we have nothing to hide. It is the parents who are hiding things. Why are they not still coming to Portugal to look for their daughter?”
He added: “Morocco doesn’t need this. We have no crime and nothing like this. There are no paedophiles in Morocco.”
The latest breakthrough comes days after a Moroccan woman claimed she saw a little girl with the “mark of Madeleine” getting into a taxi with an Arab woman in the town of Fnidek.
Naoual Malhi, 24, who lives in Malaga, Spain said she was convinced it was Madeleine as the youngster had the distinctive fleck in her eye, where the pupil merges with the blue-green iris. But when she tried to challenge the Arab woman she was forced away.
After that sighting, agents from Spanish investigators Metodo 3 were dispatched to Morocco and posters of missing Madeleine were distributed across the country.
In a rare interview at the weekend, the agency’s managing director Francisco Marco confirmed his belief that Madeleine was abducted and taken to Morocco, .
He told Spanish newspaper La Vanguardia: “A blonde girl like Madeleine is a symbol of social status in Morocco. That is the way it is and I can tell you more, ” he said.
Metodo 3 focuses on cases of business fraud but also finds about 300 missing people each year.
Mr Marco added that Madeleine’s parents Kate and Gerry, of Rothley, Leics, were not involved in her disappearance.
Last week the agency opened a 24-hour hotline to gather information about Madeleine from callers in Spain, Portugal and Morocco.
The agency has 40 people working on the case in Spain and Morocco, and has told the McCanns that it expects to find Madeleine within six months.
Mountain folk who love their children so keen to find her
From Nick Fagge in the Rif Mountains 7 November 2007
VILLAGERS in the isolated mountains of Morocco yesterday joined police and private investigators in the search for Madeleine McCann.
As news of her disappearance reached the remoter areas, families in the Rif Mountains promised to help find her.
A sighting of a “little blonde girl” caused a flurry of excitement around the windswept town of Karia Ba Mohamed, north of the ancient city of Fez.
She was spotted inside an enclosed farm compound less than two kilometres from the town. But searches by Moroccan police and British j ournalists have failed to find the missing youngster, or another child who could be mistaken for Madeleine.
The gendarmes in the town have widened their hunt into the surrounding countryside where 100,000 live in lonely communities. Among those recruited to the Find Madeleine campaign is Louali Bushta. The unmarried farmer, 28, said: “We very happy to help.” Speaking in Arabic and surrounded by his relations, Mr Bushta added: “I have only just learned about this tragic case but my family and I will do everything to help find this little girl. We will all keep our eyes and ears open and if we see a little blonde girl I will tell the police immediately. Our farm is far from the road so we don’t see many people, but everyone we do, we remember, especially a stranger.” His father Mohammed Bushta added: “We love children. I have eight. We will be doing everything we can to help.” Another Rif Mountain dweller recently recruited to the cause is father-of-nine Mohamed Tijani.
The builder, 48, said: “I’ll tell my children about her and describe her face. And I’ll tell my neighbours back in my village about her, too. If she is here we must find her.”
No DNA on the holiday hire car
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 20 November 2007
NEW tests on the McCanns’ hire car have found no traces of their missing daughter’s DNA, it emerged last night.
Portuguese police named Kate and Gerry McCann as formal suspects in Madeleine’s disappearance in September after apparently discovering traces of her DNA – hair, body fluids and fibres – in a Renault Scenic they hired about three weeks after she disappeared.
The couple have always maintained their innocence and last night their fight to clear their names was gaining strength from the latest test results.
The tests were carried out by an independent team of Home Office-accredited pathologists whose results appear to contradict Portuguese police findings.
Last night a source close to the McCanns said: “Tests show there was no DNA evidence linked to Madeleine.”
The McCanns embarked on their own tests after the Portuguese police investigation transformed them from victims into suspects.
Their fightback has been bankrolled by home improvements tycoon Brian Kennedy, who is convinced of the couple’s innocence. Last night he confirmed the new tests had proved negative.
The multi-millionaire said: “We carried out our own tests which found no traces of Madeleine in the hire car.”
Other tests have also disproved allegations that the McCanns routinely sedated their children.
Examinations of twins Amelie and Sean’s hair found no trace of sedatives, which doctors Kate and Gerry were accused of giving their children – including Madeleine – to get them to sleep.
Mr Kennedy is also paying for Spanish private investigators, from the firm Metodo 3, which has agents working in more than three countries looking for Madeleine.
The McCanns hired the car at Faro airport to help transport friends and relatives to and from the resort of Praia da Luz.
They used the Renault to visit Spain to publicise Madeleine’s disappearance. After Portuguese police examined the car the couple parked it in a friend’s garage on the Algarve until independent tests could be conducted.
POLICE QUIZ PRIEST AGAIN
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 20 November 2007
DETECTIVES have carried out fresh searches at the church where Kate and Gerry McCann prayed for their missing daughter, it emerged yesterday.
The Roman Catholic priest who offered comfort to the distraught parents and gave the couple their own set of keys to the chapel has also been reinterviewed by investigators.
Portuguese police carried out a detailed search at Our Lady Of Light church in Praia da Luz and the surrounding area, including the old cemetery.
The operation was carried out “informally and with maximum discretion” by agents from the Policia Judiciaria as they followed up leads into possible hiding places for Madeleine’s body.
Officers “spent the day” with Father Jose Manuel Pacheco, questioning him for several hours and also visiting him at home.
Detectives want to understand the precise nature of the relationship between the McCanns and Father Jose and what involvement the 16th century church itself played during the five months the couple were in the Algarve.
The priest became a close friend and confidante of the McCanns after Madeleine’s disappearance on May 3.
The couple, who are devoted Catholics, attended Mass most Sundays and also participated in several candle-lit vigils at the tiny church.
Father Jose even gave the couple, from Rothley, Leics, their own set of keys so they could pray in private whenever they wished.
He has since been reprimanded by the church authorities for allowing himself to get so close to the couple.
The Bishop of the Algarve, Dom Manuel Quintas, was particularly critical of his decision to give church keys to the McCanns.
Father Jose has previously said he felt “deceived” in connection with the investigation but has never clarified what he meant by this statement.
A friend of Father Jose yesterday said the priest had changed since the Madeleine affair, which had deeply affected him. He has moved out of the clerical house he used to share with other priests in the parish and now lives with his elderly parents.
He has also almost completely stopped going out. The friend said:
“Whenever anybody talks about Madeleine he steers the talk on to other subjects. He has stopped going to all the places he used to go, especially the coffee shops.
“There are two completely different Pachecos, the one before the McCanns and the one after.”
The latest searches took place two weeks ago on the orders of Paulo Rebelo, Portugal’s second most senior policeman, who took over the investigation last month.
He has re-examined the entire case and even ordered a re-enactment of the night Madeleine went missing from the family’s holiday apartment.
Detectives visited Father Jose at his parents’ home in Odiaxere, about 10 miles from Praia da Luz and close to the Barragem da Bravura lake which detectives searched last month for the body of the missing four-year-old girl.
Officers then followed the priest to the church in a separate car in order to be discreet and avoid unwanted attention.
Last night it was unclear whether Father Jose had been asked to make a formal statement as a witness in the case or if officers had searched his home.
It is possible they asked him if he had ever taken confession from either of the McCanns, although Father Jose has previously said he would never reveal anything he had been told during confession.
Police sources have said in the past that they believe Madeleine to be dead and “either on the bottom of the ocean or in the church”. Some officers believe that the toddler died after an accident in the holiday apartment and that her body was disposed of more than three weeks later.
It has been suggested the body was hidden in the church or its grounds and then taken away in the boot of the McCanns’ Renault Scenic hire car.
However, after more than 200 days since Madeleine’s disappearance, Portuguese police insist that all avenues of inquiry remain open.
Gang smuggled Madeleine
From Nick Fagge in Silves 21 November 2007
A NEW witness saw Madeleine McCann being handed over to a professional gang who smuggled her out of Portugal to Morocco, police believe.
The witness called a detective agency to tell them he saw a woman “deliver” a little blonde girl who looked just like Madeleine.
The handover took place in the town of Silves 48 hours after Madeleine vanished. The woman gave the child to a man, who put her in his car.
A source at the detective agency said: “The witness later identified the woman as Michaela Walczuch after he was shown some pictures. He phoned us with his report about two to three weeks ago.” Walczuch is the lover of police suspect Robert Murat.
The detectives believe that the caller, a Portuguese lorry driver, was witnessing the handover of Madeleine to a Moroccan paedophile gang.
And they are working on the theory that the youngster was taken to the north African country either directly on a boat from Portugal or via Spain on the ferry to Tangier.
Silves is 25 miles from Praia da Luz, where Madeleine was snatched from the McCanns’ apartment.
But it is close to Portimao, where dozens of ocean-faring boats are moored. There is also a mountain road from there to Spain.
The source at the Metodo 3 private detective agency told the Daily Express: “We received a call from someone who said they had seen Madeleine two days after she went missing.
“The caller said they saw Madeleine in the inland town of Silves. We think it could have been the moment Madeleine was handed over by the original kidnappers. .
“We are working on the theory that Madeleine was spotted as an easy target on the demands of a local gang and stolen to order.
“But because of all the publicity she became too hot to handle and she was either passed on or they sold her.” The events in Silves took place down a small country road on the outskirts of the town on May 5. The trucker made contact with the detective agency to say he was struck by the fact that the child was wrapped in a blanket on such a hot day.
The witness said he saw a fair-haired and fair-skinned woman handing over the child in a blanket or a shawl.
He described the woman as northern European and driving an “extremely distinctive” car. Detectives have described the vehicle, a hire car, as very unusual in Portugal in terms of its make, model and colour.
Last night a spokesman for the McCanns said the Find Madeleine Campaign was treating the new sighting seriously, but added that this was just one line of inquiry.
But a source close to the detective agency claims police are set to make arrests within weeks.
MADELEINE – I SAW HER WITH MURAT’S GIRL IN MOROCCO
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 21 November 2007
ROBERT Murat’s lover was seen in Morocco minutes after Madeleine McCann was spotted nearby, it was claimed yesterday.
A tourist who saw a little blonde girl being dragged across the street there by an Arab woman on June 15 says she also saw Michaela Walczuch in the same town that day.
Isabel Gonzalez, 60, who made the alleged sightings in the northeastern town of Zaio, insisted yesterday: “I have always been convinced the girl I saw in Morocco was Madeleine.
“Now I am equally sure the blonde woman I saw that day in the town was Murat’s girlfriend.” Walczuch, whose lover Murat was the first suspect named over Madeleine’s disappearance, has been identified as the woman seen passing a little blonde girl to a man in Portugal two days after she vanished on May 3.
Mrs Gonzalez and her husband scoured the town after they thought they saw Madeleine.
The Spanish mother of six said: “It was then that I saw the European-looking couple. It was a blonde woman and a very paleskinned man with dark hair. They seemed completely out of place as the town is very remote and everyone else there was Moroccan.” She identified the woman as German-born Walczuch after seeing television news reports linking Murat’s lover to the youngster’s disappearance earlier this week.
She added: “After seeing the news reports I am convinced the woman was Murat’s girlfriend.
“I never saw the blonde woman with Madeleine but I have always connected the two events.” Mrs Gonzalez told the McCanns’ private detective agency, Metodo 3, of her suspicions on Monday.
Mother-of-one Walczuch, 34, vigorously denies any involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance and has described such claims as “ridiculous”.
Murat also insists he is innocent.
Mrs Gonzalez said: “I saw a little blonde girl being dragged across the street by a north African woman wearing a headscarf. I immediately thought, ‘That is Madeleine’.
“But by the time we stopped the car and jumped out, the woman and girl had disappeared.
“My husband and I began searching the streets.” She then spotted the European couple, who she claims vanished after the man saw her.
A source at Metodo 3 said yesterday: “We are looking into the claims. It may be that Walczuch can prove she was in Portugal at the time but we must examine every lead.” Metodo 3 chief Francisco Marco thinks Madeleine is in Morocco. Agents are continuing to look for her in the remote villages of the Rif Mountains.
Last night the McCanns’ spokesman said: “We are keeping an open mind about this.” Moroccan police have told the Daily Express they think Madeleine was brought into the country by a gang of peoplesmugglers. Police chief Abdelkada Chouhou said: “We believe the woman involved is a known Spanish smuggler who has links with Zaio.
“This woman holds the key and we continue to look for her.” There have been four reported sightings of Madeleine in Morocco.
One near the town of Zinat turned out to be Bushra Binhisa, the threeyear-old daughter of a farmer. Another was next to a petrol station in Marrakesh days after Madeleine went missing from Praia da Luz.
A British tourist also reported seeing a youngster with a strong likeness the same day outside the Ibis Hotel next to a petrol station. The girl involved has never been found.
Don’t obstruct probe, private eyes told
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 22 November 2007
POLICE in Portugal have warned private detectives not to interfere with their probe into Madeleine’s disappearance The Spanish agency Metodo 3 hired by her parents claim they are following up new leads and are “very close” to cracking the case since the McCanns recruited them in September.
But the Portuguese authorities have described the detectives as “small fry” who are now only going over old ground and could even jeopardise the investigation.
A source close to the Policia Judiciaria said: “We know the Spanish detectives are here and what they are doing. But they are ineffectual and without credibility.
“They can be in Portugal as long as they don’t interfere. Agents from Metodo 3 can speak to neighbours or whoever they like as long as they do not do a formal investigation.
“If they speak to any witness who has been named in this case or gain access to any evidence relating to the case they are committing a crime and could be obstructing justice.” Metodo 3 currently has up to 40 agents working in countries including Portugal, Spain, France, the UK and Morocco. It has received 1,300 calls to the Madeleine hot-line from as far afield as Mexico and Australia.
The firm is believed to be charging 2,000 a day for its services and has been signed for six months. Boss Francisco Marco has said he is “100 per cent sure” Madeleine is alive and in Morocco.
Last night the McCanns’ spokesman Clarence Mitchell said: “We have every confidence in M3′s abilities. Everything it does is within the law.”
MADELEINE – MCCANNS ARE STILL THE MAIN SUSPECTS
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 22 November 2007
POLICE in Portugal are to halt their inquiry into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann though her parents remain prime suspects.
Detectives will pull out by Christmas “unless a new piece of evidence falls out of the sky”, sources close to the Policia Judiciaria said yesterday. If the case is closed, the shadow of suspicion could be left hanging over Kate and Gerry McCann for life.
A police source said: “Detectives are getting ready to pack their bags.
We are practically back where we started. The parents are still the prime suspects in hiding their daughter’s body, not of her death which was probably accidental, but there is no firm proof.” Officers believe that Madeleine will never be found.
They are still waiting for full results of forensic tests on the McCanns’ hire car and holiday flat in Praia da Luz, from where Madeleine vanished on May 3, aged three.
But whatever the results, they are not expected to alter detectives’ belief that Madeleine is dead and that their parents played a role.
A list of calls made by the McCanns on the day Madeleine vanished is also still awaited by police in Portugal.
Paulo Rebelo, one of Portugal’s most senior detectives, took over the investigation from disgraced former chief investigator Goncalo Amaral seven weeks ago.
But the new team said to feature some of the country’s best detectives has so far failed to turn up any more leads on Madeleine’s whereabouts.
The police source added: “Given the current state of the investigation, police chiefs are considering demobilising the team sent specifically to investigate the case and are even planning on moving Paulo Rebelo on to tasks of greater responsibility.” Another police source, quoted in Portuguese daily newspaper 24 Horas, added: “No proof has been collected up until now that incriminates anybody. The laboratory results received up until now do not allow us to reach any conclusions.” PJ director Alipio Ribeiro has recently admitted that there may never be arrests over Madeleine’s disappearance.
He said in an interview: “I still don’t know if there are going to be any arrests. A criminal investigation cannot produce miracles. We still do not have the solution.” Last night the McCanns’ spokesman Clarence Mitchell urged detectives not to abandon their search for Madeleine.
He said: “We hope that the Portuguese police are continuing their investigations thoroughly and will not stop until they have established the truth over Madeleine’s disappearance. We want her returned as soon as possible.
“Our own private investigators continue to work closely with the Portuguese police, and hope they will maintain whatever level of manpower necessary to ensure she is returned safe and well.” An end to the investigation was described as the “worstcase scenario” by the McCanns. A family friend said: “The worst thing that could happen is for the case to close and Gerry and Kate to remain official suspects.” Robert Murat, the third arguido or official suspect, would also be left in limbo.
Earlier this month it was claimed Portuguese police had scaled back their investigation as they were running out of money. The six-month probe is known to have put them under immense financial pressure.
The McCanns have brought in their own investigators after lawyers claimed leads were not being properly followed up.
And it has been reported that the McCanns would have a legal case to sue the Portuguese police for up to 1million for failing to find their daughter and for bungling the investigation.
The couple believe a string of errors in the early stages of the probe allowed Madeleine’s abductor to escape. Detectives named Kate and Gerry as suspects in September after sniffer dogs reportedly discovered the scent of death in the couple’s hire car and microscopic traces of blood were found at their holiday flat.
The McCanns and their friends all strenuously deny any involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance.
Why Madeleine is probably dead by top law officer
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 3 November 2007
THE parents of Madeleine McCann suffered fresh heartache yesterday when Portugal’s most senior law officer said she was almost certainly dead.
The Attorney General claimed it would have been “natural” for an abductor to kill her.
He delivered his verdict as part of a brutal assessment of the missing four-year-old’s chances of survival.
Police have already admitted they think Madeleine was most likely killed by accident by Kate and Gerry McCann, who later hid the body with the help of their friends.
But in a thinly-veiled attack on the publicity created by the McCanns after Madeleine vanished, law chief Fernando Jose Pinto Monteiro said it would have turned her into a liability if she had been abducted.
The Attorney General said: “There’s a greater possibility of the girl being dead than alive. If it is an abduction it would be normal for the abductor to have killed her.
“Would an abductor with all this publicity and with the whole world having Maddie’s photo still demand a ransom?” Reinforcing the belief among police that the case may never be solved, he said: “If you asked me at this moment in time if I was going to discover anything, I’d have to say ‘I don’t know’. This sort of crime is extremely difficult to solve.”
Mr Pinto Monteiro’s comments were seen as the clearest sign yet that the authorities fear Madeleine will never be found alive and those behind her disappearance will escape justice.
Detectives have admitted that the chances of finding her alive are slim but they have never been so openly pessimistic as the Attorney General.
Last night the McCanns’ spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, said: “We still firmly believe that Madeleine is alive. Making these comments is entirely unhelpful.
“From our point of view, in the absence of any evidence to the contrary, the possibility that Madeleine is alive and being held somewhere is still valid.” He added: “Our investigators are working on that basis. They, too, have stated that they are confident they will find her alive soon.” The family have called in a team of private detectives, Spanish agency Metodo 3, whose boss says he believes Madeleine is alive and most likely being held in Morocco.
Mr Pinto Monteiro insisted that the police investigation was not directed at proving Madeleine died by accident at the hands of her parents, who then recruited their friends to help hide the body.
This is believed to be the main theory being followed by detectives after a thorough review of the work carried out by the head of the original investigation. But Mr Pinto Monteiro said: “I analysed the case and all leads are to be followed. All lines of inquiry are being pursued. There’s not one that excludes the others.” The Attorney General also refuted claims by police that the inquiry is being hampered by lack of money.
He insisted: “More resources have been spent on this case than any other.
In 40 years as a magistrate I have never seen such a high-profile case.
“It’s a great pity we are a country with a few of these cases, about a dozen, and in this one we have done everything.” Meanwhile, staff at the Ocean Club resort where the family were staying at Praia da Luz are being re-interviewed by police in an attempt to discover the truth about the hours before Madeleine disappeared.
Detectives are “discreetly” questioning employees at the complex where Madeleine vanished on May 3.
Investigators want the answers for “100 questions” they have drawn up following alleged inconsistencies in statements made by Kate and Gerry McCann and their friends.
In particular, they remain intrigued about who Kate McCann was referring to when she screamed “they’ve taken her, they’ve taken her” when she first discovered Madeleine was missing.
Now Murat lover’s alibi is trashed by church
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 24 November 2007
ROBERT Murat’s lover has been accused of inventing her alibi for the night Madeleine McCann went missing.
Michaela Walczuch has said she was “miles away” at a Jehovah’s Witnesses meeting.
But the Daily Express can reveal she had been barred from the meetings months before and kicked out of the church because of her adulterous relationship with British expatriate Murat.
Church elder Teofilo Castela said Walczuch, 34, was “cast aside” after falling foul of their strict rules.
But he also revealed how Portuguese detectives had not bothered to test her alibi by talking to any of the Jehovah’s Witnesses in Lagos, near Praia da Luz where Madeleine was kidnapped.
Brother Teofilo said: “There was some problem with the rules and Michaela was cast aside.
“She used to come to our church but it was before this year. The church has certain rules and they must not be broken.” Speaking before the weekly Thursday night meeting in Lagos, he added: “I haven’t been interviewed by the police. They haven’t been here.” Brother Teofilo’s revelations were backed up by members of the 100strong congregation. One woman said: “I haven’t seen Michaela all year. She’s been thrown out.” The spotlight fell on German-born Walczuch after numerous sightings linked her to the case.
A Portuguese truck driver said he saw a woman passing a child fitting Madeleine’s description to a man on a country road two days after she vanished.
Private detectives believe he was witnessing the handover of Madeleine from her kidnapper to a paedophile gang in Silves, 25 miles from Praia da Luz, where she was snatched from the McCanns’ apartment.
Agents are working on the theory that she was taken to Morocco by boat from Portugal or via Spain on the ferry to Tangier. A Spanish tourist has claimed she saw Walczuch in the remote Moroccan town of Zaio the day she spotted Madeleine there.
And British tourist Graham Desuys said he saw her staring at his four-year-old niece in Praia da Luz a month before Madeleine disappeared.
Walczuch, who has dismissed these claims as “ridiculous”, was unavailable for comment yesterday when asked by the Daily Express about discrepancies in her alibi.
Murat’s lawyer Francisco Pagarate yesterday repeated Walczuch’s alibi when confronted by the information from the Jehovah’s Witnesses.
He said: “Michaela says she was at the Portuguese congregation in Lagos on May 3, then started attending the British congregation in Portimao.” Portuguese police kept Walczuch under surveillance for a week before she was questioned about Madeleine on May 14.
Investigators were interested in the bizarre love triangle of Murat, Walczuch and her estranged husband Luis Antonio.
Murat started a relationship with the property saleswoman after they embarked on a business venture.
He even moved into the marital home for six months while Luis Antonio, a 47-year-old pool-cleaner, continued to live with their eightyear-old daughter. The affair was blamed for the breakdown of Murat’s 11-year marriage.
Walczuch and Antonio were hauled back for questioning a second time on May 24, but released without charge.
They still live together in Lagos with their daughter.
MADELEINE – MUM FACES TEN YEARS IN JAIL
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 24 November 2007
THE mother of Madeleine McCann could be jailed for up to 10 years for abandoning her children, it emerged last night.
Kate and her husband Gerry face being put behind bars even if they are cleared of any involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance.
A lawyer yesterday accused the couple of committing the crime of child abandonment simply by leaving their three children alone in their holiday apartment in Praia da Luz.
Under Portuguese law, the maximum penalty is 10 years in prison if the victim is a dependant and dies as a result of being abandoned. Lawyer Jose Olimpio, aged 42, said: “The fact the McCanns were made arguidos means that there are justified suspicions against them of committing a crime.” Mr Olimpio claimed the Portuguese penal code states that placing a person’s life in danger by abandoning them is punishable with a jail sentence of between one and five years.
But the sentence rises to between three and 10 years if the victim is a child and the crime is committed by a parent or guardian.
The McCanns have admitted regularly leaving their children Madeleine, Sean and Amelie alone in their apartment at the Ocean Club while they went for dinner with friends.
But last night their official spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, said: “They have committed no offence under Portuguese, British or any country’s laws.” News of the possible charges came as the couple faced a further setback in the fight to clear their names over accusations that they were involved in Madeleine’s disappearance.
Reports in Portugal claimed it could be a further six months before they are re-interviewed by police, although the 39-year-old doctors from Rothley, Leicestershire, say they are ready to be quizzed again about Madeleine’s disappearance on May 3.
But the official process to allow detectives to interrogate them is progressing at “a snail’s pace” because of red tape.
Madeleine’s parents refused to answer up to 40 questions in a gruelling set of interviews with police in Portugal when they were named as arguidos or formal suspects in September.
The couple faced accusations that Madeleine died as a result of an accident and they disposed of her body with the help of their friends. Police believe re-interviewing the couple and their seven holiday friends could provide the key to unlocking the Madeleine mystery.
Detectives have prepared a legal letter outlining 100 questions for the McCanns, their friends and relatives.
But it must now pass through a complicated chain of officials before the questions can be put to them in fresh interviews in Britain.
The local state prosecutor is at the moment waiting for forensic test results from a Birmingham laboratory before sending the letter on to a judge.
The judge will in turn send it to the Attorney General in Lisbon. It will then pass through the Justice Ministry to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who will pass it on to the British Foreign Office.
But the complicated process does not stop there. The Foreign Office will send it to the Ministry of Justice, who will pass it on to the Lord Chancellor’s office before British police are asked to carry out the interview.
The scale of the convoluted legal process became clear a day after Portugal’s Attorney General said Madeleine was almost certainly dead.
I saw man like Murat try to kidnap a child
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 26 November 2007
A MAN resembling suspect Robert Murat tried to snatch a child from the apartment where Madeleine McCann went missing, a new witness has claimed.
A British nanny has told police that she caught the intruder trying to climb through the ground floor window while a baby slept inside.
In a statement to detectives she described him as looking like Murat, 34, who was named as an official suspect after Madeleine vanished on May 3.
The woman, who asked not to be named, had left a baby sleeping in the apartment at the Ocean Club in Praia da Luz. She returned and scared off the prowler.
She has given details of the incident in December last year to Metodo 3, the Spanish private detective agency hired by the McCanns, to find their daughter.
Investigators are working on her description of a man in his thirties with dark hair. They are understood to have shown the nanny photos of British expat Murat and are certain it is the same man.
A source linked to Metodo 3 said that the nanny told detectives she caught a man trying to climb in through a window of apartment 5A – the apartment later occupied by the McCanns.
“He was trying to get in through the exact same window which police believe Madeleine’s abductors may have used. She gave a detailed description of the man who the detectives say is identical to Robert Murat, ” said the source.
Kate and Gerry McCann, both 39, have always believed they were stalked by a predator or gang who abducted Madeleine 207 days ago.
Expat property developer Murat was named as an arguido – or official suspect – following 12 hours of interrogation. But yesterday he repeated his denials and urged the McCanns to intervene to stop what he regards as a smear campaign against him and his lover Michaela Walczuch, 32.
Mother-of-one Walczuch – whose estranged husband Luis Antonio previously worked at the Ocean Club – fell under suspicion after witnesses said they had seen her with Madeleine, who was three when she vanished.
A Portuguese lorry driver said that he spotted Walczuch on May 5 with the youngster in the town of Silves – 12 miles from where she was last seen. A second witness – a Spanish tourist – came forward to claim she spotted Walczuch in a remote Moroccan village where she saw Madeleine being dragged by an Arab woman.
The alibi Walczuch has given for night Madeleine went missing has also been thrown into doubt. She said she had been at a Jehovah’s Witness meeting but members said she had been cast out months before for breaking strict rules.
Last night a friend insisted she was at the meeting near her home in Lagos after being welcomed back by the group. He said: “If there was any doubt about her story or suspicion she would have been made an arguida. She is not and has not been made an official suspect.
“Metodo 3 detectives have alleged twice now that she was seen transferring a child from a car.
They have not attempted to speak to Michaela or Robert at any time.
It would seem they are making huge accusations without much substance.”
The friend added: “Why are they building the hopes of parents who are distraught over losing their daughter and making accusations against a lady who is not involved, is a mother herself and has been helpful in answering questions and providing police with information as to her whereabouts, which clearly shows she has had no involvement in this at all.
“The unsubstantiated lies are destroying her life, it is crumbling down before her eyes. She is very vulnerable and this is pushing her to the brink of despair.”
Last night Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns’ official spokesman said the couple had not spoken publicly about Murat or anyone being investigated. They would continue to refuse to comment during the inquiry. He said: “We continue to work closely with Metodo 3 and collectively we are always careful about what detail enters the public domain for operational reasons.”
DNA SECRETS LOCKED AWAY
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 27 November 2007
CRUCIAL evidence which could point the finger of suspicion at Kate and Gerry McCann is being kept under lock and key, it was revealed last night .DNA tests are said to undermine their claims that they had nothing to do with the disappearance of their daughter Madeleine.
A piece of lining from the couple’s hire car is being held in highsecurity storage at a laboratory in Birmingham.
It is there that tests into DNA particles allegedly linking the McCanns to Madeleine’s death have been carried out.
The disclosure, made by sources within the laboratory, undermines claims by the couple that their own tests have cleared them of involvement in the four-year-old girl’s disappearance.
Last week sources close to the McCanns told the Daily Express that examinations of the couple’s Renault Scenic hire car – in which Madeleine’s body is alleged to have been carried – discovered “no DNA evidence linked to Madeleine”.
These tests were made by an independent team of Home Office accredited pathologists whose results appear to contradict completely Portuguese police findings.
But yesterday sources within the laboratory of the Forensic Science Service said key evidence from the car – a piece of its boot lining – is being kept locked away and the McCanns’ scientists have had no access to it.
It is claimed this means that the results from the couple’s own DNA tests cannot absolve them because they were carried out on the wrong material.
Last night the McCanns’ official spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, confirmed that a piece of evidence had been retained by the Forensic Science Service but added that this did not alter the couple’s position.
Mr Mitchell said: “We do not believe that this affects the results of our tests at all.
“They were extremely thorough and covered all aspects of the vehicle. The piece retained by the Forensic Science Service is extremely small. If anything has been found on it there is a wholly innocent explanation for it.”
Several other pieces of crucial forensic material are also being kept in the highsecurity storage facility at the laboratory in Birmingham, it is claimed.
Leaks from the Portuguese police maintain that these official tests discovered traces of Madeleine’s bodily fluids and hair in the back of the car.
Detectives in the Algarve see this as highly significant because the car was rented 25 days after she vanished and was one of the main reasons police directed their investigation towards the parents.
No official statement has ever been made on these forensic examinations which were carried out at the British laboratory at the request of the Portuguese authorities.
But within hours of the first batch of results arriving in Portugal, both Kate and Gerry McCann were called in for questioning and were named as arguidos – official suspects.
A second set of test results, which are understood to have supported the initial conclusions, were subsequently sent to detectives in the Algarve.
The McCanns have always maintained there are innocent explanations for any traces of Madeleine in the car because her DNA could have been transferred via her clothes or toys. But these suggestions have been dismissed by detectives, claim sources close to the investigation.
They point out that the highly-regarded scientists conducting the tests take such possibilities into account.
Detectives also emphasise that the scientists are able to distinguish between DNA which has been deposited directly from a body and that which has been passed on via a secondary source such as clothing.
The official forensic tests are also understood to have found traces of Madeleine’s blood at the Mark Warner holiday apartment in Praia da Luz where she disappeared. Speciallytrained sniffer dogs detected the scent of death on Kate McCann’s clothes, in the hire car and at the apartment.
However, Portuguese police sources say forensic test results are rarely enough to press charges and add that other evidence is usually needed.
The McCanns deny any involvement in their daughter’s disappearance.
Last week their lawyer, Edward Smethurst, said he believed it was “highly unlikely” that charges would ever be brought against the couple.
Madeleine has now been missing for 208 days.
She vanished from the family apartment in Praia da Luz on May 3 while her parents were dining with friends at a nearby tapas bar.
As she was being tucked up in bed, she said: “Mummy, I’ve had the best day ever. I’m having lots and lots of fun.”
Last week father Gerry again used his online blog to emphasise his belief that she was abducted and “is still out there somewhere”.
Countryside search for body
Nick Fagge 28 November 2007
POLICE in Portugal have carried out fresh searches for Madeleine’s body or a place she could have been hidden in countryside surrounding Praia da Luz.
The Policia Judiciaria has refused to reveal the exact locations, and inquiries continue.
But a police source said the searches were “not near the villa” from where Madeleine disappeared. He added: “The searches were conducted outside of Praia da Luz. They are looking in the countryside.” Another source close to the investigation said operations took place on Friday and Sunday “in the area of Praia da Luz”.
Detectives are believed to have identified a number of locations several miles away from the Algarve resort, in countryside between the towns of Lagos and Portimao.
Sources said the theory that Madeleine was killed by an intruder at the villa, who then disposed of her body elsewhere, was gaining strength at the centre of the investigation. A PJ source said: “Detectives weren’t looking specifically for Madeleine’s body but were also investigating premises where it could have been left.” Dotted with remote farms, the mountainous terrain inland from the coast near Praia da Luz would provide a perfect hiding place. Virgin forest grows up to the edge of the few tarmac roads and uncharted dirt tracks lead out into an apparently endless wilderness. Small villages are surrounded by a network of ploughed fields and rivers wind through the few towns.
MADELEINE – MCCANNS SHOULD BE ‘CURSED’ SAYS LAWYER
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 28 November 2007
KATE and Gerry McCann were y esterday told they deserve to b e “cursed” in an astonishing attack by a lawyer.
The solicitor acting for Robert Murat, the first official suspect after their daughter Madeleine vanished, condemned them for leaving their children alone in their holiday apartment.
Francisco Pagarete said Murat and his lover, Michaela Walczuch, are having their names dragged through the mud on a daily basis.
But Madeleine’s grief-stricken parents are “swanning around with bulging bank balances.” He then accused the couple of hypocrisy for saying the Portuguese police were the best in the world before they were made official suspects and the worst afterwards.
The outspoken lawyer also branded the Spanish private detectives hired by the family as “mercenaries”, and accused them of trying to make witnesses change their statements.
In his blistering attack on the McCanns which was published yesterday in the respected newspaper 24 Horas, he raged: “The McCanns deserve to be cursed to pay for leaving three children unprotected.” He added: “I’m just sorry that there are people out there ready to feed a couple who abandoned their three children and strutted round the streets daily. On top of that, with bulging bank accounts.
“In the meantime my client, his mum and his girlfriend, who have nothing to do with this case, are seeing their names dragged through the mud on a daily basis.
“Before they were made official suspects, the Policia Judiciaria were the best in the world and after they became the worst.” Turning on the detective agency Metodo 3 hired by the McCanns, he said: “Metodo 3 should be charging 10 times more than they are to wage this defamatory campaign against my client. Any other private investigator would be charging thousands of pounds.” His words have struck a cord with many in Portugal who fail to understand why the 39-year-old doctors regularly left their children Madeleine, now four, and twins Sean and Amelie, two alone in their apartment while they ate at a tapas bar.
Portuguese children, no matter how young, routinely accompany their parents to restaurants and are allowed to stay up late.
Metodo 3 claims a lorry driver identified German-born Walczuch as the woman seen handing a child in a blanket to a man in the nearby town of Silves two days after Madeleine vanished.
Detectives have said they believe this was the moment she was passed from her original kidnappers to a paedophile gang.
The agency claims to have interviewed a British nanny who identified a man who tried to snatch a baby from the same apartment that Madeleine disappeared from six months earlier.
The firm’s founder, Marita Fernandez, told a Spanish newspaper that she thought expat property developer Murat knew more about the case than he was letting on.
But yesterday Mr Pagarete said the company was breaking Portuguese criminal secrecy laws by talking to official witnesses and accused them of trying to make witnesses change their statements.
He said: “The Metodo 3 investigators are mercenaries. The people from Metodo 3 have spoken to everyone, including witnesses.
“They have worked in Portugal, they’re pressurising witnesses and no one does anything.
“They are constantly pursuing my client and his girlfriend and they no longer have a private life.
This is simply unacceptable in a democratic country.” Private investigators are allowed to work in Portugal. But they are not permitted to approach witnesses or official suspects. However, a spokesman for Portugal’s attorney general said he was not aware that any official witnesses had been approached by Metodo 3 agents.
The firm was yesterday described as “one of the best” and praised for it’s professionalism by Spain’s Association of Private Detectives.
A spokesman said: “It has received prizes from several different bodies, including the ministry of the interior.” Last night the McCanns’ official spokesman, Clarence Mitchell said: “We are not going to get into an argument with Robert Murat’s lawyer.
“All we will say is that Senor Pagarete should keep his views to himself and concentrate on representing Mr Murat.
“I would remind him that the McCanns have committed no offence in either Portuguese or British law, and to throw about such accusations is as abusive as it is unhelpful.
“Metodo 3 retain our full confidence and are working diligently within the law in every country they are in to find Madeleine.”
Madeleine ‘seen at marina’
Nick Fagge 28 November 2007
A BRITISH expat says he saw Madeleine McCann being dragged towards a marina by a “very suspicious” couple, just hours after she vanished, it was reported last night.
Businessman George Burke says he saw a small girl resembling Madeleine being hauled along by a “viciouslooking” man and woman, as he drove past Lagos marina in the early morning of May 4, just eight hours after she vanished.
He said: “It was dark and they were hurrying towards the marina. There was no one else around at the time and they looked very suspicious.” Mr Burke, who is from Liverpool but lives in Portugal, reported the sighting to Portuguese police but said they did not take him seriously. He is now being quizzed by the McCanns’ private detectives who say the sighting may be crucial.
The claims came as it was revealed that police in Portugal have carried out fresh searches for Madeleine’s body or a place she could have been hidden in countryside surrounding Praia da Luz.
The Policia Judiciaria has refused to reveal the exact locations, and inquiries continue.
Detectives are believed to have identified a number of locations several miles away from the Algarve resort, in countryside between the towns of Lagos and Portimao.
Sources said the theory that Madeleine was killed by an intruder at the villa, who then disposed of her body elsewhere, was gaining strength at the centre of the investigation.
1million fund running out of cash
Nick Fagge 29 November 2007
THE resources of the Find Madeleine Campaign are rapidly dwindling it emerged yesterday amid concern about how long the hunt for the missing four year old can go on.
Cash poured in during the first weeks after the youngster vanished from the Ocean Club apartment in Praia da Luz on the night of May 3.
And donations have now reached 1,095,223.50, according to the fund’s official website yesterday. But a large proportion of that will be used to pay for the sixmonth contract with Spanish private detectives Metodo 3.
The Barcelona-based firm have signed a 50,000-amonth deal which will result in a final bill of 300,000.
This equates to about 2,000-a-day for a 25-day working month, including expenses.
McCann spokesman Clarence Mitchell told Portuguese newspaper 24 Horas: “The fund has been used to search for Madeleine. These things are not free.
“Kate and Gerry will use that money until it runs out.” He added: “From the start they have been very optimistic of finding her. Metodo 3 director Francisco Marco has said he is convinced that his operation will succeed.” Mr Mitchell confirmed that the flow of cash has dried up to a trickle, but he said there is enough for a further few months. Other expenses include poster campaigns in Spain and elsewhere.
There will also be more publicity in Portugal. And a new publicity drive is expected in Morocco, where detectives believe Madeleine is most likely being held.
The fund raised around 450,000 a month after its launch, but this is now around 30,000 a month.
There was a huge drop after the couple, both 39, were named official suspects in September. And there was another cash crisis in October after it emerged they had used donations to pay the 2,000 per month mortgage on their 600,000 home in Rothley, Leicestershire.
However, the salary of Mr Mitchell, former BBC presenter and Foreign Office press officer said to be 75,000 a year is being paid by millionaire benefactor, homeimprovement tycoon Brian Kennedy who has also offered free legal services.
Madeleine: ‘Someone’s holding back the truth’
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 29 November 2007
KATE and Gerry McCann are behind a deliberate campaign of misinformation about the disappearance of their daughter, it was claimed yesterday.
In a thinly veiled attack on the couple and their private investigators, a high-ranking police source in Portugal rubbished recent “sightings” of Madeleine and accused them of trying to suppress the truth about events on May 3.
“Someone is trying to deviate attention about what really happened that night, ” says the source in Portuguese daily newspaper 24 Horas yesterday.
It is claimed that detectives have spent weeks pouring over media reports of worldwide sightings, including Morocco and Bosnia.
And the report says the authorities now believe details of the sightings have been leaked to the British press by agents working on behalf of the McCanns to discredit the official police investigation. The source told 24 Horas: “We have analysed all the information reaching the public.
None of the reports indicating sightings of the McCanns’ daughter have been confirmed.
“And there’s also someone who wants to bring down an investigation that has been carried out honestly and rigorously.” The source close to the Policia Judiciaria (PJ) investigation countered claims that the Portuguese police are determined to “nail” the McCanns for their daughter’s disappearance.
He said: “The PJ doesn’t want an innocent person to be taken prisoner. It’s just trying to find out the truth. And that’s the direction it will continue working in.” The latest “sighting” is from a British expat who says he saw Madeleine being dragged towards a marina by a “very suspicious” couple eight hours after she vanished.
Businessman George Burke says he saw a small girl resembling Madeleine being hauled along by a “vicious-looking” man and woman as he drove past Lagos marina five miles from Praia da Luz in the early morning of May 4.
Last week it emerged that a Portuguese lorry driver told police he saw a girl being handed over by a blonde woman to a man in the town of Silves on May 5.
Private investigators believe this was the moment the four year old was passed from her original kidnapper to a paedophile gang who whisked her to Morocco.
The trucker is said to have identified Michaela Walczuch, the lover of official suspect Robert Murat, as the blonde woman handing over the youngster on the country road.
Spanish tourist Isabel Gonzalez has claimed she saw Jehovah’s Witness Walczuch, 32, in Morocco in June, just moments after she noticed a little blonde girl whom she is convinced was Madeleine. And a British nanny has identified expat property developer Murat, 34, as the man she saw trying to snatch a baby from the same holiday apartment that the McCanns booked six months later.
Murat and Walczuch both deny any involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance. And Francisco Pagarete, Murat’s lawyer, has accused the McCanns of trying to frame his client and his friends.
The official Portuguese police investigation continues to focus on the theory that Madeleine died in the apartment as the result of an accident, and that the McCanns hid the body and recruited friends into covering their tracks.
Kate and Gerry McCann, both 39, from Rothley, Leicestershire, vigorously deny being involved in their daughter’s disappearance.
MADELEINE – POLICE IN MAKE OR BREAK SUMMIT
Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz and Martin Stote in Rothley 29 November 2007
POLICE flew to Britain yesterday to v iew evidence which could condemn or clear Madeleine McCann’s parents of involvement in her disappearance.
The visit dubbed a DNA summit is crucial to Portuguese detectives who have accused the doctors of being directly involved in the four-year-old’s death.
The decision by the team, which includes the second in command of Portugal’s forensic science service, caught the McCanns and their lawyers completely by surprise.
The team want to be briefed on the precise methods used by the British scientists who analysed the forensic evidence which led to the McCanns being named as arguidos, or official suspects, in September, a police source revealed yesterday. He said: “The investigators are hugely anxious. It is hoped that the tests are conclusive this time.
“The meeting with UK forensic experts will enable investigators to see what’s already been analysed and find out what information is already available from the results the English scientists obtained.” The meeting, due to start first thing this morning, was expected to analyse in fine detail the implications of the results of DNA evidence from the couple’s holiday apartment and hire car.
The strength of the evidence, which has been the subject of widespread speculation, will help detectives to decide if the McCanns have a case to answer.
The Portuguese prosecutor will rely on this heavily as he composes a letter to Leicestershire police, in which he may ask them to reinterview the McCanns and their friends, and explain the exact nature of the further questions he wants them to face.
The four-man team is made up of Inspector Ricardo Praia, a detective with the investigative Policia Judiciaria, two police forensic science experts and the vice-president of Portugal’s National Pathology Institute, Francisco Corte Real.
They will meet senior officials from the Forensic Science Service laboratory in Birmingham at a secret location.
The team want to familiarise themselves with the pioneering methods used so that they can explain them to the investigating magistrate in the Algarve who will decide whether to charge or clear the McCanns.
The source added: “They are going to England to decode the results of the tests so we are not caught by surprise.” He added: “The team that is going to the UK is going to examine everything microscopically to make sure the tests have not been manipulated by someone linked to the suspects.
“We want to be sure all the information that reaches us has not previously been interfered with.” The meeting was also due to be attended by Detective Supt Stuart Prior, who is in charge of the Leicestershire police operation, working under the direction of the Portuguese force.
Last night Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns’ official spokesman, said the couple from Rothley, Leics, had nothing to fear from the visit.
He said: “We have been informed by Leicestershire police that a meeting between forensic scientists from Portugal and the Forensic Science Service laboratory will be taking place.
“We understand there is no intention for the McCanns to be interviewed or indeed anybody else.
That such a meeting is taking place is not particularly surprising and we do not see this as a significant development.”
Gerry and Kate ‘still the prime suspects’
From Nick Fagge and David Pilditch in Praia da Luz 1 December 2007
KATE and Gerry McCann are still regarded as the prime suspects in the disappearance of their daughter Madeleine despite inconclusive findings from DNA evidence.
Portuguese police will come to Britain next week to re-interview the seven friends who were dining with the couple on the night the little girl vanished, a highly placed source claimed yesterday.
It shatters the couple’s hopes that they will be cleared by Christmas.
Investigators say that while findings revealed at a DNA summit this week did not give them enough evidence to bring charges, they do provide the legal basis to demand further interviews of the McCanns’ friends and relatives on British soil.
Leaks in Portugal claim tests on DNA samples support Portuguese detectives’ theory that the couple were involved in Madeleine’s disappearance. Portuguese daily newspaper 24 Horas reported that a police source said: “The existing evidence up until now is far from clearing the McCann couple in the case.
“There are more and more indicators that they were involved in the disappearance of the child, but it has been difficult to prove this fact. We will continue to follow all hypotheses.” Investigators still cling to the theory that Madeleine died as the result of an accident in the family’s holiday flat in Praia da Luz, and that her parents hid and later disposed of the body with the help of their friends. Respected Portuguese daily newspaper Correio da Manha reported: “The main theory is still the accidental death of the child on the afternoon of May 3, specifically in the two hours when the parents were alone with their children.
“That is when the McCanns say they gave her a bath and put the three children to bed before 8.30pm and then met their friends for dinner.” Detectives are understood to be intrigued by “certain inconsistencies” in the statements made by the McCanns’ seven dining companions.
They also want to know who Kate was referring to when she cried “they’ve taken her” when she found Madeleine was missing. These are among “100 questions” detectives want to put to the McCanns and their friends, police sources claim.
Yesterday British ambassador Alex Ellis and Algarve official Angela Morado met Paulo Rebelo, who heads the investigation, and Portimao District Attorney Jose Magalhaes e Meneses at police headquarters in Faro. The British Embassy in Lisbon said the timing was a coincidence but confirmed the McCann case had been discussed.
A team recently returned from the UK where it was told what the Forensic Science Services lab had learned from analysis of blood and hair found at the McCanns’ holiday apartment and in their hire car.
But yesterday sources close to the investigation said the tests “are only one of the pieces of the puzzle” and “other operations were being done”.
Yesterday Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns’ spokesman, said: “Kate and Gerry’s friends are happy to be reinterviewed by police if necessary, indeed are keen to help if it clears up any inconsistencies. They, like Gerry and Kate, have nothing to hide.” The McCanns, both 39, of Rothley, Leics, were named as suspects on September 7. Gerry wrote in his blog yesterday of his hopes of being free of suspicion by Christmas.
Madeleine: Diplomat’s secret file that raises fears about her parents
Nick Fagge 3 December 2007
A BRITISH diplomat warned the Foreign Office of concerns regarding Madeleine McCann’s parents, it emerged last night.
Doubts about Kate and Gerry McCann were raised almost immediately by an official sent to Praia da Luz due to what he considered to be “inconsistencies” in the couple’s testimonies about the night the four-year-old vanished.
The warning was contained in a classified document sent from the Algarve to the Foreign Office days after Madeleine’s disappearance.
Details of the letter have been leaked through the British diplomatic mission in Brussels to the respected Belgian newspaper Derniere Heure.
The unnamed diplomat voices his concern about the “confused declarations” as to the whereabouts of Kate and Gerry McCann and their friends in the final hours before Madeleine’s disappearance.
He also mentions the couple’s “lack of co-operation” with the Portuguese police in the light of instructions from London suggesting consular staff “overstretch their authority and put pressure on the Portuguese authorities”.
The document also asks for confirmation of orders sent by the Foreign Office in London the day before, commanding embassy staff to give “all possible assistance to the McCann couple”.
Diplomats on the Algarve were told the McCanns had to be “accompanied at all times during any contact with the Portuguese police” by a member of consular staff or by British police officers sent out from the UK.
The letter, sent just days after Madeleine disappeared, warns of the risks of siding with the McCanns so completely.
Excerpts published in a report by La Derniere Heure quote the diplomat as saying: “With the greatest respect, I would like to make you aware of the risks and implications to our relationship with the Portuguese authorities, if you consider the possible involvement of the couple.
“Please confirm to me, in the light of these concerns, that we want to continue to be closely involved in the case as was requested in your previous message.”
A huge team of diplomats have been involved in the case since Gerry McCann asked the Foreign Office for help.
In an unprecedented move, the then Prime Minister Tony Blair despatched special envoy Sheree Dodd, a former Fleet Street journalist, to Portugal to act as a “media liaison officer” for the McCann family.
Direct government communications with the McCanns came to an abrupt halt, however, when the couple were made official suspects in the case in September.
Portuguese detectives believe it is possible Madeleine died as the result of an accident on May 3 in the family’s holiday apartment and that her parents hid and later disposed of her body with the help of their friends.
The couple have always said they had nothing to do with their daughter’s disappearance.
The Belgian report says it is highly significant that almost all of the diplomats involved at the outset have now been taken off the case.
Special envoy Sheree Dodd has since resigned from the Foreign Office, the British consul in the Algarve Bill Henderson has retired and the British ambassador to Portugal John Buck is no longer in Portugal.
Last night the Foreign Office refused to comment on the report.
I saw intruder try to get into McCann flat
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 7 January 2008
AN intruder tried to break in to Madeleine McCann’s holiday apartment just days before she vanished, the Daily Express can reveal.
British holidaymaker Paul Gordon confronted a man trying to get in through the patio doors of flat 5A at the Ocean Club Resort in Praia da Luz where his two young children were sleeping.
Mr Gordon was so convinced it was linked to Madeleine’s disappearance on May 3 he contacted British police immediately he heard she had gone missing.
But Portuguese detectives have never interviewed him to ask about the intruder who has not been identified by any other witness.
Mr Gordon, 34, a salesman, from Fareham, Hampshire, said: “I find it incredible that no one has tried to work out who this person was who came to the apartment unannounced just days before Madeleine McCann went missing.”
Recalling the incident at the ground floor apartment in April last y ear, Mr Gordon said: “I came across someone at the flat. I now believe he was suspicious.
“He said he was collecting donations for an orphanage in the mountains. But he did not come to the front door.
“And it happened in the middle of the day when most people are out.
He must have been staking out the property, or worse.”
He added: “We used the creche facilities a few times in the morning and a couple of times in the afternoon but we didn’t go out without the children or use a babysitter.”
Mr Gordon was midway through a two-week Mark Warner holiday with his wife and two children, aged one and two, when he confronted the man at the doors of the patio through which Madeleine is thought to have been taken.
The doors are at the back of the apartment, hidden from the main road by a high hedge. The intruder, described as “definitely not British”, engaged Mr Gordon in conversation.
He even convinced the father to fetch something, allowing him time to survey the layout of the apartment and the flimsy state of the locks securing the patio doors.
Relaxed and enjoying his holiday, Mr Gordon did not think anything about the incident at the time.
But he and his wife, Saleigh, were struck by its significance the moment they heard Madeleine had gone missing from the same apartment.
The couple provided written statements to British police as well as fingerprints and DNA samples.
Mr Gordon was reinterviewed by Leicestershire Police in the past few weeks.
And most recently he has spoken to agents from Metodo 3, the private detective agency hired by the McCanns to find their daughter.
Staff are working on the theory that Madeleine’s abductors used spotters to target potential victims.
The revelation of the mystery intruder stalking the apartment could provide a fresh lead in the police investigation that appears to have ground to a halt recently.
And it follows a chilling series of incidents linked to the flat.
A British nanny has claimed a man tried to kidnap a child from the same apartment six months before Madeleine went missing.
The unnamed babysitter says she popped out briefly from apartment 5A to get food, and the man fled empty-handed as she returned.
In November British mum Karen Sixsmith told how she got suspicious when she saw a woman trying to get into an apartment at the Ocean Club where her daughter was playing.
She said the woman claimed to be a Jehovah’s Witness and wanted to discuss her faith. But Mrs Sixsmith said the woman and a male friend seemed anxious to get inside.
In October a childminder told investigators she saw a man lurking in bushes outside the holiday apartment. And in September an Ocean Club employee said she witnessed a British tourist hiding in a stairwell outside Madeleine McCann’s apartment on the night she disappeared.
Last night the McCann family spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, confirmed Mr Gordon’s account.
He said: “Mr Gordon has spoken to the police about his time in the apartment. And our investigative team has spoken with him.
“He said somebody came round to the apartment 5A asking for a charity donation and said it was suspicious.”
Mr Mitchell said Madeleine’s parents, Gerry and Kate, both 39, have never met Mr Gordon.
IT WAS HER BLOOD IN PARENTS’ HIRE CAR
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz, 8 January 2008
BLOOD found in the McCanns’ hire car and holiday flat DID belong to missing Madeleine, it was claimed yesterday.
It reflects detectives’ belief that she is dead and her parents Kate and Gerry disposed of her body.
New results sent to Portugal in the last few days show the blood samples could only belong to Madeleine, it was claimed.
The McCanns have always insisted there were innocent explanations for the traces found behind the sofa at the Ocean Club apartment in Praia da Luz and in the boot of the Renault Scenic they hired there 25 days after Madeleine vanished on May 3. They claim the DNA could be linked to her siblings, two-year-old twins Sean and Amelie.
But the respected Portuguese newspaper Correio da Manha reported yesterday: “The definitive result of the tests leave no doubts for the Policia Judiciaria. The blood found in the McCanns’ car is that of Madeleine as well as those samples detected in the flat.”
Detectives in Portugal asked British scientists to carry out new tests after initial ones by the Forensic Science Service laboratory in Birmingham proved inconclusive.
They are believed to be using a new technique called low copy number analysis, which allows them to find a genetic fingerprint from a tiny sample. The samples from the flat and the hire car were said to be damaged and of low quality, but police sources now claim the latest results are definitive.
Portuguese detectives plan to travel to Britain in the coming weeks to reinterview the McCanns and the friends they dined with at a tapas restaurant on the night Madeleine vanished, aged three.
Yesterday Dr Russell O’Brien and his partner Jane Tanner were named as the two friends reported last year to have told police they wanted to change their account of that evening.
Ms Tanner, 37, from Exeter, says she saw a mystery man carrying a child away from the flat at 9.15pm on the night Madeleine vanished.
Police were said to believe Dr O’Brien, 36, wanted to change his statement to claim he also saw the man, newspaper 24 Horas reported.
But staff at the restaurant say Ms Tanner was at the table throughout the meal and only left after Kate came running in shouting “They’ve taken her!”, the tabloid reported.
Dr O’Brien and Ms Tanner have denied contacting police to change their stories and sources close to the McCanns support that position.
The McCanns were made formal suspects after sniffer dogs allegedly detected the “scent of death” in the flat and car, and on clothes belonging to Kate. Further tests found microscopic blood traces in the flat and on lining in the boot of the car.
Portuguese police believe Madeleine died in an accident and that Kate and Gerry conspired with their friends to dispose of the body.
Police sources claim the couple could be charged with manslaughter as well as hiding a body and wasting police time. Kate and Gerry McCann, both 39 and from Rothley, Leics, deny involvement in their daughter’s disappearance.
They have had independent DNA tests on the car which they say revealed no trace of Madeleine.
Last night their spokesman Clarence Mitchell said: “These reports are very distressing for Kate and Gerry, they are depressed that again wild rumour and speculation is being presented as fact. We wish Portuguese police would just get on with their investigation, come over to England and carry out the interviews with Kate and Gerry and their friends. All those interviews will prove, yet again, that Kate and Gerry have nothing to hide.
“As for the supposed DNA testing, we cannot comment on yet more unsubstantiated rampant speculation in the Portuguese press.
“It is ridiculous to suggest that Madeleine’s blood was in the hire car because she was never in it. It was hired more than 20 days after she went missing, which means it was impossible for her to have ever been in it. Kate and Gerry were in no way involved in her death. Nor were they involved in disposing of her body. To suggest otherwise is ridiculous. This report is flying in the face of all other articles which reported that the DNA and forensic tests were inconclusive.
“If there had been anything found I would have thought there would have been more urgent activity on the behalf of the Portuguese police than there has been.
“We have been waiting months now for them to come to England to carry out their re-interviewing.
Anything the police feel may give them cause for concern can be wholly and innocently explained.
“But until we actually see the official FSS report we have no idea what it contains, and I suggest the Portuguese press don’t either.”
A friend of the McCanns added: “They were in no way involved in her disappearance, reports like this just add to their anguish. We would also point out that low copy DNA is under review by police forces in this country following the outcome of the Omagh bombing trial.”
Kate’s screams as police told her: You’re a suspect
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz, 10 January 2008
KATE McCann screamed when told by police that she was a suspect in Madeleine’s disappearance, it emerged y esterday.
Opening the door of her rented villa to a Portuguese officer the family had come to know, Kate, 39, shouted: “Do you honestly believe that I would murder my own child?” The officer had called to tell Kate and Gerry McCann: “You are being made arguidos (suspects)”.
The revelation is made in a searching and emotional magazine interview published today in which Gerry speaks with extraordinary candour about the disappearance of Madeleine and the dark days that followed.
The 39-year-old cardiologist talks of how he fears he will never see his daughter again. “Probably the chances of getting Madeleine back are slim, ” he says. “But still you have hope. Still.”
Gerry also speaks of his guilt at leaving Madeleine alone at the Ocean Club Resort apartment in Praia da Luz on the night of May 3 last year.
“I wish I’d stayed in the apartment that night. I wish I’d stayed in the room when I checked on her five minutes longer. I wish I hadn’t gone to the tapas bar.” The couple’s friends, known as the Tapas Nine, took turns checking on the children and Kate McCann returned to the table, screaming “they’ve taken her” after she discovered Madeleine missing shortly before 10pm.
In the hours after Madeleine vanished Gerry wept on the phone to his sister Philomena: “It’s all my fault because Kate and I went out to dinner.” But Gerry, from Rothley, Leicestershire, now maintains the couple were not irresponsible to leave their children unsupervised and the doors and windows of their holiday apartment in Praia da Luz unlocked.
“At the time we did it, it was not irresponsible. Of course we feel guilty about not having been there, and that is just something we have to deal with for the rest of our lives.
We live this 24 hours a day.” In the interview with magazine Vanity Fair, the couple tell writer Judy Bachrach of their darkest moments in the days following Madeleine’s disappearance.
Gerry says: “The world was all black, with maybe tiny points of light.” And Kate says she told friends: “I hope whoever has Madeleine is giving her blankets, is feeding her properly, is keeping her warm.” Gerry goes on: “We can’t cry our eyes out every day because that’s not helping. So after three days I picked myself up quicker than Kate could.” And it was building the Find Madeleine campaign that helped them go on, Gerry claims. The couple also speak of their anger and heartache after they were made suspects.
Gerry says bitterly: “Yes, yes, I know. Kate killed her in a frenzy, Madeleine was sedated by us, she fell down the stairs in which case you would have thought they’d have found her body. I’ve heard all of that. There are a huge number of theories in the media. But what I want to know is, who told them all that?” Gerry says he risks jail if he talks in detail about the night Madeleine vanished, adding: “I can’t talk about the details.
“I live under threat from the Portuguese if I do talk of two years imprisonment.”
The Madeleine lookalike on hire for 600 an hour
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz 11 January 2008
A LITTLE girl who bears a striking resemblance to Madeleine McCann is being offered out for hire at 600 an hour, it emerged y esterday.
The blonde American y oungster is the spitting image of the missing foury ear-old and her British agent claims she has been “stopped everywhere” by passers-by who have mistaken her for Madeleine.
Now the unnamed child is now being rented out and has been put forward to star in a film about her disappearance, already dubbed ‘Madeleine the Movie’.
Last night Kate and Gerry McCann revealed their fury at such a callous way to profit from their daughter’s misery.
Their official spokesman branded the project scandalous and horrifying. He added: “This is an offensive way to make money out of Madeleine’s disappearance.” The Madeleine double, who is believed to be less than six y ears old, is being promoted on the internet through a shady model and casting agency.
Based in a council flat in the run-down south London suburb of Streatham, Shona JulietAdams, the boss of Juliet Adams Model and Talent Casting Agency, boasts she has a number of young lookalike girls for hire.
But Ms Juliet-Adams claims one of her protegees is a “dead ringer” for Madeleine who is stopped wherever she goes by people desperate to find the missing four-year-old.
Ms Juliet-Adams said: “There’s one girl who’s a contender. It’s in the eyes.” The model agency boss claims the girl could be “ideal” to play missing Madeleine in the proposed film about the disappearance. And she claims it could catapult the youngster into a life of fame.
“It would be a huge opportunity, ” she urged.
However, it was the youngster’s own mother who devised the plan and put her forward for possible contracts. The parent sent the model agency pictures to prove the similarity and proposed casting her as a Madeleine lookalike, Ms Juliet-Adams claims.
She said the lookalike’s mum had sent photos to prove how alike she is.
She said: “Her daughter is completely aware of this missing little girl and also aware that she bears an extreme resemblance to this child.” The American girl was offered for one photo session at a cost of 300 for half an hour.
A contract was issued spelling out the full cost for using the pictures. It included a 500 nonrefundable goodwill payment.
A total of 1,057 was to be paid up front with another 3,500 on publication plus VAT. Despite the storm of protest, Ms JulietAdams claims she and the girl’s parents are doing nothing wrong.
Ms Juliet-Adams said: “The entertainment world is an expensive business.” The company does not directly advertise its Madeleine lookalikes. But parents of blonde, blue-eyed daughters have come forward to register.
And the agency has kept them on the books in case they are ever asked to provide a young starlet to play Madeleine in a movie.
Ms Juliet-Adams added: “The McCanns will obviously be looking for someone to play Madeleine in the film.” The unrepentant model agency boss insisted: “I’m just doing my job, I provide lookalikes. I’ve done nothing wrong.” Doctors Kate and Gerry McCann are considering an offer to make of a film about their little girl’s disappearance in Praia da Luz on the Algarve, Portugal, on May 3.
But they were furious last night at their home in Rothley, Leics.
Their spokesman Clarence Mitchell said: “I would urge this woman to think again about what she is doing.
“We would be horrified if people were to pay for this sort of thing.” Kate and Gerry, who were later made suspects, believe she was kidnapped by a paedophile gang who had been watching the family. Portuguese police believe she died in the apartment as the result of an accident and that her parents disposed of her body.
Police ignored my vital tip-offs
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz, 12 January 2008
MADELEINE McCann was raped, murdered and her body dumped in a lake within 48 hours of her abduction, it was claimed yesterday.
Underworld figures reported her death, three days after she disappeared, to human rights lawyer Marcos Aragao Correia, he said.
But he claims his potentially case-cracking leads have been ignored by officers from the Portuguese investigative Policia Judiciaria.
He told Portuguese weekly magazine Lux: “Madeleine was abducted, raped and murdered and her body was thrown into the reservoir in Silves [in the Algarve]. It’s the ideal place for somebody to get rid of a body, practically without leaving a trace.” Mr Correia, 32, said yesterday an underworld source contacted him on May 6 last year.
He himself contacted police on his native island of Madeira three days later and they promised to pass the information to detectives on the Algarve searching for Madeleine.
He said he was told the lake was deep, murky, in a deserted area surrounded by many trees, unguarded and easily accessible from the road.
“The Barragem do Arade reservoir corresponded perfectly to the description I had.” He also sent letters directly to the McCanns and contacted Metodo 3, the Spanish detective agency they have hired to find their daughter.
Last autumn, police revealed they were to search the lake, but no drag was carried out and no more than a handful of officers were sent to the vast stretch, which is about a mile wide, with its deepest point about 130ft.
Mr Correia said Metodo 3 were convinced that his information could be crucial.
A Portuguese lorry driver had told them he saw a girl resembling Madeleine being passed between a man and woman near the lake in Silves two days after the disappearance.
But the agency could not organise the huge resources needed to search the lake, he said.
MADELEINE BRITISH ODD-JOB MAN QUIZZED
From Nick Fagge in Praia da Luz, 12 January 2008
A BRITISH gardener and odd-job man has been questioned by police investigating Madeleine McCann’s disappearance after a tip-off named him as a suspect.
An anonymous email sent to Portuguese detectives claimed that Daniel Groom was spotted lurking in an alley close to the McCanns’ apartment on the night Madeleine vanished.
It said Groom bears a striking resemblance to the person seen carrying a child away from the Ocean Club holiday complex in Praia da Luz that night.
Groom, 30, does have access to the complex because of his gardening duties. But he told the Daily Express yesterday that he was being set up. Speaking at his home just outside Praia da Luz, Groom, originally from Horsham, West Sussex, said: “I think I am being framed. I am the victim of a smear campaign by someone with a grudge against me.
“I’m just a gardener and can easily account for my movements that day.
I wasn’t anywhere near the Ocean Club complex.” Groom was questioned informally by two Portuguese detectives on Thursday.
He said: “On Tuesday I was followed by two uniformed police as I drove from my home to meet friends for drinks.
“During the week two detectives had arrived in town and begun asking friends about my whereabouts. I rang them after they left a message with a friend.
“I met them in a car park in Praia da Luz. Their English wasn’t perfect and neither is my Portuguese so I brought along a mate who can speak both.
“They were two detectives from the Lisbon area, a good cop and a bad cop. One guy was quite small and smoked a cigar. The other guy was really fat, wore girly sunglasses and kept looking around him all the time.
“The small guy told me to take off my cap and sunglasses and took a photo of me.” Groom, who moved to Portugal 11 years ago, was questioned for about an hour. He was shown a copy of the email linking him to Madeleine’s disappearance on May 3 last year.
The message read: “Is it a coincidence that this man started working as a gardener in the area and a child went missing?
“Maybe he walked through the car park at the front of the McCanns’ apartment and a little way down the dark alley between the two buildings where he could see and probably hear that the McCanns were there.
“After that maybe he listened at the window of the McCanns’ apartment for any sign that someone such as a babysitter was there. No televisionnothing.
“Did this man initially see the McCanns and Madeleine whilst working on an empty apartment/villa and note that the children were left alone? Did he then come back to watch the McCanns when it was dark and not during daylight hours?” Groom said he was shocked by the email. “I told the police it was all complete rubbish. After speaking in the car park we drove to the Ocean Club. The detectives pointed out a place where I was supposed to have been seen. Hand on my heart, I have never been in that back corridor.
“After a few minutes they said they thought it was all b******t. They said if they needed to talk to me again they would, but they thought they were barking up the wrong tree.” Jane Tanner, one of the McCanns’ holiday companions, has given police a description of a man she saw carrying a child near the family’s apartment. Ms Tanner, 36, of Exeter, did not see the man’s face but described him as smartly dressed with dark, almost black, hair.
Irishman Martin Smith, from Drogheda, County Louth, also saw a man carrying a child towards the beach shortly before 10pm on May 3.
Determined to prove his innocence, Groom yesterday showed the Daily Express his work diary for May 3. He claims he was painting a house in the hills several miles away. He also had another gardening job near his home but insists he did not go into Praia da Luz that night.
Groom admits he has access to the Ocean Club but says he was nowhere near the resort in the days before Madeleine vanished.
“I have a contract to carry out work on block four of the Ocean Club. The McCanns stayed in block five next door. The last time I worked there before Madeleine went missing was March 30 for a couple of hours.” He added: “I’m 98 per cent sure who the people behind this email are.
They used to be friends but we’ve fallen out. It’s sick that they would try to drag me into something like this.” Last night a police source said Groom was not being treated as an official suspect. “Mr Groom is not an arguido. It was simply a tip-off we received that had to be checked out.
“If we had any suspicions that he was involved we would have interrogated him formally.” Hopes that Kate and Gerry McCann’s arguido status would be lifted next week were dashed last night when police made a formal request for a three-month extension to the secrecy surrounding the case.
Under Portuguese law, details of investigations are confidential for the first eight months after police identify a formal suspect a deadline that expires on Tuesday. Police can ask for more time in exceptional cases.
New manhunt ‘another diversion by McCanns’
Padraic Flanagan in Praia da Luz and Nick Fagge, 22 January 2008
THE manhunt by Madeleine investigators prompted by a drawing of a possible abductor is designed to divert suspicion from Kate and Gerry McCann, the Portuguese police believe.
Last night, sources in the Policia Judiciaria revealed reports of a dishevelled man lurking around Praia da Luz were investigated months ago and found to be groundless.
One stormed: “The purpose of this latest exercise by the McCanns is the same as always. It’s another diversionary tactic.”
On Sunday, private investigators searching for the four-year-old released a sketch based on the evidence of a British tourist who said she had seen a “creepy man”.
Grandmother Gail Cooper, who was staying 600 yards from the McCanns’ apartment, said she saw him three times, once trying to collect money for a fake orphanage.
Based on her descriptions, an FBI-trained artist drew a likeness.
Detectives in Portugal believe Madeleine is dead and that her parents were involved in disposing of the body.
Former PJ inspector and now criminologist Francisco Moita Flores said the timing of the McCanns releasing the image was curious, coming only days before the McCanns’ dining companions are due to face further questioning.
He said: “This is maybe the most critical moment in the investigation. They know there is evidence that the girl died and we are on the eve of interrogating witnesses who may undo all the theories.”
It was reported the only other official suspect, Robert Murat, was seen chatting to a man resembling the sketch suspect last May.
Nanny Charlotte Pennington, 20, told the police she saw Murat, 34, talking to “a man 27 to 35, average height, very dark eyes, Portuguese or Spanish appearance”.
After Madeleine was snatched on May 3, the McCanns’ dining companion Jane Tanner, 36, said she had seen a man walking away from the Ocean Club carrying a child.
Yesterday, despite never seeing his face, Ms Tanner, from Exeter, said she was “80 per cent certain” it was the man in the drawing.
Last night, Amanda Mills, 34, from Basildon, Essex, claimed she saw a man resembling the sketch suspect trying to break into a ground-floor apartment in the Ocean Club, similar to the one the McCanns occupied, a week later.
Last night the McCanns’ spokesman Clarence Mitchell said the McCanns’ sleuth agency’s 50,000-a-week contract is up next month but could be extended if the mystery man was still at large.
After Madeleine’s disappearance, Kate was advised to keep a diary by Hugh (a consultant brought in by the International Family Law Group) on about 11th May 2007. He provided her with w spare A4 notebook for the purpose (p 125, Kate’s book). She says “I hadn’t kept a diary since my early teens”. She began keeping her diary, in earnest, on 23rd May 2007 (p 126), leaving blank pages to fill in the first 20 days post disappearance.
The diary was taken by PJ during late afternoon of 2nd August 2007, along with some clothes, cuddle cat (for forensic examination) and a Bible (p 205). They were returned to the McCanns later that evening (of the same day) in a black bin bag (p 207). Kate ‘felt violated’ by having her diary taken (p 206).
On 13 September 2007, the diary photocopies were deemed to be legal (translation by Ines of themaddiecasefiles.com) and sent to the approved translator for translation from English to Portuguese. It states (in the following note) “The respective translation, will be presented to me, as well as the photocopies, in a sealed envelope, which the translator will deliver in these offices.” :
“Processos Vol X
Pages 2627 – 2628
Portimao Family Court
Case 201/07.GALGS
Conclusion: 13-09-2007
Page 2624 seen.
1. As concerns the request to intervene as “assistente” seen on page 2510 and considering the passage of time and the vicissitudes that occurred with regard to the processal status of the requesting parties, notify them that in the period of ten days, they should clarify whether they are still interested in being given “assistente” status.
Notify.
2. Authorise the Public Ministry to validate the apprehension of the “two diaries” and a block note obtained during the search authorised by the dispatch contained in pages 2082 and 2083.
Therefore a sealed envelope is presented which I proceed to open now.
Inside the envelope is another sealed envelope containing 188 photocopies, 187 are handwritten and one typed.
My examination of these photocopies indicates that this is a “diary” as most of the texts begin with “Fri 4th May”, “Day 30”, etc.
3. Decision.
a) Validate the collection of the photocopies as being legally obtained.
b) For the moment I relegate the decision about maintaining the document in the case files until its respective contents are known because it could be the narration or experiences directly intruding upon the intimate, personal and inviolable sphere of any person, in other words, the experiences of a minimal nucleus which nobody may penetrate and upon which no judgement of interests may be made.
c) Therefore, it is important to proceed to translate the photocopies and this task should be carried out by the translator who has already intervened in these files and who should be contacted to pick up the photocopies and make her sworn declaration if she has not already done so.
The respective translation, will be presented to me, as well as the photocopies, in a sealed envelope, which the translator will deliver in these offices.
Duration: 15 days.
d) Finally I state that I will number, page by page, each of the photocopies contained in the envelope referred to in point 2, from 1 to 188.
Portimao, 2007-09-13″
http://themaddiecasefiles.com/topic3461.html
The translation into Portuguese was received on 4th October 2007 by a court official who delivered both the photocopy of the original (in English) and the Portuguese translation to the Instruction Judge:
“Processo Vol XVII Page 4489
Portimao Criminal Instruction Court
On 4th October 2007, at about 10.50 I received from the interpreter Armanda Russell, named in the 201/07.OGALGS case files, the following two requirements, the original document which was the object of the translation and the translated document produced according to the price that was agreed by the Court, I personally having delivered these documents to the Instruction Judge in the presence of the interpreter.
This is the manner in which the interpreter delivered them,
signed
The Court Official”
and a note from the translator regarding her work:
“Act of Compromise
NUIPC-201/07.OGALGS
Armanda Duarte Salbany Russel, resident in Portimao, hereby makes a legal compromise to comply with the duties undertaken, certifying that this translation work is in accordance with the document written in English seen by me,
- The syntax, punctuation and graphics have been maintained, as far as possible.
- The “X” (kiss in English children’s language) was replaced by the word “kisses”, regardless of the number of “x”s.
- The first person singular form of the verb was used whenever the personal pronoun was not expressed, given that English verbs generally do not undergo any declination in number: and,
- The definite article before nouns and diminutives was not used, due to the fact that in some cases the gender was unknown, thereby maintaining a certain uniformity.
Portimao 4th October 2007
Signed”
So, from 13 September 2007 the photocopied diary was legally held by the Portuguese authorities as a potential contributor to the case of missing Madeleine McCann. Nine and a half months later, just prior to the ‘shelving’ of the case, the following documentation is in the case files:
“Conclusion on 25-06-2008
In the sequence of the dispatch by Mmo JIC on page 2081 a diary was apprehended belonging to Kate Marie Healy, after being photocopied the original was returned (delivery note 2125).
In the sequence of the dispatch on page 2628 the decision about maintaining the diary in the files was relegated to the moment that its respective contents were known, taking into account that it could reveal personal material or information without relevance to the investigation.
Bearing in mind that the inquiries of the investigation are almost finished we request the Mmo JIC to make a pronouncement as to the relevance of the contents of the photocopied diary.”
This request is followed by the pronouncement:
“Conclusion 26-06-2008
(Presents invoice)
The photocopies of the “diary” do not contain any material of interest to the ongoing investigation, but relate to the personal and inviolable personal experiences of any person.
Accordingly I order the diary’s respective destruction.
Portimao
2008-06-27
Pedro Frias
Criminal Instruction Judge”
It’s important to note that the correspondence from the PJ files only relates to the photocopies made of the original diary – which was returned to the McCanns on the same day that it had been seized.
The Leveson Inquiry
http://www.levesoninquiry.org.uk/evidence/?witness=gerry-mccann
The above is part of Gerry McCann’s Witness statement presented to the Leveson Inquiry – and which he signed as being a truthful statement. Kate also signed a statement of truthfulness relating to Gerry’s witness statement as she says that she saw and contributed to it.
Paragraph 90, at best, is seriously misleading and is not supported by any of the documentation in the PJ files. In fact, the photocopies of the diary were suspected of having relevance to the investigation for, approximately, nine and a half months.
The transcript for the oral evidence presented by Kate and Gerry is equally misleading (starting from page 47 of the text file) – questions/statments by QC are in bold:
22 Q. The News of the World come into the narrative a few
23 months later, as you rightly say at paragraph 86. It
24 may be that Dr Kate McCann would like to deal with this,
25 but I’m in your hands. Out of the blue, 14 September
page 47
1 2008, transcripts from your personal diary appear or
2 purport to appear in the News of the World. Can you
3 tell us a bit about that, please?
4 MRS McCANN: You’re right, this was totally out of the blue.
5 It was Sunday lunchtime, we’d just got back from church
6 and I got the text message from Gail, who works in the
7 nursery where Madeleine, Sean and Amelie went, and it
8 just said, “Saw your diary in the newspapers.
9 Heartbreaking. I hope you’re all right.” And it was
10 totally out of the blue, and I had that horrible panicky
11 feeling, confusion and, you know, what’s she on about?
12 I didn’t have a clue. We rapidly found out, it was the
13 News of the World. I went and looked at it online,
14 which was five pages, including the front page. I got
15 my original handwritten copy of my diary out and sat
16 there, and it was lifted in its entirety and put in the
17 newspaper without my knowledge. Apart from the odd
18 word, which was — I think it was a translational error,
19 that had obviously been taken — translated into
20 Portuguese, and then a Portuguese copy had then been
21 translated back to English, which was slightly different
22 from the original, but pretty verbatim and it had been
23 put there.
24 I felt totally violated. I’d written these words
25 and thoughts at the most desperate time in my life, most
page 48
1 people won’t have to experience that, and it was my only
2 way of communicating with Madeleine, and for me, you
3 know, there was absolutely no respect shown for me as
4 a grieving mother or as a human being or for my
5 daughter, and it made me feel very vulnerable and small
6 and I just couldn’t believe it.
7 It didn’t stop there. It’s not just a one-day
8 thing. That whole week was incredibly traumatic and
9 every time I thought about it, I just couldn’t believe
10 the injustice. I actually just recently read through my
11 diary entries at that point at that week and I talk
12 about climbing into a hole and not coming out because
13 I just felt so worthless that we’d been treated like
14 this.
15 Q. Can we be clear as to the provenance of the diary. You
16 mentioned a Portuguese translation, which may be a clear
17 indication of provenance but perhaps I can take this
18 quite shortly, that the judicial or police authorities
19 in Portugal had obtained or had seized a copy of your
20 diary, or perhaps it was the original, in August 2007;
21 is that right?
22 MRS McCANN: Yes, it was –
23 Q. We’re talking about a hard copy, manuscript document?
24 MRS McCANN: It was just handwritten. They’d come and said
25 they had taken clothes from the villa and we had to
page 49
1 leave, and when we got back later that day, they said
2 they’d also taken my diaries as well, which I have to
3 say was a little bit of a shock, but it did come back to
4 me about 24, 48 hours later, so I obtained the original
5 copy. Obviously, photocopies were taken during that
6 period.
7 Q. Yes. It wasn’t clear from your statement, but it now
8 is. It was within quite a short space of time that the
9 original was returned to you, you believe by order of
10 a Portuguese judge, so it sounds as if the initial
11 seizure had been a step too far, or whatever. But
12 a copy of the original must have been taken by someone,
13 presumably someone within the Portuguese police or
14 judicial authorities; is that correct?
15 MR McCANN: I think it’s clear that the police had copied
16 the journal and had it translated, and of course at the
17 time we didn’t understand why the journal could have
18 been relevant because Kate only started keeping it
19 a couple of weeks after Madeleine was taken, so we
20 didn’t know there was a copy until the file was released
21 the following summer, but within the file, the
22 Portuguese judicial file, there is an order from the
23 judge, who’s read the translation and says, “This is of
24 no interest to the investigation, it’s Kate’s personal
25 thoughts and should not …” and he actually used the
page 50
1 word “violation”.
2 MRS McCANN: He used the word “violation”. He said use of
3 which would be a violation of its author.
4 MR McCANN: And ordered that any copies be destroyed.
5 LORD JUSTICE LEVESON: And further investigation of that has
6 revealed, if anything? To unpick where this came from?
7 MR McCANN: I would like further investigation as to where
8 it came from.
9 MRS McCANN: An investigation.
10 MR McCANN: Because clearly it was an illegal copy.
11 MR JAY: I think what it relevant, and I think this has
12 already come out from Dr Kate McCann’s evidence, is that
13 one or two things were lost in the translation, or
14 changed, which indicates that the piece in the
15 News of the World was a translation from the Portuguese.
16 MR McCANN: Yes.
17 Q. Because had it been precisely verbatim, it might have
18 led us –
19 MRS McCANN: Very subtle changes but things like where
20 I said I was “really upset”, it says I was “fed up”. It
21 does change the meaning slightly.
22 Q. It may be we can investigate that or it may be that we
23 will receive an admission as to –
So, in summary:
Kate’s diary was seized, presumably photocopied and the original returned to her by the police on 2nd August 2007
The Portuguese court deemed the photocopied diary to be legal and potentially important for the investigation and therefore requested its translation on 13th September 2007. The photocopy and official translation were returned to the court offices.
On 27th June 2008, just prior to the investigation being shelved, a Portuguese judge pronounced that the photocopy of the diary is destroyed (there is no mention of the translation?)
The Archiving Dispatch was made on 21 July 2008. Shortly after this date the PJ files were released to the McCanns and from which they learned of the diaries official and approved translation and subsequent destruction of the ‘photocopies’.
NoTW publish extracts of an English translation of the Portuguese version on 14th September 2008
Scotsman (Edinburgh, Scotland)
May 18, 2007
Tireless PR keeps Madeleine in mind
Fergus Sheppard media correspondent
HER image is everywhere and her story has dominated news headlines since 3 May. On television, print, radio and the web, the hunt for toddler Madeleine McCann has captivated the emotions and interest of millions. But in a world of 24/7 news coverage, even human trauma needs to be properly organised.
The journalists camped in Praia da Luz and the countless news outlets covering the story in the UK and elsewhere have been on the end of a sophisticated news-management machine designed to ensure that, as days pass with no word of Madeleine’s whereabouts, the story does not fade. So far, there has been little risk of that. Every day the story has thrown up a new “line”. Questioning of suspects has in the last 48 hours galvanised waiting journalists who anticipated some kind of breakthrough.
But on days when there was little police activity, Kate and Gerry McCann made statements, or family members appeared on their behalf. Relatives appeared to speak to the media in Mr McCann’s home town of Glasgow or the family’s home county of Leicestershire.
In Glasgow last Friday, a church service dominated evening news bulletins. And again in Glasgow, 50,000 Spanish football fans who gathered for the UEFA cup final on Wednesday night were shown a two-minute film on Madeleine.
The media handling of the story fell to Alex Woolfall from the Bell Pottinger PR group. Set up by Lord Bell – known as Mrs Thatcher’s favourite adman for his work for the Conservatives – one of the services Bell Pottinger offers is “crisis management”.
Holiday company Mark Warner – owners of the Ocean Club resort from where the four-year-old was taken – already retains one of Bell Pottinger’s companies, Resonate, for ordinary PR. But when the scale of the story became apparent, Woolfall, whose job title is “head of issues and crisis management”, was immediately sent to Portugal with a support team.
His task there was to shield the family by ensuring a controlled but regular supply of statements and images. The PR company operates the equivalent of a 24-hour newsroom and one of its key roles is to anticipate media needs as well as react to inquiries. It was noticeable that on days when little appeared to be happening in Praia da Luz, the parents would on occasion walk before the cameras without speaking. It sounds a simple detail but even that is enough to give the cameras fresh picture and enough to update a news bulletin.
A Mark Warner official told The Scotsman: “Alex Woolfall is very experienced and was a fantastic asset to the family. What Kate and Gerry wanted to do was to get this on the news agenda and make this as big as possible so that people don’t forget.”
Woolfall returned to London on Tuesday, and on Tuesday night the Foreign and Commonwealth Office installed one of its own press officers as the McCann family’s official press contact in Praia da Luz.
Bell Pottinger remains on hand to provide media-handling although the agency stresses that many of the events happening up and down the country are down to the McCann family’s own network and an “organic community” of supporters.
Former News of the World editor Phil Hall, now a PR adviser, said he did not believe the story needed much handling. “With people being questioned, there has been something coming out of Portugal every day,” he said.
Are there dangers in such saturation coverage? Max Clifford said the GBP 2.5 million reward money of has its own risks.
“Massive exposure can be counter-productive. All kinds of people come forward, and often all sorts of people who haven’t got a clue and are acting on a hunch. They will waste a lot of police time,” he said.
“TEESSIDE UNIVERSITY lecturer Bethany Usher was arrested today over phone-hacking at the News of the World.
Bethany Usher, who worked at the axed Sunday tabloid and its former rival the People, is being questioned in custody at a police station in the region, sources said.
The 31-year-old – who was questioned by officers in 2006 on suspicion of providing false information for a job at Buckingham Palace – becomes the 17th arrest under Scotland Yard’s Operation Weeting.
Officers said the suspect was being held this morning in connection with conspiring to intercept communications.
Ms Usher, who worked in the newspaper industry for seven years, is currently a senior journalism lecturer at Teesside University.
Ms Usher studied at Leeds University before getting her first job as a trainee reporter on the Sunderland Echo.
According to her biography on the university’s website: “Bethany has won four awards and was named young journalist of the year in 2003.”
Regarding her arrest, a spokesman for the university said: “We cannot comment on an ongoing investigation.”
Ms Usher has referred several times to the Leveson Inquiry on her Twitter page, @bethanyusher.
One tweet yesterday read: “For god sake Paul McMullen, shut your sickening trap.”
Another, posted on Monday, said: 2Am I the only former tabloid reporter who followed the PCC? Leveson. Hey kids. They the rules, stick to them.”
http://www.sundaysun.co.uk/news/breaking-news/2011/11/30/teesside-university-lecturer-bethany-usher-held-over-phone-hacking-72703-29868454/
