Analysis of McCann Media Interviews - Dr Martin Roberts
The documentary the McCanns don't want you to see, 30 April 2009
'A Verdade da Mentira', 'Maddie: The Truth Of The Lie'
Clarence Mitchell: "...the station that broadcasts it will be sued by our lawyers."
The documentary - based on Gonçalo Amaral's book, 'The Truth Of The Lie' - was broadcast
on Portuguese channel TVI on Monday 13th April 2009.
Documentary also available in a
6-part English narration version: Click here
Latest news/Newly added old articles of interest
Inferences and Deductions, 04 February 2012
Inferences and Deductions
EXCLUSIVE to mccannfiles.com
By Dr Martin Roberts
04 February 2012
INFERENCES
AND DEDUCTIONS
"The book is full of inferences and deductions," said Isabel
Duarte, two years ago, of former lead detective Goncalo Amaral's book, The Truth of The Lie. And for that
stunning inference a deduction will inevitably have been made from the Find Madeleine Fund. (Love me, love my invoice).
Like a football match staged on a land-fill site, there are so many obstacles in the McCann case (that of the missing
child, not the satellite legal productions of the McCanns), a simple intuition or two about the best route to goal could prove
just as effective as any in-depth knowledge of waste categories. Participants are always likely to fall over debris left by
others in any event.
An associate member of the McCann legal team at the same Lisbon Court hearing, speaking on
the McCanns' behalf, made it perfectly clear that they were in no way responsible for obstructing the path to justice.
As Sky TV's Jon di Paolo reported at the time (12 Jan, 2010):
12:24: The McCanns' lawyer makes the point
that 'evidence' usually sightings – has suggested Madeleine is still alive.
12:25: He says that the
McCanns are not responsible for generating any of this 'evidence' that their daughter is not dead.
As previously
observed (see article, 'Just Like That,' McCannFiles, 22 March 2011), according to the advocate concerned, evidence
suggesting Madeleine is still alive usually took the form of sightings, implying that on occasion it might take some
other form. Whatever form this 'evidence' took however, the McCanns were not responsible for generating anyof it (an inference followed by a deduction wouldn't you say, Ms Duarte?). Curiously this defence of the McCanns
appears to have been in rebuttal of an accusation that had not even been made.
'Generating' evidence in
the manner alluded to by the McCanns' lawyer would constitute interference with a police investigation, surely? Which
is no doubt why said lawyer pre-emptively denied the unannounced allegation. But while he 'majored' on sightings far
and near (those reported by David Payne and Jane Tanner fall into this very category), he overlooked those of a more spiritual
variety.
Kate McCann generated photographs of a boat, on board which Madeleine was supposed, by a clairvoyant friend,
to have been sequestered following her abduction (i.e., she was alive and not dead).
While Kate
McCann has not personally laid claim to the pre-cognitive 'sighting,' she was reportedly present at the marina when
the photographs were taken and has never denied taking them herself.
The photographs constitute evidence in support
of a 'sighting,' albeit a phenomenal one; evidence that Madeleine was not dead, and generated by Kate McCann;
evidence which proved, on further investigation, to be worthless. The 'vision' was of a boat that didn't sail
anywhere throughout April or May 2007!
The statement: 'The McCanns are not responsible for generating any...'evidence'
that their daughter is not dead.' is therefore false. It was made by a legal advocate speaking on behalf of the McCanns
in open court during proceedings in January, 2010. Professionally highly dubious, it is on a level par with Kate McCann's
own perjury before the more recent Leveson Inquiry ('There were no body fluids.').
But just as one man's
terrorist is another man's freedom fighter, supporters of the McCanns, be they vigilantes or 'hired guns,' would
most likely champion the view expressed by Gerry McCann, to Jeremy Paxman, that they merely wanted...to get information into
the investigation, that might help find their daughter.
All well and good if the child existed to be found. And
if not?
In the final analysis, whether these initiatives were born of an earnest desire to locate a missing child
or an ulterior motive of some kind, serves only to colour an inescapable fact: That the McCanns, contrary to an unambiguous
statement made on their behalf by a legal representative in open court, generated evidence their daughter was not dead.
And in the complete absence of even a 'grain of proper evidence' that Madeleine McCann was the victim of a
stranger abduction, one has to question the true purpose of such evidence generation.
SOSNOWIEC: The kidnapping of 6-month-old
Magda. Magda is the Polish Madeleine McCann, 28 January/03 February 2012
SOSNOWIEC: The kidnapping of 6-month-old Magda.
Magda is the Polish Madeleine McCann SE.pl
Published: 28.01.2012 19:40
The mysterious
disappearance, the frantic searching and despair of their parents. And there are similar names. The Magda kidnapping
case (6 months) from Sosnowiec is very similar to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, British (4 years), in 2007.
The parents left Madeleine alone for a while, while she slept
in a bed. They went to dinner with friends and took turns to ensure that everything was in order. Once they found the bed
empty.
That was the story told to British investigators by Kate and Gerry McCann, whose four-year-old daughter
Madeleine disappeared from a hotel room in the Portuguese resort of Praia da Luz. Although a large scale search was undertaken,
to this day we do not know what happened to that child.
For a time the parents were themselves in the circle of
suspects. Investigators reportedly found biological traces of the girl in a rented car after McCann's disappearance. There
were also suspicions that the child was given anesthetic which accidentally killed her, and claims by a private detective
that the child had been kidnapped by a paedophile and taken to the United States.
At the end of the investigation
it was shelved. We will probably never know what really happened. Let's hope that the "Polish Madeleine" will
be different.
The case of missing baby Magda took a number of dramatic turns late Thursday night after the girl's mother reportedly
told police where they could find the body.
At the time of going to press details were still sketchy,
but it's believed that the woman has pointed out a tree next to which she left the body and police officers have been
combing the surrounding area ever since.
The six-month-old baby was reported missing on January 24 in the town
of Sosnowiec. Immediate reports stated that the mother had lost consciousness, presumably after being attacked, and when she
came round, Magda's pushchair was empty.
Since then, the country has witnessed a nation-wide campaign, with
huge amounts of money being offered up as rewards for the child's return.
However, according to recent reports
on TVN24, it transpires that the mother has now admitted in an interview with Detective Krzysztof Rutkowski that her baby
died in an accident and she later hid the body outside next to a river.
So far police have only uncovered a rolled
up jacket, but have been unable to confirm whether it belongs to the girl.
"We are checking every bush and
shrub," says Pawel Warchol, a spokesman for Sosnowiec police.
Reports state that the mother made the confession
to Detective Rutkowski during an interview, in which she claims baby Magda fell out of her arms from a slippy blanket, hit
her head in the bedroom and died.
"The mother did not know what to do with the body," states PC Warchol.
"She packed it into her truck and eventually left it under a tree next to the river. Police are searching there as we
speak."
He went on to stress that the child's father had no knowledge of the accident.
However,
despite the tragic developments, there was officials said, still a glimmer of hope.
Mariusz Sokolowski, spokesman
for Polish Police Headquarters (KGP) said that they would continue to search adding, "While there is no corpse, hope
dies last."
The mother is currently at Katowice's Regional Police Headquarters, although reports claim
that in her current state she is "unable to perform any acts".
Posted by John Blacksmith Friday, 3 February 2012 at 16:30
Let us return to Gerry McCann's claims about the strange change in UK media attitudes at the Leveson inquiry. These
followed (very closely indeed) the answers he and Clarence Mitchell had given to the Commons select committee in 2009. They
were:
That at first the huge media pack were "broadly supportive" but altered their attitude in late June
2007.
This was because, he says, there was a shortage of hard news about the case around that time which led to the
media, under pressure from their editors, searching for scraps or, worse, starting to invent stories. These, for some unknown
reason, were critical of the parents, either by innuendo or pure invention.
Despite their denials that there was
any truth to these stories the situation got worse and worse as the imaginations of the journalists ran free until they were
printing horrible fantasy speculation.
Counsel: The date you give for the shift of the emphasis
of the media reporting is about June 2007, is it, but then you feel the mood may have been moving or turning a bit in the
British press? Or perhaps a bit later than that?
McCann: Yeah... it was probably towards the end
of June 2007, and slowly deteriorated through July, culminating in September 2007.
This repeated what he and Mitchell
had told the Commons committee in 2009:
Mr McCann: We saw pressure, particularly on journalists,
to produce stories when really there was not anything new to report. Probably that was the point where things became what
I would call irrelevancies or half truths or suggestions were making front page news.
Chairman:
Your impression was that the newspapers wanted to go on reporting stories about Madeleine's disappearance and, if there
were no new facts to report, they started to resort to making up things?
Mr McCann: I totally
agree with that.
And from the Leveson evidence again:
"In June 2007 it appeared to us that the
focus of the media reporting was shifting from the search for Madeleine to Kate and myself which made us very uncomfortable...as
information from the investigation began to dry up the journalists had to look elsewhere for their copy. Not only were journalists
seeking stories from and about our friends and relatives at home in Leicestershire. At other times we believe they were simply
making stories up. One story that sticks out in this regard was an article in the Daily Star that suggested that we had
sold Madeleine and shift this back to Madeleine into white slavery to pay off our mortgage. I cannot imagine how any self-respecting
journalist in Praia da Luz at that time, and who could witness what Kate and I were going through, could write such lies."
Note how McCann has phrased this. "One story that sticks out in this regard" clearly means at this period.
But the Star story was published on November 26 2007! And this sums up the deception.
Now, the
facts.
Computerised tracking of all the English language media articles coming out of Portugal on the
McCann story shows a dramatic drop in material from late June to late July - and with a virtually complete absence of any
obviously "made-up" anti-McCann tales.
And there are two good reasons why.
First: the
man who'd been creating so many of the "broadly supportive" stories, Clarence Mitchell, had gone home!
He had been recalled to the MMU in London when his contract posting ended in mid-June. The latter, by the way, makes a nonsense
of Mitchell's claim to the Commons committee about witnessing the idle UK press pack sitting in the bars waiting to make
up stories during this period - he wasn't even there!
And when do the computer tracking statistics show the
quiet period ending? In early August. And what do they show? That the McCanns had become the focus of the police investigation.
That, of course, was the other reason for the "quiet period": unable to answer the gradually increasing
questions from the media about the PJ homing in on them, the couple, lacking Mitchell to screen them and invent alternatives,
had first lied and then gone to ground. We are not talking here about rumours or behind-the-hand PJ leaks but about material
events such as the pair's apartment being searched and their car seized, or their being called in for interrogation
by the police.
These facts had nothing to do with invention and were no more a campaign against the parents
than were the similar events that had been so fully reported about police actions regarding Robert Murat. In themselves the
events didn't mean that the parents were guilty of anything, just as the searches of Murat's property and his interrogation
didn't mean guilt in his case either. What possible reason was there to deny the truth of them?
Never once
have the pair answered this crucial and obvious question. We know what they'd say now, don't we? The all-purpose magic
nonsense answer still being used in the libel claim against Goncalo Amaral - that it was to avoid a diversion in the famous
"search for Madeleine".
But that's junk as well, isn't it? And disingenuous junk at that. Because
one can accept that the McCanns are totally innocent of anything involving their daughter but pose the question: surely admitting
the truth of the police focus and dealing with it honestly would have speeded up the process of freeing them from investigation
and getting everyone back to the search? Whereas documented lying, evasion and a determined defence kept the energies of both
themselves and the police away from other avenues until summer 2008.
But deny them they did, and lie about them,
they did, both in their "blog" and (Madeleine, page 205) in their meetings with the UK media. And the UK
media, far from having turned against them in June, were not only "helpful" but actively suppressed the stories
of police interest in them that were all over the European media by August. By then it was simply impossible for the
UK media to help them anymore - to anyone outside the UK it was making them look biased and foolish.
And note
this report from the Guardian of August 10 2007, by which time the McCanns, paralysed by the fact that the things
they had lied about or denied were now seen to be true, and unable to unsay them, were refusing to deal with media questions
at all:
"With the small town's beaches now packed with holidaymakers, the couple face a besieged existence
behind the high gates of their villa, loaned to them by friends. "We are trapped," said Mrs McCann. "What can
we do?"
The couple's criticisms were directed at local media. British journalists in Praia da
Luz have been careful not to harass the family."
It wasn't the UK media that had changed,
let alone invented things. It was the McCanns who had invented things (page 205 again) and the McCanns, their lies exposed,
who had changed their behaviour.
Conclusion
In their evidence to both the Commons
committee and the Leveson inquiry the McCanns have tried by every means at their disposal, but primarily by lying, to give
the impression that the UK reporting in late June/July and early August - which in the main was either suppressing information
in the McCanns' interest or completely accurate and truthful in reporting police activity against them - was
all of a piece with the quite different reporting after they were made arguidos.
Nothing, as we have seen above,
could be further from the truth. The real inventions began, in the inventive UK tabloid press, after September 6, for the
very simple reason that all the latter had become convinced that the McCanns were heading for trial and conviction and would
therefore be unable to sue - something which they are now ashamed to admit either to the tribunal or the public. And something
which the McCanns are determined to go on lying about.
Sir Christopher Meyer: Twitter comment, 01
February 2012
Interesting how
my appearance at Leveson has got all the anti-McCann loonies frothing.
1
Feb via Twitter or BlackBerry® [10:28 PM]
Press Release: Cease-and-Desist Letter issued
to Gerry and Kate McCann, parents of Missing Madeleine McCann, 01 February 2012
Press Release: Cease-and-Desist Letter issued to Gerry and
Kate McCann, parents of Missing Madeleine McCann Women in Crime Ink
Posted by Pat Brown at 8:55 PM Wednesday, February 1, 2012
PRESS
RELEASE
Gerry and Kate McCann, parents of the missing Madeleine McCann, find themselves for the first time at the
other end of a potential legal action. Top defense attorney, Anne Bremner, counsel to the Friends of Amanda Knox and the families
of Rebecca Zahau and Susan Cox Powell, has issued a cease-and-desist letter (content posted below) on behalf of American criminal
profiler Pat Brown whose book, Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann was removed from sale by Amazon following
a claim by the McCanns that the book was defamatory. In recent years, the McCanns have instructed their solicitors, Carter-Ruck,
to send numerous cease-and-desist letters to people who have publicly questioned their possible involvement in their daughter's
disappearance nearly five years ago while on family holiday in Portugal.
Next week on February 8th, retired solicitor
Tony Bennett faces English prison as the McCanns' fight to shut down his efforts to bring focus to aspects of the missing
child case that point to the parents' possible involvement. Also, the McCanns have sued the detective on their daughter's
case, Dr. Goncalo Amaral, for libel and have had his book, Truth of the Lie, pulled off the worldwide market. The
trial is scheduled in Portugal for April. Now, Pat Brown has fought back for the cause of freedom of speech and justice, alleging
that the McCanns have interfered with her right to conduct business and have damaged her professional reputation with their
successful removal of her book from sale. On Monday, Pat will leave for Portugal to continue her quest for truth and justice
in the case of Madeleine McCann. The Find Madeleine Campaign operated by Gerry and Kate McCann has spent some 2.5 million
pounds on the supposed search for their daughter, Madeline, who vanished in Praia da Luz, Portugal while on vacation with
the family nearly five years ago and come up empty handed. Since last May, a 37-man team headed up by Scotland Yard has spent
1.5 million pounds on salaries plus many more pounds following up supposed leads with no sign of success. Altogether, four
million pounds has been forked out to locate a missing child with zero results. What, then, does American criminal profiler
Pat Brown hope to accomplish with her two week trip to Portugal, beginning next week on February 6, with her small band of
assistants and a few hundred euros of her own money?
She could find the truth. She could find Madeleine. She could
find nothing but at least she won't be costing the taxpayers millions or draining the pocketbooks of kindhearted donators
chasing useless leads.
Pat Brown will be following up on the theory she purported in her Profile of the Disappearance
of Madeleine McCann, her eBook which was pulled by Amazon at the request of the British solicitors Carter-Ruck on behalf
of Gerry and Kate McCann. Amazon was told the book was defamatory in spite of the fact Ms. Brown clearly stated facts in the
case, developed a theory based on those facts, and repeated numerous times that she makes no claim that the McCanns are guilty
of any involvement in their daughter’s disappearance (other than leaving three children unattended night after night
in the resort apartment). Since Gerry McCann clearly stated during the Levinson hearing, "I strongly believe in freedom
of speech" and "I don't have a problem with somebody purporting a theory," it is difficult to understand
why the McCanns wanted the book to be repressed except that it was selling well and that the theory she presented was being
considered credible by a number of readers.
During her trip to Portugal, Pat Brown will study the town of Praia
da Luz and environs, reconstruct the crime, and examine possible locations as to where Madeleine might have been taken, dead
or alive. If she discovers evidence to support a theory other than the one that was the focus of her book, she will pursue
that information. She is looking forward to meeting with Dr. Goncalo Amaral, the ex-detective on the McCann case. Meanwhile,
it is her hope and that of her lawyer, Anne Bremner, that the McCanns rethink their actions regarding the Profile of the
Disappearance of Madeleine McCann and instruct their solicitors to have Amazon return the book to the market (now available
at Smashwords and Barnes & Noble online).
For interviews and media appearances, please contact:
Pat
Brown The Pat Brown Criminal Profiling Agency
she2000@comcast.net
301-633-1151
www.patbrownprofiling.com www.sheprofilers.com
and
Anne M. Bremner Stafford Frey Cooper, PC 3100 Two Union Square 601 Union Street Seattle, WA 98101-1374
abremner@staffordfrey.com
206.623.9900
www.annebremner.com
Anne M. Bremner Stafford Frey Cooper, PC 3100 Two Union Square 601 Union Street
Seattle, WA 98101-1374
February 1, 2012
Isabel Duarte
Carter-Ruck
6 St Andrew
Street
London EC4A 3AE
England
Dear Ms. Duarte,
In July 2011, American criminal
profiler, author, and television commentator, Pat Brown, released on June 15, 2011 a self-published book of thirty-pages on
Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and Amazon.de, for the price of US2.99. It was titled Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine
McCann, sold 850 copies over the next five weeks and garnered 49 nearly all five star reviews on Amazon.uk alone. Then,
the book vanished from sale on all three sites. Upon questioning, Pat Brown was informed by Amazon that they had received
a communications from Carter-Ruck on behalf of their clients Gerald and Kate McCann that the book was defamatory.
Mon
7/25/2011 7:27 PM
Dear Pat,
We have received a notice of defamation from Carter-Ruck Solicitors that
says the content of Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann (UPDATED) B0055WYVCQ, contains defamatory statements
regarding their clients, Gerry and Kat (sic) McCann.
Because we have no method of determining whether the content
supplied to us is defamatory, we have removed the title from sale and will not reinstate it unless we receive confirmation
from both parties that this matter has been resolved.
Carter-Ruck can be reached at:
6 St Andrew Street
London EC4A 3AE
T 020 7353 5005
Best regards,
Robert F.
http://www.amazon.com
This
was quite a surprise to Pat Brown as she had never received any communications from the McCanns nor their solicitors concerning
any defamatory material in this book nor had she ever received any communication concerning any defamatory material in her
blogs on the case she has posted online at The Daily Profiler over the last four years. As Ms. Brown is an analyst of evidence,
she is careful to not state anything as a fact that is not a fact and to clearly state what is a hypothesis or a theory as
opposed to proof. She has publicly and repeated explained to anyone reading her analyses of crime that criminal profiling
is a methodology which explores the possible and theoretical scenarios that might be considered as logical based on evidence
connected with the crime - forensic, linguistic, or behavioral. Any findings resulting from investigative tools which are
not acceptable in certain courts of law (such as cadaver dogs or polygraphs) are noted as suitable for speculation, but not
as solid proof of anyone's guilt or involvement in criminal activities. Criminal profiling itself is an investigative
tool and not a finding of guilt as Pat Brown clearly notes in her book.
Due to the speculative, if analytical,
nature of Deductive Criminal Profiling, the methodology used by Pat Brown, she was careful to repeat numerous times throughout
her publication that she was not accusing the McCanns of being involved in any crime or in the disappearance of their daughter,
Madeleine. She was clearly only "purporting a theory" and exercising "free speech," both manners of communication
Gerry McCann stated he strongly supported under oath at the Leveson Inquiry on November 23, 2011 in London:
"I
would like to emphasise that I strongly believe in freedom of speech, but where you have people who are repeatedly
carrying out inaccuracies and have been shown to do so, then they should be held to account. That is the issue. I don't
have a problem with somebody purporting a theory, writing fiction, suggestions, but clearly we've got to a stage
where substandard reporting and sources, unnamed, made-up, non-verifiable, are a daily occurrence." Gerry McCann
As
Pat Brown also believes in free speech and the right to purport a theory, it would seem she and Gerry McCann are in agreement
that any work that purports a theory as opposed to false statements of fact is acceptable under freedom of speech. Pat Brown's
Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann opens up discussion of what happened to the McCann's daughter,
further stimulating interest in the case, and keeping Madeleine in the minds of the public. As the McCanns claim this is what
they want, Pat Brown's book is in accordance with this desire. In fact, it is the McCanns themselves who have clearly
encouraged massive interest and speculation on this case. Pat Brown is in no way, therefore, infringing on any wish to keep
talk about the case to a minimum.
By speaking and writing out quite often and in such a high profile manner, the
McCanns have succeeded in making Madeleine McCann the most well-known missing child in modern history (since the Lindbergh
baby in 1932). They have stimulated debate worldwide as to what happened to Madeleine. They have publicly purported their
own theories; that someone took Madeleine because they wanted to raise a child, that she is being held captive in a sex ring,
and that a pedophile had taken her. They have publicly disclosed many details of the case and repeatedly told their version
of what occurred before, during, and after the disappearance of the daughter. They have discussed their emotions, behaviors,
and opinions. Pat Brown is carrying on that discussion.
Utmost of importance in the entire matter, is the handling
and funding of child abduction cases, the prevailing attitudes toward these crimes, and the future of catching child predators.
Because the victims are so young and innocent, missing children are among the most publicized cases in the world. In the last
three decades with the increase of the Internet and the 24-hour news cycle, awareness of child sex predators and stranger
child abduction has radically increased fears of parents that their child will be taken and murdered. In reality, stranger
abduction continues to be exceedingly rare for children of Madeleine's age. Regardless, the paranoia that is engendered
when a small child goes missing is a great stress to the community, the police, and resources. Therefore, it is extremely
important that each and every case be properly analyzed and understood so that wrong ideas aren't promulgated and funding
and efforts are wasted investigating such crimes improperly. Each child that goes missing is a terrible tragedy for the parents,
siblings, relative, friends, and community. Pat has great empathy for any family of a missing child and, most of all, compassion
for the innocent young person who has suffered abuse, terror, sexual assault, and, possibly, an early death at the hands of
others.
We are requesting that you respect Pat Brown's right to free speech and to purport a theory as Gerry
McCann has stated is not a problem for him. We request that the claim of libel be retracted for the Profile of the Disappearance
of Madeleine McCann and the book permitted to be returned for sale at Amazon.
Posted by John Blacksmith Wednesday, 1 February 2012 at 15:32
DICK: The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers. Shakespeare, Henry VI part two.
Anyway,
we came out yesterday and admitted that if we have to choose between the lawyers and the tabloids we support the latter; historically
the lawyers have always been the enemy of free speech.
It's no coincidence that the Bureau's view
of the press "crisis" is the direct opposite of the inquiry's. Just as we believe the media only began to tell
some of the truth about the McCanns after July and the real scandal was the way they'd reported the affair before then,
so we believe that the real problem with UK journalism lies with the so-called quality newspapers, not the tabloids.
We agree with the coarse and crude (he's Australian after all) Rupert Murdoch view: if people want to read trashy tabloids
full of celebrity tripe with tits on page three, piles of adverts for internet gambling (a true reflection of what the tabloids
really think of their readership) with some over-simplified news slipped into the pot then it's their right to do so. Feel the quality
The "quality" press is a different matter. Preoccupied by weak
finances and declining readership, it has blindly refused to combat the infiltration of its pages by people and organizations
with an agenda. For decades now, as the Bureau has described exhaustively, whole industries have been growing up
dedicated to penetrating and using the quality press: about 80% of the paper is created by bodies feeding the journalists,
either openly, as with the press conferences organized by charities, unions and other visible pressure groups, or semi-openly,
like the corrupt travel and motoring pages or secretly by the vast PR and lobbying industry - an industry, by the way, packed
with lawyers.
They don't bother with the tabloids much because nobody except the thickos really believes what
they read there. The qualities, however, still have the false, if diminishing, reputation that if something appears in them
then it's probably true, a situation worsened by the increase in news opinion pages - easier to corrupt - at the expense
of factual reporting.
The significance of the McCann affair is that for the first time a spotlight was
shone on the way that information professionals - from PR companies, legal practices and government information departments
- were shaping the news reported in the qualities. Not only have these papers never admitted what they knew was going on but
they actively encourage it by using the conventions taken over from the original infiltrators, the political correspondents.
Did you ever read a paper which said "the following stuff comes from a dodgy source that you can read but shouldn't
trust"? Unthinkable, isn't it? Instead we have "a pal told us", "sources say", "a friend
of the family said" - deliberate lies.
And so we reached the position that by late 2007 The Times
was used ("Beyond the Smears") by Gerry McCann to plant secret material regarding Jane Tanner's baby monitor
in the public domain in his own interest, something which its wretched reporter only admitted when confronted by a clever
German blogger. Enter the judge
And what does the Leveson inquiry have to say about
this sink of misinformation and corruption and what might be done to clean it up? Nothing. It hasn't even noticed
it.
But then what can one expect from a supposed legal tribunal that, as we wrote yesterday, had clearly determined
before any hearings were held to treat witnesses differently according to prior assumptions? Some of them were to
be aggressively examined by the absurdly smug and self-righteous Jay while others had their written evidence accepted virtually
without question or demur. Is this sort of goodies and baddies, victims and persecutors, soap-opera view of the world a basis
on which to recommend legislation limiting free speech? Does it reflect reality?
Mr Sneer QC. We prefer the one on the left.
So we had the nauseating spectacle of the bearded Jay, who asks his questions from behind his hand as though hiding bad
teeth and worse breath, and the toad-like Leveson, treating the surprisingly dignified and sensible Peter Hill, editor of
the Express in 2007, like a bad smell. Had they bothered to listen carefully to Hill's evidence - and we invite
those interested in the subject to read the transcript - they would have learned much about how the media work. But they didn't
listen: they mocked and sneered. Can you hear the sneers? Man with beard:
And the answer is what? What did you do to check on the validity of those stories? Peter Hill:
We did the best that we could do, which was not very much. Q. Which was nothing, wasn't it? A. I'm not saying it was nothing, but we tried our best. Q. Okay.
But against that, of course, you had another eye on the circulation figures, didn't you? A.
One always has an eye on the circulation.
Peter Hill, enemy of the people, before receiving the death sentence
Is that a neutral attempt to discover the truth? Read some more. A. I
felt that the stories should be published because there was reason to believe that they might possibly be true. Q. So that was a sufficient basis: reason to believe that they might possibly be true, so we'll whack it in
the paper. That's true, isn't it? A. I don't use expressions like "whack it in
the paper". I find that to be a very judgmental expression. Q. Yes, well, I don't actually
apologise for it. I'm going to carry on. At the same time, Mr Hill, you knew – A. The
fact of the matter is that this is a public Inquiry. And I do not believe that I am on trial. Q.
I'm sorry, Mr Hill, I'm just going to carry on. A. But I think you are putting me on trial.
----------
Judge grovels on hands and knees – latest
Rather different
from this, don't you think? No we're not making it up: it also comes from the transcript – except for our italics. LORD TOAD:[sinks to knees] Before we start, you've probably heard me thank others before
you for coming along, voluntarily, to speak of matters which I have no doubt are intensely personal and extremely sensitive,
and I am [chokes back sob] very, very grateful to you for doing so. In your case, of course, nobody, and in particular
nobody with children, could fail to appreciate the terrible impact of your daughter's abduction on you and your family,
so words of sympathy for these appalling circumstances are utterly inadequate, but I am very grateful to you for coming.
[rolls on back]
---------
Urgh! You can tell they're going to get a really rough and probing
ride, can't you?
Finally, for those like the Jay and the Toad who swallowed Gerry McCann's untruthful line
that the UK media really had "turned on" the McCanns in summer 2007 because they wanted new, invented and sensationalist
stories, have a look, for once, at a neutral view: The McCanns' Trial by Media - TIME in September 2007 beginning:
"There's been no shortage of surprises in the ongoing saga of Madeleine
McCann, the 4-year-old British girl who disappeared from her family's vacation apartment in Portugal more than four months
ago - the biggest shock occurring earlier this month when Portuguese police officially named her parents as suspects. Still,
it was somewhat stunning when a YouGov poll published in the Sunday Times of London this week found that only 20%
of Britons think Gerry and Kate McCann are completely innocent.
That indicates a huge disconnect between the public
and Britain's many and multifaceted newspapers, which are usually adept at playing to their readers' biases. The
press here - from populist tabloids to serious-minded dailies - has largely been unswerving in its support of the McCanns.
[our emphasis] "Madeleine: Her Mother is Innocent," shouted Wednesday's Daily Express. "Torture,"
declared Sunday's The People over a picture of Kate McCann, Madeleine's mother. And Chris Roycroft-Davis,
a media consultant and Express commentator, thinks that's how it should be. "The media have been very, very
sympathetic toward the McCanns, quite rightly so," he said on a Sunday morning BBC Radio 2 program."
Doesn't
quite tally with the McCann version, does it? But who cares?
Still, as we said the
inquiry is becoming irrelevant. The press itself is looking for new models as the failure of the "quality" pretence
becomes clearer. The Guardian, having lost hundreds of millions over the last few years despite its large-scale tax
avoidance, now says that it is considering closing the paper edition completely and going 100% on line, an admission of the
depth of its failure. And the Murdoch group has been exposed as a nest of criminals with consequences we can't yet foresee.
Meanwhile, thank God, the internet is here and the public can get behind the newsfeeds to find out more. They can
also see some things for themselves – such as how the tribunal witnesses performed. Better than sitting like fat, passive
Strasbourg geese waiting to have the Clarence Mitchell version stuffed down their throats.
Madeleine McCann review soars to £2m,
01 February 2012
Scotland Yard's review
of the Madeleine McCann case is expected to cost nearly £2 million in its first year.
Detectives from the
Metropolitan Police's Homicide and Serious Crime Command are carrying out a re-examination of the original investigation
into the girl's disappearance in Portugal in May 2007.
Since beginning work last May, the British officers
have travelled to Spain and Portugal to pursue lines of inquiry.
Scotland Yard said it expected to recover £1.9
million from the Home Office for the cost of the Madeleine case review up to the end of March this year, of which it has already
claimed for £800,000.
Madeleine was nearly four when she went missing from her family's holiday flat
in Praia da Luz in the Algarve on May 3 2007 as her parents Kate and Gerry dined with friends nearby.
Portuguese
detectives, helped by officers from Leicestershire Police, carried out a massive investigation into her disappearance.
But the official inquiry was formally shelved in July 2008 and since then no police force has been actively looking
for the missing child.
Scotland Yard's review of the case, called Operation Grange, was launched after a request
from Home Secretary Theresa May supported by Prime Minister David Cameron.
Critics have argued that the decision
to bring in Met detectives to review the evidence about what happened to Madeleine has undermined the force's independence
and diverted resources from other crime victims.
Met bill for Maddy soars to £2million,
01 February 2012
The cost of the Met's review of the Madeleine McCann investigation is set to reach
£2 million less than a year after it was launched, the Evening Standard reveals today.
The
bill for 30 detectives, translation and travel expenses has soared since David Cameron called in Scotland Yard last May.
Detectives from the homicide squad were asked to examine the case of the missing three-year-old after the Prime Minister
acted on the request of Madeleine's parents. A spokesman for Kate and Gerry McCann said: "They have always been very
appreciative of the time and resources that the British police and Home Office have committed to the search for Madeleine
and they are grateful that the review is ongoing."
Met detectives have made at least four trips to Portugal
and Spain to meet police and private investigators who were engaged in the original investigation.
When the review
was announced it sparked controversy over the use of public funds. Labour peer Lord Harris has said the case raises "very
big questions", adding: "There is clearly an issue about the resources being used."
The cost is
disclosed in a document to the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime. Sources say the Met has already sent the Home Office
a bill for £800,000 but the figure is expected to reach £1.9 million by the end of the financial year next
month.
The bill includes the costs of the detectives' salaries, translation and interpretation fees and travel
expenses. Madeleine disappeared from her parents' holiday apartment in Praia da Luz on the Algarve in Portugal on May
3 2007.
She vanished days before her fourth birthday as her parents dined with friends yards away. Since then there
have been hundreds of "sightings" of Madeleine around the world but none confirmed.
The official police
inquiry into her disappearance was shelved in July 2008 but private detectives employed by the McCanns continued the search.
Scotland Yard says the trips to Portugal, and now Spain, are part of "laying the groundwork" for future
co-operation between the police forces.
Officers are examining all the evidence connected to the case, including
material gathered by private investigators.
Detectives have spent months reading a huge file of case material that
had to be translated from Portuguese to English at a considerable cost. In December detectives met Spanish colleagues in Barcelona
to check on reports that the toddler had been abducted and smuggled across the border.
Private investigators in
Spain also handed the Met police team 30 boxes of evidence which they claimed contained up to eight "important new leads".
However, sources say the inquiry could take years to complete and they have played down hopes of a major breakthrough
in the review so far.
The cost of the inquiry compares with the £80 million spent on the policing
operations to tackle and investigate the summer riots.
Posted by John Blacksmith Tuesday, 31 January 2012 at 18:09
Descent into irrelevance
Leveson is now shrouded in an increasing atmosphere of futility. The
inquiry, with all the grand trappings of screens, massed lawyers, strong legal powers and a judge whose air of self-importance
has become more risible as his proceedings sink into irrelevance, was based on sand - an assumption from the beginning that
"something had to be done" about the press, rather than merely throwing a light on its workings.
Unproven
prior assumptions make bad law and worse tribunals. Not only has the truth of the assumption not been demonstrated but it
has looked more and more superficial and misguided as the proceedings have progressed. The industry witnesses have rightly
pointed out - after a shaky and slightly shamefaced beginning - that 98% of the problems have been nothing to do with regulation
of the press but derive from the failure of the police and prosecution authorities to deal with the clear breaches of the
law which phone hacking and surveillance involved. The other 2%,say, involve two very unusual cases, the Millie Dowler and
McCann affairs and this time hard cases, as the old legal saying goes, also make bad law. As for the showbiz celebrity "victims"
who strutted and flounced their way through proceedings like stoned peacocks, their mere memory has become an embarrassment.
Lurking in the background but rarely referred to is the knowledge that the inquiry's eventual findings will either
be pre-empted or overtaken by what comes out at the criminal trials now in prospect and by the expected measures to crack
down on political lobbying and the use of the back door to Number Ten by media bosses.
That leaves the inquiry
with virtually nothing significant to recommend but recommend it will, oh but it will. And that is the final guarantee of
futility: almost every witness from the industry and its regulators has seen the proceedings, despite the comical Lord Justice's
protestations, as a potential threat to the freedom of the press, if only by the imposition of quasi-legalistic and detailed
regulatory powers to a new PCC equivalent. And they are right. As a result the industry and its professional advisors - the
crowd of high-powered lawyers for the press sitting at the back of the inquiry, including probably the sharpest legal brain
in England, James Dingemans QC - will be ready to deal with the recommendations when they finally arrive. With such disparate
bedfellows as steamy Richard Desmond, the editor of Private Eye, Ian Hislop, and Christopher Meyer of the PCC all united in
defending the status quo, the likelihood is that all but the most anodyne of recommendations will be fought and, eventually,
buried. Back to our blind spot
From our own narrow perspective, the McCann affair,
we have gained rather more than we expected. We regret that we have to allude yet again to our supposed blind spot about hidden
hands and conspiracies, something which disappoints some of our readers. Yes, we have written reams about the subject over
the years but we've failed to convince some that the evidence for any conspiracy to protect the McCanns by UK authorities
is exactly on a par with the evidence for abduction: there isn't any.
This led, of course, to our regrettable
falling out with S. Amaral and his team. We wanted to help the truth come out by actively assisting his cause rather than
merely theorizing and to a certain extent we did so, though here isn't the place to give the details of that collaboration.
At times we had wanted to clarify certain episodes such as the Jane Tanner/Robert Murat surveillance operation or the sequence
of events in police headquarters on the night of September 6, which we felt were the twin keys to the whole case, but we eventually
accepted that while others were able to assist us S. Amaral was unwilling to commit himself, quite possibly because he wanted
to keep his powder dry - from everyone.
But the issue of UK protection for the McCanns was critical. Here there
was no question of S. Amaral holding back information because of its potentially explosive future impact (now, now Jane, don't
worry so much): he talked about it openly in his book, his press interviews and on television. Now S. Amaral knows a great
deal more about detection than any of us ever will; on the other hand the Bureau has a pretty good knowledge of how
UK institutions, including the secret services, actually operate and S. Amaral's claims simply didn't tally with what
we knew. So, ultimately, we had to ask him and his team to produce a single item of evidence, just one, on which he was basing
his claims, to give us the confidence to go with him all the way.
Well, they couldn't do it. We were given
examples but they didn't stand up. From here we move from facts to speculation, in this case that S. Amaral certainly
had felt pressure but in our view it came from within Portugal, about which we know almost nothing, not from outside. With
such a basic disagreement about the dynamics of the case. collaboration, sadly, was no longer possible. Deep
Waters, Watson, deep waters
So back to Leveson. As soon as the McCanns made their entrance we were reminded,
once again, why so many people have felt there must be a secret explanation for the apparent untouchability of the pair. As
we wrote previously Leveson himself was loftily dismissive (and if you dismiss you don't learn) of the pressmen's
work and handled the McCanns with velvet gloves. It was, as we said, an unnecessarily excessive public display. But everybody
else behaved similarly, including the very people who'd written the stories!
That is why we still believe that
the Madeleine McCann affair is a psychological phenomenon, not merely a criminal one. How would any protection for the parents
tally with these responses which we were able to watch live? That everyone was sworn to secrecy? That they were following
a script? These questions will have to be answered, not because of opposing theoriesand egosbut
because the time approaches when they will be tested, and judged, in court.
We don't claim to know the exact
make-up of this complex psychological reaction but there it is, a gulf in attitudes to the pair as deep as the Grand Canyon
between many people who have studied the case and "neutral" outsiders such as Lord Justice Leveson and the majority
of the population. When describing the press reporting of the affair Sir Christopher Meyer, ex-head of the PCC, screwed his
face up into an expression of disgust and called it "abominable", reminding us of the way the good Lord Justice
had thrown his head back as he muttered about the tittle-tattle. Why the intensity of the reactions?
Is it that
back in 2007 both of them had allowed themselves to wonder whether the supposed leaks were right and now they are deeply ashamed
that they ever had such thoughts? Just as the journalists who made their embarrassing apologies to the inquiry, for all the
world like redeemed heretics, might be. And just as the most vituperative of the McCanns' internet allies are when they
talk of the bad old days - when they attacked the parents with the viciousness that they now reserve for the parents'
enemies. Those supporters actually talk in terms of having been indoctrinated into a quasi-satanic cult of hatred when they
were sceptics and describe themselves as since being "saved"! Could anything more clearly demonstrate the psychological
depths that lie beneath this investigation?
Meyer
barking
Meyer, by the way, an ex-ambassador to the United States, is a gentle reminder that intimidating
behaviour by a diplomat, in Portugal or elsewhere, does not necessarily mean that they are using the secret power of the UK
to subvert. It just comes naturally to many of them to bark at non-diplomats, partly because the only real power a diplomat
has in this age of instant communication is the power to be rude and bossy to waiters, drivers, doormen and, possibly, overseas
policemen. Or, as in this case, to counsel for the inquiry.
Meyer added that the parents were in "an impossible"
position: they needed the press to help the search for their daughter and yet that exposed them to the damage that the press
could do. It was, he said, a "Faustian bargain", revealing, once again, the strange way that myth bubbles to the
surface when people discuss the case. But was Meyer, a man given to the grand statement, correct? There are many of us who
maintain that Gerry McCann should never have started the media ball rolling. The Portuguese police warned him he would be
putting his daughter's life at risk by doing so and for all we know they were right and she was slaughtered once her description
hit the screens.
Oh no, says the chorus, people who know these things, experts, say that modern best practice is
to give an abduction the widest publicity. Really? So Dr McCann just happened to know about this "modern best practice"
on the night of May 3 when he started blabbing to the media did he? Why would that be?
And then Sir Christopher,
who had been deeply involved in the affair, confirmed that experience and bullying doesn't necessarily bring knowledge
when he followed Team McCann's untrue claim that in July 2007 the press were under pressure to create new and novel stories
because nothing much was happening. It has to be repeated that this, however often and however loudly stated, is garbage:
July is precisely when, as Kate McCann's Madeleine confirms, things started happening as the police
turned their attentions to the weaknesses in the parents' version of events. A free press—the
lesser evil
What else did we learn at Leveson? Well, the Bureau has had to bite the bitter bullet
and take the side of the journalists. The latter, and in particular, the tabloid editors, we had pictured as cynical exploiters
deliberately supporting the McCanns early on for their own purposes; Medusa Brooks clearly is one but Colin Myler equally
clearly isn't and the editor of the Mailon Sunday came across as a balanced and highly able professional.
"Slimy" Morgan deserves his nickname but wasn't involved in the McCann case. Such is the humanising power of
TV, as it was when it brought The Pair to our screens.
Despite the fact that it suits internet blogs and journals
to have the overground press hobbled by more legislation and regulation while we prosper, especially if we are located beyond
UK jurisdiction, one has to hold one's nose and say what most of the witnesses from the industry would like to have said
and, in Richard Desmond's case, almost did: fuck off lawyers and leave the press alone.
The Leveson Inquiry
Press
Complaints Commission (PCC)
The Leveson Inquiry turns to the Press Complaints Commission (PCC)
and hears from Sir Christopher Meyer, chairman of the PCC from 2003 to 2009
A former solicitor could be jailed for repeatedly
accusing Kate and Gerry McCann of covering up the 'death' of their daughter Madeleine.
Lawyers for the
Rothley couple are taking civil action against Tony Bennett to try to stop him making allegations that they were involved
in Madeleine's disappearance from the Portuguese resort of Praia de Luz in May 2007.
Mr Bennett is secretary of an organisation called the Madeleine Foundation,
which repeatedly claimed the three-year-old was not abducted.
The 64-year-old, of Harlow, Essex, signed a High
Court agreement in November 2009, to say he would not persist with his accusations.
Court papers say: "The
Defendant (Mr Bennett) undertakes not to repeat allegations that the Claimants (The McCanns) are guilty of, or are suspected
of, causing the death of their daughter Madeleine McCann: and/or disposing of her body and/or of lying about what happened
and/or of seeking to cover up what they had done."
Mr Bennett is accused of being in contempt of court for
breaching the agreement in leaflets, books and internet postings.
There will be a hearing at The Queen's Bench
Division of the High Court in London next week.
The McCann's spokesman Clarence Mitchell yesterday told the
Leicester Mercury: "The matter is in hand with Kate and Gerry's lawyers. It has been pretty distressing for them.
"He has accused them of lying and that is a prima facie libel.
"Kate and Gerry do not want this
but he (Mr Bennett) has persisted with making hurtful and untrue allegations about them and they want it to stop.
"They feel enough is enough.
"It is the case that he could face jail."
Madeleine's
parents were considered suspects in her disappearance by Portuguese police in the early stages of the investigation, but were
subsequently completely cleared of any wrongdoing.
In 2007, Mr Bennett launched a private prosecution against the
McCanns, alleging child neglect, but it was thrown out by magistrates. In summer 2009, the Madeleine Foundation delivered
leaflets around Rothley relating to the youngster's disappearance.
Mr Bennett was unavailable to comment yesterday.
In a story about his prosecution in the Sunday Telegraph, Mr Bennett said: "I have done my best to comply with
the undertaking but I would argue to the courts it was an unreasonably wide undertaking to sign.
"In the last
two years, I have not written specifically about the details of how she (Madeleine) might have died or how the body was hidden.
"Three of my colleagues in the Madeleine Foundation distributed a small quantity of leaflets in Rothley. I would
honestly say perhaps that was a leaflet distribution too far."
He added on the Madeleine Foundation website:
"It will be a strange thing if the court decides that in this land noted for its commitment to free speech, I am not
allowed to discuss what is freely available to be distributed, and debated, in most of the rest of Europe."
The McCanns v. Tony Bennett
The McCanns instruct Carter-Ruck to instigate contempt of Court
proceedings against Tony Bennett, leaving him facing a possible prison sentence.
Previous correspondence and
documents can be read here:
THE British police hunt for Madeleine McCann will cost more than £1.3million in its first
year.
Scotland Yard's 37-strong team includes three detective inspectors and five detective sergeants.
There are also 19 detective constables on the case under the lead of Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood.
And three of the country's top cold case officers have been brought in.
The three, from the Metropolitan
Police's Murder Review Group, are assisting the main Operation Grange team reviewing the Madeleine case files.
The combined salaries of the team total more than £1.3million with thousands also being spent following
up leads, including at least four trips abroad.
The Met has vowed there will be no limits to the probe, which is
being funded through a grant from the Home Office.
Already this year the cold case squad has seen Gary Dobson,
36, and David Norris, 35, brought to justice over the 1993 murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence.
Detective
Chief Superintendent Hamish Campbell, who led the Jill Dando murder inquiry, is also involved.
The Met
refused to say if he was one of the three taking part in the Madeleine case but, we can reveal, he is helping oversee the
probe.
Along with Commander Simon Foy, Mr Redwood and Detective Inspector Tim Dobson, Mr Campbell is part
of a "Gold Group" monitoring the review.The group has met eight times since it began last May to discuss progress.
A spokesman for the Met said: "A Major Investigation Team is assigned to Operation Grange. Staff numbers
are open to change depending on the needs of the review."
Three-year-old Madeleine was on holiday
with her parents Kate and Gerry, both 43, when she was snatched from their holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal,
in May 2007.
At Christmas the McCanns said they remain hopeful of a breakthrough, adding: "Our search for
Madeleine and the Metropolitan Police review of the case are progressing well."
Around £2.5million
raised through a fund set up by the McCanns, from Rothley, Leics, has been spent on the hunt for the youngster.
Influence, 28 January 2012
Influence
EXCLUSIVE to mccannfiles.com
By Dr Martin Roberts
28 January 2012
INFLUENCE
Gerry McCann's televised meeting with Jeremy Paxman features several quizzical moments
on the part of the interviewee, but one in particular stands out:
JP (on the subject of media attention in Portugal):
"Do you think, to some degree, you reaped a whirlwind?"
GM (after an initial verbal fumble): "We
had very clear objectives, what we wanted, and any parents would take the opportunity of trying to get information into the
investigation, that might help find their daughter, and that's what our clear objectives were..."
Even
an uninformed listener is likely to have wondered why Gerry McCann should have found such a straightforward question apparently
stressful, his answer being peppered with speech errors initially. If they took the time to think about it, they might also
have wondered how this statement answered the question, since 'getting information into the investigation' and airing
it before the media are not at all the same pursuit. To simplify the issue however, we may classify this semantic confusion
straightforwardly as resulting from the stress hitherto observed. The real cause of curiosity resides in the first clause,
which concerns the taking of a very particular opportunity.
The Paxman interview was included as part of a BBC
Newsnight programme broadcast early in March 2009, and covered the unprecedented media activity surrounding the McCanns in
the wake of Madeleine's disappearance; activity which Gerry 'fully expected to die down' after the parents'
European 'trips.' These junkets, to Germany, Holland and Morocco, occupied Kate and Gerry and McCann until mid-June,
travelling to locations 'where we felt there might be information relevant.' (relevant to what exactly is not made
clear). After which time the parents remained in Portugal where, emotionally unprepared to leave, they felt closer to their
missing daughter.
So much for context. Now let us return to the issue engendered by that one all-too-meaningful
clause.
As vague as Gerry makes it sound, it is entirely reasonable to suppose that the 'information' the
McCanns toured Europe in search of was relevant to the quest for their missing daughter and would, should it have materialised,
have been introduced into the investigation. What class of useful information might this have been? Much as the McCanns and
others would have sought at the outset most likely, e.g., sightings, of the 'where,' 'when,' 'how'
and 'with whom' variety; perhaps even the odd remark overheard in conversation, such as take place on the boardwalks
of the Barcelona marina.
But the significance of the media in all of this can be discounted. Whereas they formed
the topic of the Paxman discussion, they were nothing like appropriate agents for 'getting information into the investigation.'
That role belonged to the family liaison officers from Leicestershire Constabulary and the PJ. 'Getting information into
the investigation' should not have involved the media at all, however concerned the informant(s) may have been. In the
McCanns' case the media, having invited themselves to Praia da Luz, albeit at the McCanns' instigation, were there,
in principle, to comment upon the investigation, not to influence it. We all know of course that certain of its representatives
exceeded their remit in that respect, and it is a moot point as to whether that might have been an intended outcome, but the
media were essentially present as observers, not agents provocateurs.
Leaving the headlines, both good
and bad, aside, let us consider one very obvious aspect of this much discussed 'information.' Come mid-June, i.e.,
four weeks or so after Madeleine had been 'taken,' there was not very much of it. And what of those sightings which
had already come to the attention of the Portuguese authorities without the benefit of McCann intervention at all? What importance
did the parents attach to any of those? None whatsoever. And that puts a whole new slant on the idea of there being 'very
clear objectives' as regards 'getting information into the investigation.' If sightings were of no apparent interest
from the outset, why travel around Europe in an attempt to encourage them? Widening a search is one thing, spreading confusion
quite another. And all the while Madeleine stands to be seen by everyone from Turks to the Tuareg (Germany has long hosted
a substantial population of Gastarbeiter), hope springs eternal.
'Sightings' seem not to have represented
the class of information the McCanns themselves were concerned to 'get into the investigation,' in which case it will
have been information of a different sort they were desirous of introducing. And suddenly we have an altogether inappropriate
state of affairs. Because even those of us whose culinary skills extend no further than the micro-wave cooker understand that
whatever ingredients a chef adds to his or her recipe will directly affect the outcome. Yeast will make the dough rise. If
you want banana bread you add bananas. What you put into the mix will influence the result.
Having had
every opportunity during interview to inform the PJ of as much relevant detail as they possibly could, the McCanns should
have largely met their 'clear objective.' Obviously they did not meet it entirely, since they went jetting off looking
for further information, of a type they had previously disregarded. Objective not totally fulfilled therefore. But in the
absence of information worth passing on to investigators, 'taking the opportunity of trying to get information
into the investigation' would necessarily require initiative.
It fell to Kate (who couldn't bear
to use her camera after taking the 'last photo') to get information into the investigation, and via the proper channels
of police liaison, thereby giving the attendant matter of mysticism an air of respectability. And it came to pass that the
PJ diligently investigated the ownership and movements (not) of the yacht 'Shearwater.' Just as they had diligently
held a press conference to announce inclusion in their 'missing persons' bulletin of an official photograph, of pyjamas
identical to those being worn by Madeleine at the time of her disappearance.
Interfering with a police investigation
is a crime in the U.K. and, I dare say, in Portugal also.
Posted by John Blacksmith Saturday, 28 January 2012 at 16:01
The McCanns. They are shown demonstrating the terrifying psychological
damage that their libel writ describes.
We ourselves have had no information about whether S. Amaral's
lawyer Antonio Cabrita has ceased working for his client. Still, as we wrote in 2010 Cabrita is a serial incompetent who came
close to destroying what remained of Scotland Yard police officer de Freitas's career by his bungled attempt to call him
as a witness for Goncalo Amaral as well as simultaneously embarrassing both the Yard and Leicester police.
Some
weeks later he excelled himself in court when the prosecutor Menezes offered him a gift-wrapped treat in the form of his now-famous
statement that the group had lied about the "checking". Unfortunately Cabrita gave it back to him unopened. He completely
failed to appreciate its importance and thus didn't develop a line of questioning that would have brought its significance
to the attention of both the judge and the slavering media pack outside. Finally the "interpretation" finding in
the appeal court judgement which brought eventual success to S. Amaral seems to have owed more to the judges' own reasoning
about the case than to any arguments put forward by Cabrita. Nor does it help that he has been severely and incurably ill
for some years.
That was why we called on Amaral to get rid of him and that's why we can't help thinking
that any replacement would be preferable. But what do we know?
The McCanns describing the appalling and continuous symptoms of pain
that the libel writ outlines.
Anyway the case is postponed, to the disappointment, no doubt, of
those who are certain that Amaral is hurtling towards his doom. Much has been made of the impossibility of S. Amaral demonstrating
the likely truth of his central contention that the child died in the apartment on May 3. After all we have David Payne who
can testify that he saw the child alive, well and strikingly pretty at 6.40 PM, staff at the Tapas restaurant who can testify
to the couple's arrival time and the unanimous evidence of the whole group that the demeanour and behaviour of both Kate
and Gerry McCann was completely normal and untroubled until 10 PM that night. All the other stuff, say the parents' allies,
such as the traumatising effect that the parents claim Amaral's accusations had on them, is really unimportant and peripheral
compared with what these solid and undeniable witnesses will tell the court.
So what are we to make of the witnesses
called by the McCanns?
Just a little reminder
Well, a large chunk of the police and legal system are there, from Alipio Ribeiro down — João
Melchior Gomes, António Marinho e Pinto, Paolo Rebelo, José Barra da Costa. Oh, and our dear old friend José
Magalhães e Menezes. That the latter was called by Amaral himself in the Lisbon hearings should remind us that in Portugal
a witness for one side or the other has a rather different status than in the UK. Their knowledge of what happened in apartment
5A that night comes to them courtesy of Amaral's officers at the scene.
Then we have Susan Healy, Trish Cameron
and Michael Wright. They were rather a long way from the apartment that night but with luck they'll be able to tell us
all about those shutters. And Susan Healy can tell the court all about her conversations with Kate McCann about the deal that
the PJ offered.
Next we have Emma Loach, Susan Hubbard and Alan Pike who'll be able to give the court plenty
of "colour stuff" about what wonderful people the pair are and the dreadful symptoms that the pair have been showing
ever since Amaral made his claims.
Now some big guns to prepare us for the climax: Ed Smethurst, that well known
eye-witness to events will be there, as will Jim Gamble, a Mr David Trickey and Angus McBride.
Finally, ladies
and gentlemen, after all these warm up acts we have the stars of the show, the Tapas 7.
Only they're not there.
Not one of them. They aren't calling a single witness with actual knowledge of anything that happened in and around
apartment 5A that night. Well, well, well. Not one.
However there is one last name to add to the list: that
modern Sherlock Holmes, Dave "Strangler's Hands" Edgar. He'll sort it all out.
The president of the bar
[Order of Lawyers], Marinho Pinto, will be a witness for the McCanns against Gonçalo Amaral, in the civil case that
Madeleine's parents have brought against the former coordinator of the Directorate of Judicial Police of Portimão,
Correio da Manhã has learned.
The president Marinho Pinto
Marinho Pinto has made himself available to testify, in person, against
the former coordinator at the trial that was scheduled to start next week but was postponed by the judge, who granted the
request of the McCanns to hear several English witnesses by videoconference. Gonçalo Amaral was successful, in the
Appeals Court, against the injunction which prevented publication of his book "The Truth of the Lie," where he defended
the thesis that Maddie had died in the Algarve. The judges held that the prohibition of publication of the book violated the
Constitution.
How did these two children simply vanish
one day?, 21 January 2012
How did these two children simply vanish one day? Sunday Express
By William Bond Sunday January
22,2012
AN INVESTIGATING judge in southern Spain will this week lift a secrecy order on the disappearance
of two young children that has gripped the nation for more than three months.
It could cast fresh light
on what happened to Ruth Breton, six, and her two-year-old brother Jose but could just as easily only fuel the mystery.
The children were reported missing by their father on October 8, 2011.
He approached a security guard in
a popular public park in the city of Cordoba, telling him his children had simply disappeared when he was distracted and had
taken his eyes off them for no more than a minute or two.
Jose Breton and his wife Ruth had just separated. He
had weekend custody and had taken them to the park that Sunday.
Police launched a frantic search but the two children
were nowhere to be found and no one had seen them. Even the park's numerous security cameras had captured images only
of the father, none of Ruth and Jose.
Police immediately noticed that Jose senior seemed to show no emotion. In
a flat voice, he repeated his story several times, never changing a detail.
Yet there wasn't a flicker of fear
over what might have happened to his beautiful children. It was reported that he had shown no guilt either for having taken
his eyes off them, nor anger that they may have been snatched by strangers to meet who knows what fate.
Detectives
leaned heavily on him but he just kept repeating his story, virtually word for word. The children were playing, he took his
eyes off them briefly and they were gone. Officers were convinced he was involved in the disappearance. A few days later detectives
and uniformed police swooped on the country property just outside the city owned by his parents and little Jose's paternal
grandparents at Las Quemadillas.
They were accompanied by sniffer dogs and spent hours turning the place inside-out.
They found nothing. In the next eight days they repeated the operation twice more. But there were still no clues. Although
Jose stuck to his story he was arrested and questioned as a suspect. After 72 hours – the maximum a suspect can be held
in Spain – he was handed to an investigating judge, Jose Luis Rodriguez.
After a closed-door session, Breton
was ordered to prison on suspicion of illegal detention, kidnapping and simulating a crime. A secrecy order meant that whatever
evidence there was could not be disclosed.
Last week, state prosecutor Jose Antonio Martin-Caro said that when
the secrecy order is lifted on Wednesday there will be evidence to back-up why Breton is being held. He admitted, however,
that what actually happened to the children remains a mystery. The police are convinced that the father did not take them
to the park and knows what happened to them, but they have yet to get him to admit it.
The pressure has not let
up on the paternal grandparents. The estate where they live has been searched at least half a dozen more times. Drains have
been scoured, false roofs torn down and walls opened up. Last Wednesday a team of National Police divers dragged the River
Guadalquivir where it passes through Cordoba and near to the grandparents’ property for a second time since the drama
began.
The weekly Madrid news magazine Interviu reported that the father had let one ominous expression slip when
a detective asked yet again: "Where are the kids, Jose?" "That," he is reported to have said, "is
my secret."
Equally convinced that Jose senior is responsible for the children's disappearance is their
mother, Ruth. She broke her silence for the first time this month as the 100th day of their disappearance approached.
She told a rally near the Portuguese border: "Everyone who knows Jose Breton knows that he did not lose his children.
And to those who don't know him, I will assure them that he didn't."
The case bears a passing resemblance
to the disappearance of British child Madeleine McCann on a family holiday in Portugal almost five years ago, in the sense
that the mystery has a nation in thrall. Just as Kate McCann has clung to the belief that her daughter is still alive, so
Ruth Ortiz is convinced her children are not dead. Also like Kate, she is determined to keep the spotlight on the case and
not to give up until the mystery is solved.
Earlier this month she crossed the border into Portugal to put-up scores
of posters with pictures of Ruth and Jose.
In Cordoba, a city visited by thousands of tourists every week, posters
are being prepared in several languages, including English.
British expats are said to have offered to send posters
to the UK as Interpol alerts police across Europe.
It has to be emphasised that there is nothing to connect the
Spanish children's disappearance with that of Madeleine.
Madeleine's parents support
the family of the missing children in Córdoba europapress
MADRID, 19 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS
) 19.10.2011
The parents of the missing girl Madeleine McCann, Kate and Gerry, wanted to show their
solidarity with the family of the two missing children in Córdoba and have said that their "heart" goes out
to them and they hope that they will be found "safe and well".
"We have heard about this case but
we do not know the details of what happened. Of course, our heart goes out to the parents and we hope that they will soon
be found safe and well; we know from experience how hard it is when a child is abducted and we always feel with all our hearts
for the parents whose children have also been abducted," said Gerry McCann.
Madeleine's father made these
statements during a press conference in Madrid where they presented a book entitled "Madeleine" in which the girl's
mother reconstructs the facts since the disappearance of her daughter on 3rd May 2007.
"When Madeleine disappeared
at the beginning it was suggested to us that we should meet with other parents whose children had been abducted. This seemed
a totally crazy idea to us because we thought that we were going to find our daughter straight away. We could not imagine
that four and a half years later we would still be searching for her and now we know this feeling of other parents and we
feel with all our hearts for them," added Gerry.
On the 10th October the siblings Ruth (aged six) and José
(aged two) disappeared from a park in Córdoba. Since then National Police officers have been investigating the whereabouts
of the children whose father was arrested on Tuesday in the face of indications of a possible crime of homicide.
The McCanns on the children of Córdoba europapress
19 October 2012
Transcript
by Nigel Moore
Gerry McCann: When Madeleine was taken and it was suggested to us that we
might want to speak to other parents whose children had been missing for a long time, we didn't want to go there because
we couldn't imagine being in the situation we're in four and a half years down the line. So, we hope that the children
are found as quickly as possible.
Burson-Marsteller called in to cover Costa
Concordia disaster, 16 January 2012
Burson-Marsteller called in to cover Costa Concordia disaster
PRWeek
Sara Luker 16 January 2012, 10:27am
Carnival, the holding company
of Costa Cruises, has called in Burson-Marsteller to handle the corporate and crisis comms around the Costa Concordia disaster.
Costa Concordia: ran aground off the Italian coast (Rex Features)
Burson-Marsteller MD Clarence Mitchell started working on the
comms last night.
Rooster, the UK & Ireland PR agency for Costa Cruises, has also been handling media relations
throughout the weekend.
Michele Andjel, head of PR at Carnival UK, told PRWeek that the company is working with
the Passenger Shipping Association (PSA) on press enquiries and ongoing updates.
The Costa Concordia, which had
more than 4,000 people on board, flipped on its side after hitting a rock on Friday night off Italy's west coast. At least
six people have died in the accident.
The first statement from Costa Cruises was released at 1am CET on Saturday,
detailing how many people had been evacuated and that it was 'currently working with the highest commitment to provide
all the needed assistance'.
The comms response of both Costa Cruises and the general cruise industry to the
disaster could have been more effective, according to one travel PR practitioner.
Brighter Group executive chairman
Steve Dunne said: 'It's clear that the PR function there has been slow to react and take control of the situation.
To have members of staff being interviewed and using terms like there was "mass panic" on the ship smacks of people
not being briefed properly.'
Dunne went on to say that the disaster was not just Costa Cruises' problem
but an industry problem – saying that it had had a 'wake-up call'.
He said: 'For 30 years cruise
holidays have been the golden child of the travel industry with sales continuing to climb. This accident has caught them on
the back foot and it has amazed me that nobody from the industry, especially the Passenger Shipping Association, has stepped
forward to defend crusies and their safety record.
'Somebody needs to be combating the pictures of the Costa
Concordia sinking being broadcast across the world's media and the word Titantic being used.'
Captain 'Ignored Order' To Return To Ship Sky News
6:59pm UK, Tuesday January 17, 2012
- Extract -
Meanwhile,
it has emerged that in 2010 Mr Schettino gave an interview to a Czech newspaper where he said he never wanted to face a scenario
like the Titantic.
He told Dnes: "I wouldn't like to be in the role of the captain of the Titanic, having
to sail in an ocean of icebergs.
"But I think that thanks to preparation, you can handle any situation and
deal with potential problems."
A Facebook group has been set up in Francesco Schettino's name with Italian
users calling him a "coward" and saying he should be sent to prison.
Costa Cruises chairman Pier Luigi
Foschi has apologised for the tragedy, which has left dozens of the 4,200 people on board injured and the 114,000-tonne ship
lying on its side.
Clarence Mitchell, who is representing Costa Cruises, said: "Mr Foschi confirmed the captain
had been approaching the island of Giglio to 'make a salute'.
"The company says this (incident) was
caused by an attempt by the captain to show the ship to the port.
"But there's a criminal investigation
going on and we're not going to say anything that's going to compromise that or the captain's case."
Prosecutor Francesco Verusio said the captain's alleged conduct was "inexcusable."
"We are
struck by the unscrupulousness of the reckless manoeuvre that the commander of the Costa Concordia made near the island of
Giglio."
(...)
The Leveson Inquiry
Newspaper editors
Witness statements/transcripts for former and current editors including Peter Hill and Richard
Desmond have now been moved here
Kevin Halligen's Appeal against Extradition to be heard
by The Supreme Court on 21 February 2012
On 12 May 2011 the Metropolitan
Police Service (MPS) announced that, at the request of the Home Secretary, it had agreed to bring its particular expertise
to the Madeleine McCann case.
The then Commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson, considered the request and took the decision
that on balance it was the right thing to do. This was subject to funding being made available by the Home Office, as this
case is beyond the MPS's jurisdiction.
The Portuguese authorities retain the lead.
While the MPS will not provide a running commentary on its involvement, known as Operation Grange, it is felt appropriate
to make the remit available to the public and it is available in the related publications.
The support and expertise proffered by the Commissioner will
be provided by the Homicide & Serious Crime Command - SCD1.
The activity, in the first instance, will be that
of an 'investigative review'. This will entail a review of the whole of the investigation(s)
which have been conducted in to the circumstances of Madeleine McCann's disappearance.
The focus of the review
will be of the material held by three main stakeholders (and in the following order of primacy);
The Portuguese Law
Enforcement agencies.
UK Law Enforcement agencies,
Other private investigative agencies/staff and organisations.
The
investigative review is intended to collate, record and analyse what has gone before.
It is to examine the case
and seek to determine, (as if the abduction occurred in the UK) what additional, new investigative approaches we would take
and which can assist the Portuguese authorities in progressing the matter. Whilst ordinarily a review has no investigative
remit whatsoever- the scale and extent of this enquiry cannot permit for such an approach. It will take too long to progress
to any "action stage" if activity is given wholly and solely to a review process.
The 'investigative
review' will be conducted with transparency, openness and thoroughness.
The work will be overseen through the
Gold Group management structure, which will also manage the central relationships with other key stakeholders and provide
continuing oversight and direction to the investigative remit.
For the information of all UK law enforcement agencies.
The Metropolitan Police Service is conducting an Investigative Review into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann aged
3yrs on the 3rd May 2007 in Praia da Luz Portugal.
At 12.00hrs on Tuesday 14th June 2011 UK primacy for this matter
formally passed from Leicestershire Constabulary to the Metropolitan Police Service under Operation GRANGE.
All
future communication should be sent to the incident room at:-
Major Investigation Team 5 Homicide and Serious
Crime Command Belgravia Police station 202-206 Buckingham Palace Rd London SW1W 9SX
Urgent out of hours contact can be made via the Serious Crime Directorate Reserve at New Scotland Yard on 020
7230 8666.
Investigations into missing people never
expire, 02 January 2012
Investigations into missing people never expire Diário de Notícias (paper edition)
PRIORITIES Cases involving children are considered
urgent. Very often a disappearance turns out to be a crime of homicide.
by
Rute Coelho 2 January 2012 With thanks to Joana Morais for translation
92 missing people appear in the Polícia Judiciária's
database, including adults and children. The inspector Ramos Caniço points out a fundamental difference between homicide
cases and investigations into missing people: "Missing people cases never expire. Homicide cases lapse 15 years after
the crime, if an arguido isn't constituted."
In investigations into the missing there is
also a principle investigators have already in mind. "Most adults disappear on their own free will." This means
investigations into missing children are always a priority. And then there are cases that are kept in the missing persons
database even though they are classed with a different category. "Madeleine McCann is a case registered as an abduction,
even though there isn't any evidence that she was kidnapped."
In the cases of the missing found dead,
the cause of death is, usually, an accident. Ramos Caniço gives the the example of an elderly man who was found dead
by the police section that investigates missing people cases in Lisbon, just six days after being reported missing. "He
fell down in a ditch close to a river three kilometres away from his house. He died of cold."
In 2010, the
missing people section of Lisbon started investigating a case that turned out to be an homicide. "The corpse of a man
was found floating in a dam in Alentejo. The man was reported as missing, however, it was a homicide case. We found the suspect
in Lisbon withdrawing money with the victim's credit card and the case was transferred to the Homicide unit."
In cases of missing children, the missing people section of Lisbon guarantees that "at present, there is no child
aged up to ten years old missing in the Lisbon area." The exception to this being the very old cold cases.
"Processes: In 2011 the PJ had almost 60 homicide cases to solve.(...) This year alone the Homicide
section of the Polícia Judiciária had to investigate 56 homicide cases carried over from last year. In 2010,
the PJ initiated 187 inquests for homicide, of which 131 were verified as such, clarified and concluded. In addition to the
homicides there are 92 people still to be found. That is, over 150 ongoing investigations remain open in two areas alone:
homicides and missing people. (....)" (Note: extract from the article "More than 150 crimes waiting for a solution",
page 18, paper edition of Diário de Notícias)
"Solution to the Maddie Case is in the Process" 3 questions to... Gonçalo Amaral former
Judiciary Police coordinator of investigations
Do you feel somewhat frustrated because the Madeleine
case wasn't concluded? Not exactly, in the Madeleine McCann case there was always plenty of evidence and
that is in the process. The solution to the Maddie case is in the process. I never had any doubts whatsoever of what
took place that day of May 3, 2007. I didn't have doubts nor did the British police, the parents of the child were the
ones who had doubts. There are more ideas of what happened in this process than in Rui Pedro's case.
How
to prove the Judiciary Police thesis? If a reconstruction of the events of that day had been enacted that would
be enough. However Kate and Gerry McCann refused to participate. It's a shame.
Did you have many unsolved
cases in the 30 years working for the Judiciary Police? A few, not many. But I've spent most of my time
working in drug trafficking cases. In the Azores, I had two unsolved homicide cases, but they were old cases from
the 80's.
The Leveson Inquiry
Daily
Express journalists
Witness statements/transcripts for David Pilditch, Padraic Flanagan
and Nick Fagge have now been moved here
The Leveson Inquiry
Witness statements/transcripts for Tom Crone, Colin
Myler and Daniel Sanderson have now been moved here
Gonçalo Amaral: "Justice works
in Silence", 08 December 2011
Gonçalo Amaral: "Justice works in Silence"
Algarve123
Edition 707 ( 8 Dec 2011)
His life has been ripped apart since he led
the police investigation into the Millennium's greatest mystery, and came into legal confrontation with Kate and Gerry
McCann. Gonçalo Amaral has lost his family, his business, his assets and the income from his controversial book that
states all the reasons why he believes three-year-old Madeleine McCann died in apartment 5A in Praia da Luz back in May of
2007. Now, four-and-a-half years down the line, he faces another hurdle: a trial for defamation of the McCanns – due
to start in Lisbon in February – in which the couple are claiming 1.2 million euros in damages. Does he think he can
win? "Of course", he says. This is the man whose maxim is "justice works in silence". He still believes
the case of the world’s most famous missing person will be solved. And he told Algarve123 what he thinks is needed to
get there...
You wouldn't miss him in a crowd. Gonçalo Amaral, 52,
is strikingly tall with a penchant for hats. He was wearing a long black coat, a black fedora and a bright red scarf when
we met him on the terrace of Casa Inglesa in Portimão. He looked much more like an intellectual than a former police
officer, but these days his life is spent largely writing - an activity he's come to love as much as the police work that
used to fill his days.
Our first question: "How's life?" elicited the reply "Bad!" so any
further niceties went by the board.
What Amaral has always maintained is that the McCanns' zeal for litigation
"will not bring their daughter back". He claims various legal suits against him, and a number of other Portuguese
public figures who have verbalised "anti-McCann-story" sentiments, are totally out of keeping with the Catholic
faith so fervently embraced by Madeleine's mother Kate.
"Is it Catholic to hold sentiments of vengeance?
To seek to destroy a family as mine has been destroyed?" he asks.
"This litigation will carry a heavy
price – but I have faith that the mystery will be resolved.
"Even if I "disappear" in the
process - as Kate McCann has written that she wishes I would in her book - I have a daughter and lots of friends who will
make sure justice is done".
It may sound theatrical - but Amaral is not about theatre. He is about truth –
hard facts, solid investigative work.
"The case has to be re-opened, and I have faith that it will be,"
he said. "It will either be when this current "procurador" leaves, or when the current chief of police leaves.
It's not something I am pushing for - even if I could - it's just something I feel certain will happen. And when it
does, the first, most essential thing to be done will be a reconstruction of that very first night – the night Madeleine
disappeared. Because that's what happened: she literally disappeared! The reconstruction will have to involve all the
parties: the McCanns and their friends. You see, there are so many inconsistencies in these people's statements that a
reconstruction will very quickly highlight where they have not told the truth".
An example of the power of
reconstructions came only weeks ago in Spain where a father claimed his two children were abducted from a park. A police reconstruction
quickly proved that the father had never taken his children to the park: witnesses who had seen him arrive in his car but
hadn't noticed the children in the back seat, were surprised to discover that in the reconstruction the child-sized dummies
in the back were clearly visible. The children's father is now in jail – although the children are still missing.
Amaral explained that when Madeleine disappeared police didn't organise a reconstruction in Praia da Luz "because
there were so many journalists on the ground" – and once the heat had died down, "the McCanns refused. They
said any reconstruction should be made by actors – but the whole reason for reconstructions is to use the people involved,
and see where their stories don’t add up!"
Going back to that first night is logical: the initial 48-hours
after any disappearance are crucial. They can literally mean the difference between life and death – but in Madeleine's
case, Amaral is convinced of the latter. The theory that has led to his prosecution by the McCanns for defamation is clearly
set out in his book "A Verdade de Mentira" (The Truth of the Lie) – banned from sale in 2009, and then "released"
by the Appeals Court a year later. We say "released" because the books were actually never returned to publishers
Guerra & Paz, and thus they and Amaral have had nothing to sell...
"It's another part of the whole
plot to assassinate my civil position," Amaral says matter-of-factly. "I've been left with no chances; no way
of paying my debts; liens on my property. I've had to move away from my family in order to protect them. My marriage,
well, it's not so good. Not good at all, really. My life seems to be all about divorce..."
So how does
he find the strength to move forwards?
"Well, I put the McCanns in a metaphorical box and I am not really
thinking too much about the trial in February. I think I will win, and then they will appeal – but I have to have a
path. I want to open another consultancy. I had one when I left the police force, but that was destroyed when the McCanns
went after me over "A Verdade de Mentira".
So that's one thing - and the other is writing. I have
recently brought out a new book: "Vidas sem Defesa" about missing children cases in Portugal, and I have another
one almost ready (I am not going to tell you what it is about!). After that, I would like to take police "mysteries"
and study them and write stories, not novels; stories based on facts to show what I believe really happened. There's a
real lack of books of this type."
So he's not angry over the agonies and frustrations he's endured
from what came from essentially doing his job?
"I have my anger well-guarded. No feelings for revenge. Like
I say, they will pay for what they have done to me and my family – but through the courts. Even after everything that
has happened, I still have faith in the Portuguese justice system".
And does he have any clues as to what
catapulted the Madeleine case into the stratosphere of media attention? Why did the McCanns receive so much help from the
British authorities right from the very beginning? And why were they and the so-called Tapas 7 never taken to task for child
neglect – considering that they all left their children alone at night during the ill-fated holiday?
"Ah,
now there we're getting into politics – and quite honestly, those are questions for the British public to ask. I
don't have to have theories about them. My job was to find Madeleine".
A job handed to him nearly five
years ago – and one that he will never forget.
After an appearance during the phone-hacking scandal, Flack
wonders where Clarence Mitchell has gone. After the fanfare made by Lewis PR when it gave the McCanns' former PRO the
grandiose title of director of media strategy and public affairs last May, it seems he's slipped away into the night.
'Oh, he's gone,' said an unimpressed-sounding lady who answered his phone last week.
Posted by John Blacksmith at 20:25 Sunday, 15 May 2011
On July 7 2008 Mrs Justice Hogg gave judgement in the Family Division of the High Court regarding the attempt
by Kate & Gerry McCann to gain access to all the Leicester Police documents regarding the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.
The judgement was by agreement between the parties and was made in open court.
M/S Kate McCann in her book
Madeleine has now provided an excerpt from the official submission of Leicester Police to the court regarding the
matter and outlining the reasons why they could not agree to provide the documents. Signed by the assistant chief constable
of Leicestershire it runs: "While one or both of them may be innocent, there is no clear evidence
that eliminates them from involvement in Madeleine's disappearance."
EXCLUSIVE: Gonçalo Amaral issues
plea for Kate McCann to "tell the truth", 10 May 2011
EXCLUSIVE: Gonçalo Amaral issues plea for Kate McCann to "tell the
truth" mccannfiles.com
By Nigel Moore 10 May
2011
FORMER Portuguese police co-ordinator Goncalo
Amaral has issued a plea for Kate McCann to "tell the truth" and spoken of his delight at having his freedom
of speech returned.
Speaking exclusively to mccannfiles.com on the eve of the publication of Mrs
McCanns' book about missing daughter Madeleine, Mr Amaral said he was surprised at Kate's claim that she was writing
her book "to give an account of the truth."
"It is strange to hear the word 'truth' from
the mouth of someone who didn't cooperate with the police when the investigation was open," he said.
"And
it was not any investigation; it was about finding what caused the mysterious disappearance of her daughter, and the enormous
effort to recover her."
Mr Amaral believes the McCanns have "the right to be able to write what they
like about the case" and supports the fact that Kate "is using her freedom of speech". Something recently denied
him.
"A book that is written by someone who was a suspect may become of use as a document, maybe even a piece
of documental evidence. Let us wait," he added.
Mr Amaral, whose bestselling book The Truth of the Lie was
the subject of costly legal action by the McCanns, said he "felt like a free man" when the injunction on his book
was overturned by the Appeals Court in October last year. "The McCanns also felt free because they decided to write a
book," he observed.
The McCanns, who failed in their recent appeal to Portugal's Supreme Court to reimpose
the ban, must now return all seized copies of the book, currently placed with their lawyer, Isabel Duarte, or risk incurring
a criminal charge of disobedience.
"Legality has been re-established," said Goncalo Amaral. "The
McCanns have just lost one more judicial action that was paid for with money from a fund that they say is for recovering their
daughter.
"Both her and her husband were, and still are, more concerned with defending their image than in
finding out what caused the child's mysterious disappearance."
An English language version of Goncalo
Amaral's book is yet to be released but he said: "After the McCanns' book is published, there is no reason whatsoever
for The Truth of the Lie not to be published in the UK. The British people are entitled to know all of the facts."
Mr Amaral believes that the process will be reopened and "the material truth will be known" and is dismissive
of the McCanns' petition for a review of the case.
"That is one of the misunderstandings that are created
by the McCanns," he said, "they do not want the case to be reviewed, they merely want a review of the information
that has been added after the shelving (sightings of the child).
"If they wanted the case to be reviewed,
they would ask for the crime process and the investigation to be reopened, and they would supply all of the reports from the
various private detectives that they have hired.
"To ask for the process to be reopened, all it would take
is a letter to the Prosecutor, as it has already happened in so many other cases. It costs them nothing, just the stamp on
the letter."
If the process were reopened, Mr Amaral believes there are "several" diligences which
could be carried out to help discover the truth.
"There will always be diligences that will result from reviewing
the investigation and the reports from the McCanns' private detectives. Those diligences will have to take the conclusions
that the Police had reached in September of 2007 into account.
"That is the starting point, but in the end
it could happen that those conclusions are not confirmed. What is necessary is to complete an investigation that was suddenly
interrupted due to the will of the parents of a child that has disappeared mysteriously."
Mr Amaral has no
doubts about which action would have to be undertaken immediately to help unearth the truth of what happened to Madeleine.
"The first diligence, after the review, will have to be the reconstruction of that night of the 3rd of May, 2007."
Alpha Investigations Group
Alpha Investigations Group (Alphaig Limited) is the company
headed by former detectives Dave Edgar and Arthur Cowley which has been employed to find Madeleine - according to media reports.
The abbreviated accounts for Alphaig Limited have recently been released, for the period ending 30 June 2010, and
can be viewed on this page.
"I haven't lost my dignity", 20 December 2010
"I haven't lost my dignity" Nova Gente
(paper edition)
The former inspector spends Christmas with his wife, his daughters and his parents-in-law. He tells 'Nova
Gente' that he will not give up on finding out "the truth" about Maddie.
By
Alexandra Ferreira 20 December 2010 Thanks to Astro for translation
For a year, he was silent due to the injunction that had been filed against him by the
McCann couple, for all copies of 'Maddie – The Truth of the Lie' to be taken off the shelves in bookshops. Nonetheless,
he never gave up and appealed to the Appeals Court, which in October overturned the prohibition to sell the book and the video
that was produced from a TVI documentary, because "it does not offend the McCanns' fundamental rights", further
stating that Gonçalo Amaral's freedom of expression is protected by the European Convention on Human Rights. At
the time, the English couple also demanded compensation in the amount of 1.2 million euro, over statements that they consider
to be libellous. For the former PJ coordinator and his wife, Sofia Leal, those were months of suffocation that forced them
to make some changes, namely to perform cuts to their family budget, in the education of their daughters, who left the school
where they were studying due to the financial difficulties that the couple faces.
"The exile that I was subject
to is coming to an end, I have not lost my dignity or my integrity and I feel strong enough to intervene, in a more active
way, in the search for truth and in the performance of justice," Gonçalo clarifies, adding that this was a complicated
year. "It wasn't easy, actually nothing has been easy since I retired from the Judiciary Police and decided, at my
own cost and risk, to affront instituted powers within the search for the truth," he mentions. "The seizing of assets
remains unsolved because it took place outside of the injunction. The losses, financial and others, have yet to be counted,
there has been extensive damage, but we continue to believe in justice. We have been living with the support of family and
friends, who have never abandoned us," reveals the former police officer, who resides in a rented apartment in Portimão
with his wife, his daughters and the cat, Bolachinha [Cookie].
Gonçalo Amaral and Sofia Leal defend
a family Christmas and insist on keeping the tradition of the 'Presépio do Menino ao Alto' [Nativity of
the Child on the Height] alive, which dates back to the Middle Ages. "In the Algarve, it's he who brings the
presents and it's to the Child that children pray every day of the year. On the 8th of December, the day of ‘Nossa
Senhora da Conceição’ [Our Lady of Conception], the 'searinhas' [little corn fields]
or 'cabeleiras' [wigs] are sown. Those are wheat seeds, which are placed in small containers, under the bed,
where it’s dark and warm. Nine days before Christmas, a chest of drawers is 'dressed' with the finest needlework
that one owns and a stepped throne is built. Then, the 'cabeleiras' are placed, symbols of abundance, as well as the
oranges and the pomegranates. Finally, Baby Jesus is placed on top of the throne. It's a very emotional moment, where
the family all comes together. While my father says the prayers, my mother and I finish arranging the throne, the girls place
the fruits and in the end Gonçalo places Baby Jesus. On the Kings' Day, we take the 'cabeleiras' into the
field and sow them into the earth. That's the Algarve's mixture of the sacred and the profane. We also build the common
Nativity, as it was created by St. Francis of Assisi, but with a very Portuguese touch: with clay figures that are placed
on a base of cork and moss, with water streams, fountains, sheep and a little rock," the wife of the former PJ coordinator
explains.
The season has almost always the same taste to the Amaral family. "Christmas Eve supper and Christmas
Day lunch are the most important meals in the year. Therefore, on the 1st of December, the women in the family gather to decide
on the menu, the dinnerware, the linen, the details...", she says, adding that they spend Christmas in Portimão
with her parents, her sister, her brother-in-law and the neighbours.
In a conversation with 'Nova Gente',
Gonçalo said that the McCanns continue to attack him: "What they are trying to do to me is not only to limit my
civic and constitutional rights. They try my civil assassination, to destroy my life, not allowing the exercise of any licit
activity, or for me to comply with the existing compromises and those of my family," he explains, stressing that "while
limiting my freedom of expression, they have destroyed the firm that I had created, they tried to forbid my access to the
Lawyers' Orders' stay, and they have seized assets and income sources," he says, justifying that everything was
done "under the banner of searching for a mysteriously disappeared child, who is probably dead – as the Public
Ministry says -, people and their relatives are being destroyed. One has to say that this is not catholic at all, coming from
people who say they are so religious and pious. This is not how they will find the child!"
Gonçalo
Amaral says that he will wait to read the book that the McCanns are writing. "It's being said that the book is an
aid to find their daughter. As it will only be published towards the end of April, we can conclude that until then, their daughter won't be found."
UNGAGGED
The Appeals Court agreed with Gonçalo
Amaral, and that was a "beautiful moment" that was used to plan the future. "The books remain illegally with
their keeper, the McCanns' lawyer, and I doubt that they still exist. Now, it is up to Guerra e Paz to ensure that the
Appeals Court's decision concerning the book 'Maddie – The Truth of the Lie' is fulfilled." All in
all, "over 120,000 copies have been sold", and the book was translated for France, Italy, the Netherlands, Germany
and Denmark.
