Madeleine McCann’s Mum Named Suspect
It is a turn jaded Crime Rant readers have expected.
Four-year-old British girl, Madeleine McCan, has been the subject of an international search after disappearing from her family’s apartment in Portugal in early May.
Now police are pointing the finger at Kate McCann, the girl’s mother.
Here’s a snip from CNN and the AP:
Police on Friday named Madeleine McCann’s mother Kate a suspect in her disappearance, and said the girl’s blood was found in a vehicle the family rented 25 days after reporting her disappearance, according to a family spokeswoman.
She was questioned for almost 11 hours the day before, and left looking visibly shaken and drained, according to CNN’s Paula Hancocks.
Portuguese authorities made no public statement on the latest developments.
Philomena McCann, Madeleine’s aunt, said police were suggesting Kate McCann might have accidentally killed her daughter.
“They are suggesting that Kate has in some way accidentally killed Madeleine, then kept her body, then got rid of it,” Philomena McCann told Sky News.
“I have never heard anything so utterly ludicrous in my entire life.”
Madeleine’s father Gerry McCann is also expected to be questioned on Friday. Family friend Clarence Mitchell told The Associated Press that Gerry would also be named as an arguido or a formal suspect. The couple have maintained their innocence throughout.
The McCanns “continue to deny absolutely they had anything to do” with their daughter’s disappearance, Mitchell said.
As a formal suspect under Portuguese law Kate McCann will gain more legal protection than when she was questioned as a witness. She will be able to remain silent during questioning and to have legal representation.
Those involved in criminal investigations in Portugal can ask to be declared formal suspects to receive this protection although it is unclear whether Mrs. McCann asked to do this.
Madeleine was reported missing on May 3, days before her 4th birthday. Her parents told police she was abducted from the family’s holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal while they ate a meal at a nearby restaurant.
Madeleine’s parents, who are both doctors from Leicestershire in central England, have campaigned internationally to secure the safe return of their daughter, including having a meeting with Pope Benedict XVI and securing support from Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling and soccer star David Beckham.
Until now police have insisted Madeleine’s parents were not suspects and were being questioned as witnesses.
Only one person has previously been named as a formal suspect, British national Robert Murat, who has denied any involvement in the case.
After Crime Rant rant a post last month, readers engaged in a lively debate on the merits of suspecting the little girl’s parents. A reader named lozz started it off by saying the police should put the parents at the top of the suspect list. Their story didn’t add ulp. Others weren’t so sure. Here’s the exhange:
Sherry Says:
Oh I don’t know. I never got a hinky feeling about the parents. I do hope I’m right and lozz is wrong.
Shar Says:
Iozz you couldn’t be more wrong!!! Thank the Lord that I am not as wickedly cynical as you are!! What family would sit down one night and decide – let’s kill one of our children, do away with the body, then launch an international hunt to find her, thereby propelling ourselves into the public arena, building up a huge trust fund in the process!!! (Ooh what fun!!) All the while having to pretend they were grief-stricken, right there in the public eye!! What monsters they would have to be to do something like that, the acting would deserve an Oscar!The blood found in the flat could have been previous tenants. A child could have cut a finger, a joint of meat – anything – and then wiped clean! I pray the blood does not prove to be Madeleine’s and pray even harder that she will be found alive and as well as a little girl can be after whatever ordeal she has been subjected to.
OutofTX Says:
Sounds like there is a lot of “jumping to conclusions” going on right now in this case. Untested blood is proof of nothing, other than someone bled there once. I confess I tend to lean towards the conclusion that she is probably no longer alive, but only because that sort of outcome is the most common in a stranger abduction type case, not because I’ve seen anything that would prove that as a fact. As for the parents, the only problem I have with them is that they were stupid enough to leave young children alone and unsupervised in a foreign country. I don’t care how “close to home” they were at that dinner, even taking abduction out of the picture a child can get itself killed in mere minutes through a multitude of home accidents. Whatever happened to their little girl, they must bear the burden of guilt for their foolish decision. Had there been a babysitter, this would probably never have happened.
Rayvyn Myst Says:
OutofTX, I agree with you. In my opinion, the parents need to be taken out and flogged. I hope that she is found alive but my gut is telling me that it isn’t going to have a good outcome… I hope I am wrong!
September 7th, 2007 at 8:58 am
Shar, Like you I hope the parents of Maddy did not do anything that may have lead to her demise.
However, they did leave her and her twin siblings unsupervised in a foreign country!
I would have to see some real hard forensic evidence before I believed they did cause Maddy accidental death.
I don’t think anyone in this situation ‘decides’ to kill, I would guess it was an accident which for the sake of their careers and other children’s lives they may have ‘made up’ this story.
It is quite common for ‘witnesses’ to ‘convince’ themselves of what they think happened or did not as the case may be!
It a tragic story, what ever the truth.
September 7th, 2007 at 9:12 am
Gosh, In the UK there has been much talk – but literally real live face to face talking that the parents were somehow involved. Most people have said from the start that it’s amazing how biased the media has been in not mentioning it (until about 3 weeks ago reporting the Portugal press).
Most people felt it possible that Madeleine had an accident while alone although some have suggested her parent gave her a sleeping pill & miscalculated the dosage for her size or the heat.
For sure they have not rung true since day one. We can only hope the little girl didn’t suffer or was not aware of what happened.
The parents should on their return to the uk be up on child negligence charges as should the other people they were at the restaurant with that night who also left their children unattended. More money than sense.
September 7th, 2007 at 9:20 am
So, If it was a miscalculation in sleeping medication, then why would there be blood?
Personally, I think the blood was transfered in some innocuous way, involving something entirely legitimate (nosebleed, scraped knee, etc), and they’re (Portugese L.E.) grasping at straws to offer a conclusion to this case to protect their tourism industry.
September 7th, 2007 at 9:27 am
The DNA will have to pretty airtight for me to believe either of the McCanns had anything to do with M’s disappearance. Because
(1) no matter what the time frame of dining & checking in on the kids, there’s the matter of Real TIME needed to find M dead and THEN dispose of the body in a place SO SECRET that
(a) no one will stumble on it in a general search or by accident,
(b) no one will smell a decomposing corpse for 25 DAYS, and
(c) no one will notice that you, a person who’s every step is watched, will be able to hire a car, go to the body’s location, move the body and then dispose of it, again in some SECRET place.
Can you do this? Certainly. Refrigeration comes to mind which will slow decompostion but not stop it unless its a freezer. But where is a Mother on Holiday going to find a unused but plugged-in freezer that no one knows about in a very public place where she doesn’t know anybody in under half an hour? Huh?
Otherwise, you have a very smelly, goey mess on your hands within two to three days, just at the time that the PJ were indeed all over the place.
The above applies equally to Dad, and even the two in cahoots.
And then there’s the TIME necessary to do all that the 1st evening and get back to the dining area. And printed statements have indicated Kate wasn’t away for very long. Nor was Gerry.
Finding a dead M is one thing. But having Time & Means to Dispose of the Body is another thing entirely.
As to the car: if they had M stuff in that car, and Kate was seen carrying around some of M’s stuff for weeks afterwards, transfer of DNA to the car would be inevitable. And this doesn’t even begin to deal with the issues of evidence contamination from Hour 1 at the apartment, and the failure of the local PJ to establish CS rules.
The PJ better have a really really linked causal chain here, derived from the UK lab process, or they are going to look much much worse than they have so far. And they look incompetent.
They had her in for 11 elevens and again today for another 6 or so hours. Now Gerry is in.
Even if the PJ comes out within the week and says they are no longer suspects, the damage is done. There will be web-bloggers or somesuch a hundred years from now proving Kate killed her and Gerry moved the body and then Kate came back to stage the find.
Egads.
September 7th, 2007 at 10:48 am
I have always felt the parents were involved in some way, but what are these reports pertaining to the grandmother’s involvement?
September 7th, 2007 at 10:53 am
Personally, I think the blood was transfered in some innocuous way, involving something entirely legitimate (nosebleed, scraped knee, etc)
the rental car in question was rented 25 days after Madeline disappeared. If the blood is Madeline’s, it’s not going to be innocuous in those circumstances.
September 7th, 2007 at 11:06 am
Chris: The way its worded, I don’t know if it means:
1) The car was rented 25 days after Madeline disappeared and they found her blood (which would indicate, to me at least, parent’s involvement)
OR………..
2) Blood was found in the rental car 25 days after Madeline disappeared – meaning, they did not check the rental car until 25 days later.
September 7th, 2007 at 11:18 am
DebG – you stole the question right out of my mouth, so to speak. Which is it? There is a heck of a lot of difference between these two readings.
The first one I would say makes their involvment virtually impossible to deny – the second one leaves plenty of room for doubt (depending on where in the car the blood was found).
September 7th, 2007 at 11:58 am
This is absolutely ridiculous. The parents are not involved, I really cant add more to what Robert said, so I will just say, yeah, what Robert said.
September 7th, 2007 at 12:17 pm
The Mccanns have an extraordinary PR machine behind them I pray it can fight back against the lurid tabloid the headlines. I thought their high level campaign might face some problems months ago. http://www.markborkowski.com/?p=7001
September 7th, 2007 at 12:40 pm
From CNN: “Madeleine McCann’s blood was found in a car her parents rented 25 days after they reported her disappearance, Justine McGuiness told CNN.”
The parents rented the car 25 days after they reported the child missing.
September 7th, 2007 at 12:43 pm
Why, Melissa, Thanks!
And one of the UK newspapers had a quote from the head of dept CSI at the University of Durban [if I remember correctly & drat I can't find it] even more emphatically stating the problems with the decompositon issue.
While he specifically mentioned the heat, in particular there is the Lasting Odor that gets on everything and stays. Which is why one trains cadaver dogs to pick up even faint traces.
NOTE: The cadaver dogs turned up NOTHING in the later search of Algarve. And that’s not possible with their training.
Also:
The latest BBC update states that the car was indeed rented 25 days to a month AFTER M’s disappearance, just a few days before they took off onthier Euro tour. The car was impounded by the end of the next month & disassembled, and has since been reassembled and returned to the McCanns or to the rental agency!!). Again, in the US Standard Operating Procedure would be NOT to return the car until ALL lab tests where in, as the car itself remains physical evidence. But the PLE returned it.
Now, CNN has a headline that the two interrogating detectives during today’s session offered a general deal to come clean. Your classic “we’ve got bupkiss on you but we know you did it” strategy.
Kaet McCann was accompanied by two lawyers. A translator was present. I have to wonder if there was only a transcript or whether there was both a transcript and a video made.
CNN also states a LE leak as saying Gerry is not a suspect. But we’ll see after later tonight.
’cause if she’s the suspect, disposal of the body so effectively would have to involve him, especially if M died actually between 6 pm and 8:30 pm when her parents showed up for dinner and behaved perfectly normally. Both parents would have had to cooperate to pull this off.
Again, could they have hidden M’s body? Yes, but only after planning to do so BEFORE TIME and to do so between 6:30 & 8:30, with two other small children to deal with, well, really, they had no Time or Opportunity.
The PLE has misinterpreted the chemical evidence and is shooting in the wrong barrel.
Need to find that CSI prof quote.
September 7th, 2007 at 12:50 pm
Found it:
http://tinyurl.com/yt5vby
from today’s The Guardian online update to “it’s ridiculous…”
But one of Britain’s leading forensic pathologists has raised questions about the suggestion that the body could have been stored before moving it almost four weeks later.
“A body is not in very good condition 25 days after death, especially in a Portuguese climate,” said Derrick Pounder, a professor of forensic medicine at the University of Dundee. “The decomposition smell would be obnoxious, lingering and very difficult to get rid of.” The only way to stop decomposition, he said, would be to put it in a freezer or to use specialist chemicals which would be very difficult to obtain.
Asked about the possibility of DNA transferring to clothes or other materials, Prof Pounder said modern techniques were so sensitive, “it’s very easy to have an innocent contamination. It is a very powerful technique but sometimes its power is its weakness.”
September 7th, 2007 at 12:55 pm
Would ye all get real…Her poor aunt was on the radio today soooo upset and who could blame her. These are ordinary people on a family holiday with 3 children. If anything had happened that child “by accident” – as a mother wouldn’t you take her to a hospital. I think imaginations are running a bit wild. And by the way, how do ye know the results of these tests? As far as I’m aware, nothing has been released. Those parents had nothing to do with harming that little girl. Shame on ye all is all I can say. God help them.
September 7th, 2007 at 12:58 pm
The more I read, the more I think this whole situation smells (as bad as decomp odor).
Robert M makes some excellent points as to why it would stretch credibility to believe the parents somehow killed her that night and then moved her body almost a month later in a rental car. Unless the body was frozen, blood, is not the sort of “fluid” I would expect them to find from a body transported in a car.
Chris: The way the sentence is worded “Madeleine McCann’s blood was found in a car her parents rented 25 days after they reported her disappearance, Justine McGuiness told CNN.” may seem obvious as to the meaning, but it really isn’t. The modifier of “25 days after” as it is placed in this sentence can go with either when they found the blood or when the car was rented. Not to pick nits, but they really wrote that poorly.
September 7th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
I knew this was going to happen – they wouldn’t let the McCanns come home three weeks ago! I would swear on my life the McCanns are innocent!
September 7th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
Ev: Don’t shame us all, some of us are either on the fence or firmly on the parent’s side.
Myself, I’m on the fence waiting for real evidence. I’m no forensic specialist, but this sudden discovery of blood seems rather fishy to me.
September 7th, 2007 at 1:05 pm
Of course, the main issue is the blood of Madeleine being found in the rental car, which was rented 25 days AFTER she’s reported missing. Now, what if the blood in the car is completely innocent…? A scraped knee or bloody nose..? And Madeleine is actually still alive. That would mean this is no more than a huge ruse to raise funds. No death would have taken place, no crime (except fraud) committed, hence the calm exterior of the parents. Plus, it explains why blood is found here and there. Kids bleed all the time when they’re in scrapes. The question is, where has the kid been meantime..? And that question would be asked whether she’s dead or alive. The fact is, blood was found in their car. Parents & missing child’s blood. Somehow that is too coincidental for me to believe that someone else hired the car earlier and disposed of the body and they came along 25 days later and hired that same car. Improbable.
September 7th, 2007 at 1:22 pm
The following comment by a Portuguese lawyers explains the two detectives reported offer of a guilty plea for a max sentence of two years. Its the 2nd paragraph:
Ms [Lita] Gale [a Portuguese lawyer] said investigators would normally declare someone an arguido if they believed they had evidence to suggest that person had committed a crime.
Gale, said that, under Portuguese law, it was very hard to secure a conviction relating to the death of a person when the person’s body had not been found.
http://tinyurl.com/ytk8c8
This from the update to the main Guardian online report.
Despite what a poster at another site says is UK TV-4’s claim of “tons of evidence”, it would appear, IF this report from the McCann family is accurate regarding a deal, that the PLE has bupkiss, nada, nyet. No LE these days deals for such a light sentence in an involuntary manslaughter case IN SUCH A CELEBRITY CASE.
Now the question is, whether the Federal Prosecutor’s Office will back the investigators and go with what they have and issue formal murder charges against one or both. Lose face here or more face later with a retraction and/or an acquittal?
September 7th, 2007 at 1:55 pm
All this does not make any sense. It would be impossible for Kate to have killed her daughter and then to hide the body for 3 weeks before using a hired car to move it. The eyes of the world were on them.
I don’t think I will ever visit Portugal just in case I should need the help of the law.
September 7th, 2007 at 1:58 pm
Did anyone consider that perhaps the girl was never missing at all? That the parents hid her to gain attention (that Munchausen thingie)…then when it all got too intense they felt they had to kill her? Hence the blood so long after the fact. A stored body isn’t going to bleed 25 days later.
September 7th, 2007 at 2:33 pm
OK. re hide the girl. OK.
With whom then?
That would make a THIRD party involved, and if two can’t keep a secret, then the third one is a spigot that, understanding he/she is likely to be exposed in any case, would go to the PLE much sooner than NEVER. ESPECIALLY if nefarious parents showed up 24 days later and proceeded to kill the child you’d grown attached to and knew that ALL Europe was looking for.
Do NOT fly off into cuckoo-land with the PLE. I’m expecting that every reporter on the scene is reviewing all the tapes and interviews and contacts. We will know pretty much every movement Kate & Gerry made between day 20 and 30, especially in the run-up to the Grand Euro Tour. Not only do they live by Blackberries (way beyond hardcopy planners) but there are ALL those phone receipts and cellphone pings. Time to go dig up a body or retrieve a little girl alive and then kill her and dispose of the body while packing to see the Pope?
O, the Portugal Fed Pros office needs to come over en masse and spend time with now Mass AG Martha Coakley and learn how to really run a tight, all-eggs-in-the-basket ship!
PLE has nothing. They are desparate to close this case re the tourist business, just the way Aruba has been about Natalee. For 2 years, there have no Aruba ads on Boston radio at all. And before they were on so much, I’d memorized all the good lines.
September 7th, 2007 at 2:36 pm
Nobody, BOTH parents having Munchausen? Please. I havent heard ANY credible source say the blood in the rental car is Maddie’s
September 7th, 2007 at 2:49 pm
not only was their blood in that car but I recall them saying there was blood in the hotel room that they tested and said was maddies. They don’t say how much blood was in the car, that would make a difference too. A scraped knee would leave next to nothing compared to a stabbing or shooting wound.
If the amount of blood in the car is more than a drop or two they have some explaining to do. otherwise I’m on the fence.
September 7th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
Melissa, I agree – nothing credible at this point. In fact, I find the ‘blood-in-the-rental-car a bit far fetched.
September 7th, 2007 at 2:55 pm
What sources say it though Jeanne? Leaks? I havent heard anything from a real source.
September 7th, 2007 at 3:01 pm
The actual ‘leaks’ about the rental car came from Mr McCann’s sister-in-law (his brother’s wife). She went on British TV this evening decrying how ludicrous it was ‘because Madeleine’s blood had been found in the rental car’. There is some misdirection going on by the family too because neither of the McCann’s are legally allowed to speak publicly about the case. But the insinuation is that Kate spoke to Gerry’s family and this is the line of reaction that came from the family after that.
As I said earlier, there is no proof until there is a body that Madeleine is actually dead and likewise, there is no proof that Kate or Gerry did anything either.
September 7th, 2007 at 3:35 pm
I’m wondering now if the PLE even bothered to check who else rented the car prior to the McCanns. I’m agreeing with the side of science here — there is just no way that the McCanns could’ve hid a body for 25 days, not with the intense search going on.
Yes, the parents were idiots for leaving the kids alone. But parents act like idiots all the time; witness some of the current cases here in the US over parents leaving their kids in hot cars. That doesn’t mean the parents are killers, just thoughtless, ignorant, or not knowing better. In this case, assuming that, hey, the kids are asleep, we’re hungry, they’ll be okay for an hour while we eat.
September 7th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
All of this just stretches basic logic a LONG way.
September 7th, 2007 at 4:51 pm
I would say that quantity (of blood) matters here too. I’m assuming it to be miniscule based on the fact that it took a forensic fine tooth comb search to find.
For this baby to have been injured to the point of blood (associated with death) there must be more than a speck here and there.
September 7th, 2007 at 5:19 pm
In the beginning I was convinced that the McCann’s either knew more about their missing daughter or were responsible for her death. Now I’m realizing I have very little fact to go on and am basing my feelings on what the media reports.
It’s so difficult for me to remember that not all countries conduct police business as the US does. Unfortunately, we have to sit back, wait and draw speculation as to what is going on.
I hope this case is closed soon, and with a good outcome.
September 7th, 2007 at 5:31 pm
I have never really felt that the parents were involved and this latest bit of news does not change my mind. Like I’ve said in the past, the Portuguese cops and their investigation thus far remind me a lot of the Aruban cops in the Natalee Holloway investigation.
September 7th, 2007 at 5:43 pm
Could all of the supporters of the McCann Family please join with me and support the family spiritually in its time of crisis by send them a Family “Blessing from God” certificate from the website http://www.godsblessingsforyou.com
The McCanns will gain great strength and comfort when they receive one of these tasteful Blessing from God complete with your personal best wishes.
Reverend Thomas
September 7th, 2007 at 6:09 pm
And may need many such prayers.
Because if Kate, the truly Catholic one of the two, has been taking Communion without making a True Act of Contrition over NOT telling the truth about M’s disappearance, and preferably to her priest in confession who can only absolve each incident not the whole behavior, then her soul’s in mortal danger. And if she’s done this in formal confession, then he’s admonished her to stop doing it.
That she has been taking Communion, and that she got through the interviews without breaking down, are strong points in favor of her telling the truth.
But other more more directly involved Catholics should comment on this.
September 7th, 2007 at 6:30 pm
Im going to start by saying :
This isnt going to be popular!
So, If you are a Gerry and Kate groupie you may want to change the channel, plug your ears, or something.
I really am not sure if they are guilty of the disappearance of their daughter, let me say that firstly. I think it is possible, weirder things have happened. Is it probable? I dont know.
Clearly I think they were horribly neglegent to go on a “Family Vacation” with their three babies, get up every day and take the kids to the creche (daycare at hotel) in the morning at about 9 a.m. while Gerry and Kate played tennis, went to the beach, went running and the like. Then they would pick the kids up at 6 and off to bed at 7:30 so they could go have some “time to themselves” ya know, with their friends…Having a few drinks at places like the Tapas and dinner at another restaurant down by the church. Now the Good drs. would have us believe that they checked on the children every evening.They were up and down- back and fourth. But one problem, the waiters say they never left the table. Why would the drs. lie? Probably because they didnt want people to think that they just left the babies alone….20,,,,noooo 50…no wait…..120 feet from where they we eating. (you know its ok to do that because Gerry’s friend said it was “alright” “Its like eating in your garden.”
And they left the doors unlocked, you know so they could just “listen” at the door. they didnt want to actually go in and check on them because they may have woken up….Now I can understand that…why ruin the good drs. evening? After all this was their family vacation!
Menawhile, there are forums galore that you can go to now to supposedly talk about Madeleine. But really what you will end up doing is reading and reading…about Gerry and Kate and how wonderful they are…and how successful they are and gee wiz, they just made a teensy weensy mistake!
Just food for thought here, indulge me,
would they be such huge fans of the parents if they were from the inner city and they were receiving Govt. assistance and they had walked to the corner to buy a 6 pack of Colt 45…and in the meantime some maniac broke in and snatched their kid? Would we have a million dollars waiting for these people to track down the mystery abductor? Well, if we did I bet we’d have to deliver the money to the County Jail…and go see their other kids at the Local Children Services.
I hope you are still out their Madeleine. You deserve justice.
This is just one moms opinion. Make no mistake I hope they are innocent because I NEVER want to believe a parent could ever harm the child that they have been so wonderfully blessed with.
But I am tired of this entire thing being about them. They would not be in the boat they are in if they werent so selfish and thought half as much for their children ,as they thought of themselves!
September 7th, 2007 at 6:34 pm
ok one more thing and i will shut up,
they refused a free babysitting service that the hotel offered them, after some of the other hotel guests had complained about the children crying. You know they didnt want the kids with strangers.
September 7th, 2007 at 6:39 pm
The front door WAS locked Michelle, they left a sliding door that was out of sight unlocked by accident.
Dont you think that they have been bashed enough for making that mistake?
September 7th, 2007 at 6:41 pm
out of whose site..it was a corner apartment?
September 7th, 2007 at 6:41 pm
They said they left it unlocked to check on her, the parents never said it was left unlocked “by accident”
September 7th, 2007 at 6:44 pm
yes i am quite sure they are being bashes and despite how it sounded, i wasnt out to BASH them but merely show both sides to the…Poor Parents…debate. I feel bad for them, to an extent but I also feel like honestly I feel like they are where they are today because they could only think about themselves and their WANTS, never mind their children’s NEEDS. That is my opinion.
September 7th, 2007 at 6:48 pm
And you are entitled to it. I think we all feel the same way about them leaving the kids, but remember they are from a different culture, and what is the point in bashing them over a lapse in judgment?
If you are a perfect parent and have never made a mistake then by all means let us know.
September 7th, 2007 at 6:49 pm
And for the record, people have been making this point since May. Yes they made a mistake, which they are terribly sorry for. And yes, they did say so.
September 7th, 2007 at 7:00 pm
I just don’t think the parents have what it takes to kill their child and then carry on light conversation with their friends over drinks. Not to mention staging the room to look like a kidnapping, hiding, and then disposing of the body. They don’t have the balls to pull that off. They may be careless, and I think they have become increasing attached to their image as the bereaved parents of Maddy, their ritual of grief, and giving news conferences, but I don’t think they are killers.
To me, this looks like a good way for the police to deflect from the fact they are no closer to discovering what happened to this little girl than the night she disappeared. Sad waste of time and I fear it will probably seal little Maddy’s fate of never being found.
September 7th, 2007 at 7:10 pm
Rose, thats kinda unfair too. If your child is missing you do EVERYTHING to get her picture out there, you go to EVERY media outlet and you dont let the story go.
Otherwise the interest goes and they lose hope.
September 7th, 2007 at 7:56 pm
Michelle,
I completely agree with you about how this is a full blown issue because of their social status. I have stated it before. This would not have made news if they were from the ghetto, and sad but true, as you stated, people would have been bashing till sundown each night over the stupidity of leaving their children alone. What I don’t understand is, if you have the money for this type of vacation and want down time just for the adults, why not hire a nanny? It is a day late for that now, but when I want to go to dinner with my husband I hire a babysitter. If we want to go out that is what is necessary OR we take our children with. That is what being a parent is about. I am by no means wealthy, nor can I take trips like they do, but I can afford a babysitter. I beleive they could have afforded a nanny or sitter for this trip or even left them at home. It seems to me this was more of a parent vacation and not a family vacation.
September 7th, 2007 at 7:58 pm
um, just to clarify, they are not from a different culture. Leaving your kids is as equally abhorrent here in the UK as it is in the USA. They have been criticised here many times over and they have taken ownership of that mistake. I think in regards to leaving their children, they were simply naive in believing they would be safe.
September 7th, 2007 at 8:00 pm
Yes, very naive. But to put it into perspective, this was not much different than them having dinner in their own backyard while having a bbq.
September 7th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
I’m sorry I don’t agree with that. More that it’s like she was asleep and they were up the road in a neighbour’s house at a BBQ – that’s a big difference. It has been widely reported that although the apartment was only 100m away in direct line from the restaurant, a pool, hedge, wall and alleyway are between the bar and the apartment. That’s more than a 100m walk to check on them and it’s definitely not in clear line of sight of where they were eating.
September 7th, 2007 at 8:24 pm
This is a tricky road and there are no rule books. What you say is absolutely true, but I still find something in their behaviors that bothers me. It may be unfair but it is a feeling I just can’t shake.
I have worried from the start that all this attention could backfire and may have made the kidnapper(s) dispose of Maddy because she was too well known to keep.
September 7th, 2007 at 8:31 pm
Also, this link kinda shows that the children couldn’t be in direct sight. Look at all the greenery!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/graphic/0,,2080741,00.html
September 7th, 2007 at 8:42 pm
I dunno, if my kid went missing, I would be on every media outlet available, and I am sure that people would dig up shit from my past no matter how irrelevent, they would blame me because THEY would never do something like that because THEY are so damn perfect.
I have yet to meet a perfect parent btw.
September 7th, 2007 at 9:15 pm
I still think there is a chance that Madeleine woke up scared and wandered off. Not quite sure why she hasn’t been found, but it’s a possibility.
And…I agree with Michelle. Stupid, ignorant, lazy, selfish parents for leaving their young children alone in an apartment. I live in the US and wouldn’t dream of leaving my 2 year old and 3 ½ year old kids home alone while I went next door to have coffee. Too many things could happen such as..A FIRE, FALL, FINGER IN THE ELECTRICAL SOCKET, PLAYING WITH BATHTUB WATER, WANDERING OFF. Too many things the kids should never have been left alone. Order in, one adult go out the other stay home, hire a babysitter, for goodness sake not an unreasonable thing to do.
Am I a perfect parent? No, absoultely not. But I can tell you I would have never left them by themselves and I don’t know anyone who would have. Let alone justify doing it.
I too would do anything in my power to get my child back, including pounding the press, however, they should never have been surprised when the media turned on them. The media is a fickle thing, whatever sells, it was bound to turn on them.
Parenting abilities definitely flawed, murderers I’m not so sure. But I’m betting there is more to the story than any of us know at this point.
September 7th, 2007 at 9:16 pm
Melissa,
One question, would you have left your three young children alone?
September 7th, 2007 at 9:58 pm
Nope. Absolutely not. But I HAVE been at bbq’s that went into the wee hours that the kids were in bed, and we were all out by a bonfire in the back. To me it doesnt seem that much different.
September 7th, 2007 at 10:49 pm
The McCanns are in hell and must deserve our compassion. Holier-than-thou -ism can surely have no place in our attempts to understand this human tragedy. All parents have,at some time, been ‘guilty’ of negligence and naivety where the safety of their children are concerned. There-but-for-the-grace-of…….something!’ seems a far more appropriate stance. I sense the mob moving in for the kill, all too willing to scapegoat an unfortunate family, who trusted too much in the essential goodness of strangers. Something terrible has happened here, but, in the absence of facts, just about all we are left with is (ill-informed) speculation.And since ‘there is no art to find the mind’s construction in the face’, we would be ill- advised to try to ‘read’ the McCann’s public face(s), mediated , as they are, entirely by television and the glare of publicity. But have a good look at these two people. Set aside your bias against affluent professionals.Do they really strike you as capable of murder, cover-up and conspiracy?! Reserve that temptation to be judgemental! Do you really want to be counted among the curious, idle, and plain nosey gawpers outside the police station in Portimao, (some of whom had the outrageous impertinence to boo the unfortunate Kate McCann,although her stricken face should have cautioned otherwise).Let us pray that the truth will prevail, but not put too much faith in a beleagured police force to ensure that it happens.
September 7th, 2007 at 10:54 pm
man, some of you are absolutely merciless. To me, Mrs. McCann looks as though she barely cares about being a suspect. I’m sure the agony of her loss overshadow all else. She’s paying for her mistake in the worst way.
Btw–I’m a parent and I’ll gladly and honestly raise my hand at being full of error and imperfection. How unusual it is to see so many perfect parents on this thread.
September 7th, 2007 at 11:47 pm
Also, folks have to keep in mind that the Portuguese term for “suspect” is NOT the same as what we mean by the word here in the US. Over on Steve Huff’s Crimeblog, there’s a poster from Portugal who doesn’t understand the fuss we’re making over the McCann’s status — evidently that status is Standard Operating Procedure, because it grants more rights than just being a witness; just because you’re named arguido doesn’t mean you’re guilty, but it does give you formal rights to legal representation when questioned (unlike the US, where that right is granted whether you’re a suspect or not).
I agree with what some others have posted here — that the PLE is trying a plea deal for such a light sentence is a strong suggestion that they have little to no evidence.
All I can think of is that it would take huge brass balls to murder your daughter…then call a huge world-wide hunt for her, and then visit the Pope. Especially if you’re Catholic.
September 8th, 2007 at 12:29 am
I am absolutely stunned that there are people judging the McCanns here. What on earth is wrong with you people? I mean seriously…what possible good can it do to speculate in this malicious, spiteful and petty minded manner? You have NO evidence to work from beyond the highly speculative and frequently inaccurate press reports. Unless you’re actually involved in the case you have nothing of substance to base your theories on and if you ARE involved in thease you should not be speculating publicly for what, I hope, are fairly obvious reasons.
The more people denigrate the McCanns and follow this pernicious sniping, the more likely it is the press will run with it..and that can opnly be damaging to the McCanns (who, unless you have evidence to the contrary are currently innocent) and more importantly to the efforts to find poor Madeleine.
Stop curtain twitching and either show some support for a family in distress or wind your necks in. Who the hell do you think you are to judge them?
September 8th, 2007 at 4:36 am
I found it intersting that you made reference to “the Dingo did it” in poll.
There does seem to be a horrible sense of deja vue here. Lindy Chamberlain was innocent of killing her baby and she was convicted because a) she didnt cry and b) the incompetence of the police. She spent ten years in a prison before she was released because she was INNOCENT.
I dont for one moment believe the McCanns are guilty of anything other than leaving their kids in a room whilst they ate their meal.
There is such a lack of transparency in the Portugese police investigation that no one knows how incompetent they are. It isre looks from the outside like a rerun of the Keystone Cops.
September 8th, 2007 at 5:04 am
The bottom line is-what has happened to Madeleine? If my child was missing and I was told her blood has been found I would react- in that i would like to know how it got there and who killed her.They are in total denial of looking in any other direction except to reiterate that police should be looking for her alive? Get real- why can’t they view all options? Where else can the police look at the moment?
September 8th, 2007 at 5:25 am
The discussion has moved on to blaming or not the parents for leaving the kids but that’s been done to death on discussion boards across the world.
Taking a step back, would it be possible for a parent or parents to cover up their child’s death without those close to them suspecting something by now. Have there been cases where relatives have colluding unwittingly with guilty parties?
September 8th, 2007 at 5:31 am
If being a “perfect parent” means that i have enough commomn sense to not leave my children alone, far from where I am , way out of site (refer to maps people please) with the door unlocked for easy access (so “I” could check on the children).And being a perfect parent means that I go on a family vacation and include my children on any of the activities because I am concerned about their enjoyment as well as my own. And if being a perfect parent means I protect my children first and foremost!
>>>
P.S. I dont think the perfect parent anology is fair. We have all said how Susan Smith was a monster for what she did…and the list goes on. I am not saying they are responsible for Madeleine’s disappearance, dont misunderstand, Im truly NOT convinced of that….
But what I am saying unfortunately they made their bed and now they are lying in it. I am not getting enjoyment from it! I dont think anyone is!
September 8th, 2007 at 5:32 am
I just don’t understand the logic in this. If they did kill her by accidentally over sedating her. Where would there be blood involved? Not to mention that the media was following them 24/7 how could they possibly dispose of a body 25 days later without any witnesses? It is too far fetched to even comprehend.
September 8th, 2007 at 5:50 am
Over at Reuter’s the quote is that blood has been found in the car with no indication that it belongs to anyone in particular. Anyhow, blood in a car doesn’t have to equal a body. It could mean and item has been in the car that has had blood on it.
September 8th, 2007 at 7:41 am
i just can not believe for one second that the mcanns had anything to do with maddies dissapearance, if they had surely maddie would have been found by now,, my heart goes out to them its dreadfull what they are having to endure
September 8th, 2007 at 8:37 am
I think Chris is right in saying that the blood could very likely be from a nosebleed, cut….sheeesh, kids that age are always doing something.
I think the police want to close this case and protect their reputation, and I think they are
September 8th, 2007 at 8:44 am
I think Chris is right in saying that the blood could very likely be from a nosebleed, cut….sheeesh, kids that age are always doing something.
I think the police want to close this case. Period. And I think they are barking up the wrong tree. I admit that many times it is the parents, but something just doesn’t feel right this time.
As I said before, it was HORRIBLY irresponsible of them, doctors no less, to leave 3 children in a hotel room while they go out. If you can’t get a freakin’ babysitter, STAY HOME.
But that being said, there are variety of people who can gain access to hotel room keys. I just think that she truly WAS kidnapped. As we know from Karr, some evil men are very attracted to blonde little girls, and let’s face, she is an extraordinarily beautiful child.
If it turns out to be the parents, I will really be shocked and angry. It’s one thing if something happened, and she died unexpectedly. But to try to cover it up…. I just don’t think so. IMO.
September 8th, 2007 at 10:21 am
LOL- Why would the police do such a thing in such a high profile case? It’s not for us to think- it’s not a personality contest- or character analysis – cut the hype and get to the facts. There has been a crime which is being investgated and at the minute there is too much based on do we like the parents are not. I do not think that has any bearing on anything- there needs to be objection and facts looked into- The public know NOTHING and everyone is in shock over these new developments and yes if the parents did do it – it is a scenario beyond belief and if I was them I would deny it until my dying day, because I for one will never have any sympathy for them even if it was an accident because of their gall! But having said that, like the majority of folks I do not want to believe it BUT for Madeleine’s sake, if it is so I want JUSTICE for madeleine.I fully respect the police for this action because that is all they want too.
September 8th, 2007 at 11:21 am
I think Portugal would like the McCanns to go home. This questioning is a way of forcing them out of the country.
I don’t think the McCanns killed their child. I don’t think the Portuguese think the McCanns killed their child, but they have exhausted all their leads and are empty handed. They want the McCanns to take their high media focus somewhere else and let them regain some normalcy to this community. It is just my opinion and does not mean they are correct in wanting this. I will say the media may offer some help but it must also be a distraction that takes time from working the case. When the McCanns leave, Portugal will scale down the examination of Maddy’s disappearance.
September 8th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
Uhhhhhhhhhh… cops don’t just “do things” to get the media and their bosses off their backs? Yeah, right. Give me a break. You do read true crime, right???
There have been MANY cases have where these investigators ADMIT that they weren’t sure they had the right person, but if it closed the case, they’d lean on them as hard as they could to get a confession. They’ve done it to teenagers; I saw a TV special where the investigator admitted to strong-arm tactics when he really didn’t have the evidence.
BELIEVE ME, I think it’s HORRIBLE, but facts are facts. Lots of innocent people sitting in prison.
I’m not saying it happens every day, but IT HAPPENS. And I hope it’s NOT true in this case, but you cannot ABSOLUTELY without a doubt, rule it out. IMHO.
I pray for all of this child’s family. And I pray for JUSTICE. And if it’s the parents… so be it. What a sad day that will be.
September 8th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
Hey does the Duke LaCross Players ring a bell?
That lawyer (NyFong???I THINK) is in big trouble for fabricating and deleting….all to suit himself. But that wasnt a group of people. It was one man.
I do not really think that the Portugese Police and the British Police that are working so closely together are somehow trying to “frame” the McCann’s. What would they have to gain? To solve a case quickly? Are you serious? I dont think with all of their political connections that the Brits would allow that to happen. Remember here a week or two back when Brown kind of parted ways with his buddy Gerry and told him to scale things down?. It was reported that he was worried about his reputation for supporting the McCann’s. Does he know something we dont?
September 8th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Most police don’t have the entire world watching and critiquing their every move. There is a newspaper in England that does a daily tally of Maddy news and a day has not passed without some form of coverage. Many here have expressed their admiration for the McCann’s continued focus on the case and that intense focus has been their very lives since Maddy was taken.
Aruba was darn glad when Beth Twitty finally packed her bags and went home.
Even if the Portuguese did strong-arm the McCanns into confessions for a crime they didn’t commit, that would not close the case. It would just open another can of worms. They aren’t some anonymous teenagers, but the much admired parents of a precious missing child that have become international celebrities of sorts with many famous people that have given them emotional and financial support. Confessions from the McCanns just moves this story to a different and as involving level. The Portuguese better be ready if that happens.
September 8th, 2007 at 2:05 pm
CompassRose, I think the McCanns did leave Portugal and go home a few weeks ago. But I hear what you’re saying…the Portuguese were probably feeling much like the Arubans who wanted Natalee’s mom to leave.
And Scarlett, I agree. There have been lots of cases where LE used the media to spread rumors to smoke someone out or give false leads. And, as cynical as it sounds, we all know that cops tell lies every freaking day, passively (by leaving certain facts out of their reports) or aggressively (i.e., by telling potential defendants that they have certain evidence that they don’t possess, etc.). We definitely can not believe every single thing we read about this case.
September 8th, 2007 at 3:55 pm
Michelle says:
“do not really think that the Portugese Police and the British Police that are working so closely together are somehow trying to “frame” the McCann’s. What would they have to gain?”
Closure. To wrap it up and move on. To prove that their town had not been infiltrated by some child-stealing pedophile and that all is well in Algarve. That the crime was committed by Brits and not a Portugese national. Just to name a few things…
September 8th, 2007 at 5:53 pm
going on the not every case has the whole world watching it? The LaCrosse case fits that too. The world watched that one too and look those kids were all innocent but have a stigma with them forever now.
Remember Richard Jewell from the Atlanta Olympic Bombing? He died this week and the one thing people kept mentioning was how he was the original person arrested in the bombing etc.
If the parents are guilty or not they will never be looked at the same again.
Until they bring proof of more than a drop of blood in either the car or apartment I can’t say the parents did it.
They made the HUGE mistake of leaving the 3 kids alone. That can’t be changed. They feel horrible for it. They have been trying to do everything possible to comply with the investigation.
You have to wonder why it took the police 25 days to find that blood in the car.
I think they are trying to come to a conclusion quickly like the duke case as well. rush to judgement.
For now I would have to say innocent until proven guilty. If it turns out to be the parents had something to do with it, that’s gonna make cases like this in the future very hard NOT to accuse the parents. Think about the Susan Smith case or the recently highlighted case here of Diane Downs.
September 8th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
Jeanne, you just reminded me of the Tara Lynn Grant case. Her husband was allegedly being watched but he managed to dismember her, spread her body all over a forest, retrieve parts of it and take them home…all while he was a suspect. So, yep, it can happen.
But I agree with you. Until or unless the police come up with solid evidence or the parents confess, I’m in the innocent until proven guilty camp.
September 8th, 2007 at 8:17 pm
Question — Is it actually known if the McCanns’ gave the children something to make them sleep the night Maddy disappeared, or is this just a theory someone is floating?
September 8th, 2007 at 8:37 pm
SEDATIVE.
It is not known. There was a statement from the McCanns stating they’d heard the rumor and were denying it. PLE has not issued a supporting or denying statement, but technically they can’t under their Secrecy Laws. It is unclear if the rumor persists due to “leaks” from the PLE or just because it’s out there and will cirulate.
Actually, beyond the confirmation of blood in the trunk/boot of the car made by the McCann people which again is something PLE would not formally confirm or deny, all we really know is that Maddy is missing. Sourcing other “facts” is very difficult in this case.
But there are McCann PR statements, their are a few general PLE statements, and there are a lot of PLE leaks. I’m waiting for the UK polic leaks focusing on any other lab evidence to start cirulating soon.
And, yes, I voted for the dingo. Ya gotta laugh sometimes, even if its all derived from tragedies.
September 8th, 2007 at 8:40 pm
PLEASE, they are both doctors, even if there were a sedative involved (highly unlikely) they would know how to administer them.
Its a bogus claim, and as Robert has stated, how in the hell would they have hidden the body after all that time?
September 8th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
I was just curious where this idea came from — I don’t think they killed their child — by intention or by accident.
I was wondering if it is alleged they gave the children something — sedative — to guarantee they stayed asleep while they were out.
September 8th, 2007 at 9:50 pm
I’m on the fence with this. I don’t want to believe that her parents did her any harm. But isn’t the family always looked at as suspects. It’s sad when they are and turn up innocent, it adds more salt to their open wounds.
September 8th, 2007 at 10:15 pm
Rose, there is NO evidence of sedating them. Its internet rumors.
And no offense Kristina, but you are on the fence about pretty much everything.
September 8th, 2007 at 10:44 pm
Michelle Says:
September 8th, 2007 at 5:31 am
If being a “perfect parent” means that i have enough commomn sense to not leave my children alone, far from where I am , way out of site (refer to maps people please) with the door unlocked for easy access (so “I” could check on the children).And being a perfect parent means that I go on a family vacation and include my children on any of the activities because I am concerned about their enjoyment as well as my own. And if being a perfect parent means I protect my children first and foremost!
>>>
P.S. I dont think the perfect parent anology is fair. We have all said how Susan Smith was a monster for what she did…and the list goes on. I am not saying they are responsible for Madeleine’s disappearance, dont misunderstand, Im truly NOT convinced of that….
But what I am saying unfortunately they made their bed and now they are lying in it. I am not getting enjoyment from it! I dont think anyone is!
Ok, you are a better parent Michelle, bout time you got over it IMO. You have stated this so many times that I have a hard time you arent getting enjoyment over it IMO.
Its lucky for you that you just know so much better than them, and if someone snatches your kid, better hope this doesnt make you think what if.
September 9th, 2007 at 12:52 am
omg Melissa–you’re on a roll!
And Michelle, you go way too far with your judgements. How do you know that they didn’t include their kids in activities and were not concerned with the enjoyment of their children.
It must feel so good to pat yourself on the back. Okay…we all pat you on the back too. But if your life was truly filleted open, and help under a microscope, might we all pick out some imperfections? I think so. Of course we would…it’s part of being human. And it doesn’t mean that anyone loves their kids less, it’s just part of the live and learn. Unfortunately for the McCanns, they’ll never cease to regret their choice, so let it go already.
September 9th, 2007 at 6:33 am
How do i know? because the parents gave statements saying the kids were sent to the hotel daycare every day of their vacation…on the day she disappeared they picked her up from the creche’ at 6….off to bed at 7:30.
Those are their recollection of events –not mine.
Oh, and i see…its soooo wrong for me to be judgemental of the McCann’s..yet it is perfectly acceptable for you to judge me. Hey thats mighty convenient…for you.
But no problem, I wont return the same to you, because thats not what this is about.This article was written to promote “comments” concerning the McCann case…that is what I am doing.
You can get irritated with me all you want but I have a right to express myself, just as you enjoy the same right.
As for the parents new status of “arguido” or suspects…is it they want to be considered suspects because with that title they have the right to attorneys and to refuse to answer questions? When they were witnesses they were not afforded those rights. ? Thinkin out loud.
September 9th, 2007 at 9:58 am
Hey at least with this comment you didnt include “well I wouldnt have….(insert snarky comment)”
September 9th, 2007 at 10:08 am
..very witty…lol
I respectfully agree to disagree.
September 9th, 2007 at 12:21 pm
I am so confused by this case.
Leaving aside all discussion of what ‘perfect parenthood’ looks like, I am confused by the behaviour of the McCanns.
Consider this response to an interview question given by Gerry McCann:
*************************************************
I think that’s, you know, something that is many people have said to us that this is a parent’s worst nightmare and it is, it truly is and it’s as bad as you can possibly imagine but, you know, if all three of the children had been taken it could have been even worse than your worst nightmare and we’ve got to be strong for them. You know, they’re here. They do bring you back to Earth. And we cannot grieve one, we did grieve of course we grieved but ultimately we need to be in control so that we can influence and help in anyway possible. Not just Sean and Amelie but the investigation.
************************************************
Couple of issues: you cannot grieve one? and use of past tense, at a point in the investigation when both parents were adamant that M was alive and well, abducted to be adopted?
My second issue is Gerry’s blog. Here are the last few entries (apparently now suspended):
************************************************
Day 125 – 05/09/2007
We were surprised to find increased media presence in Praia da Luz again today. We were followed down to church, then to the shops and back to our accommodation which is very unusual, apart from the build up to the 100 days. All the excitement seems to be over the results of the recent forensic tests that again have created a huge amount of speculation. There has been no official conformation that the report has been received, or what the tests suggest if anything!
Kate and I went for a run along the coast at lunchtime. It was pretty windy but still warm enough. Later in the afternoon we went to visit a friend of Kate’s who is on holiday in a nearby village with her family. They brought lots of cards from well-wishers at home and we talked a lot about the search for Madeleine. The twins had a great time splashing around in a little inflatable paddle pool, singing songs and being doted on by the older kids.
Day 124 – 04/09/2007
Kate and I did our first interview for a French Publication today. Any interviews we do now, of which we only accept a small percentage of bids, focus on the issues that we have faced since Madeleine’s abduction. The French have recently adopted a child alert system with some early success stories. With increasing travel and movement of workers in the European Union, it is also important we standardise the way serious crimes are tackled.
This evening we were invited to a friend’s house with the children for dinner. The twins had a good time with the other kids in the paddling pool and especially enjoyed the banana splits with extra child friendly toppings!
Day 123 – 03/09/2007
After dropping the twins off Kate and I popped into church for 10 minutes to pray for Madeleine. Spent most of the day going through mail, e-mails and I had a number of calls to make. It was good to spend some time with my family and Sean and Amelie certainly enjoyed their auntie’s dinner- sometimes it is hard to beat mince and ‘tatties’!
***********************************************
This just strikes me as bizarre. I know people say that people grieve/process trauma in different ways, but come on? Apparently his entire blog has been full of the domestic and the mundane. Having witnessed various friends and family members endure different tragedies, I find it hard to believe that anyone could be so ensconced in normality. Even with denial.. Where is Madeleine in his posts? There are lots of references to the ‘campaign’ but..
Is this really how people behave in dire circumstances? Is this anguish?
And the exclamation marks. Particularly,
“All the excitement seems to be over the results of the recent forensic tests that again have created a huge amount of speculation. There has been no official conformation that the report has been received, or what the tests suggest if anything!”
If your child was missing and forensic tests were performed on BLOOD that might be hers, would you be so cool and dispassionate about it? He writes as if he might be talking about a local football match.
If I am wrong, heaven help me, but this is all very odd.
Also, as someone working who works with children in small groups, I have time and time again seen the panic that children of M’s age experience if they find their parents are not there when they leave a group. Total fear. Why did NOBODY hear this child scream/make noise etc, unless she was not in a position to? Why did Kate immediately say ‘they’ve taken her’? Why??????
And WHERE is that little girl?
Even if the parents have no involvement, how did ANYONE move a child with no witnesses in a busy resort – move them so far that there are no forensic traces anywhere?
I can’t understand any of it.
September 9th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
http://www.officialwire.com/main.php?action=recent&rid=21385
DA TO CHARGE MOTHER WITH MANSLAUGHTER &
AND FATHER AS ACCESSORY.
September 9th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
question is…can we believe the press?
September 9th, 2007 at 12:53 pm
Have any of you seen Gerry and Kate’s statement yet?
MISSING MADELEINE
Transcription of McCann parents’ full statement on arrival in UK
09/09/2007
This is a transcription by eitb24.com of the statement read by Gerry McCann as the family arrived back in the United Kingdom.
“Today, Kate, Sean, Amelie and I have returned home as we planned a while ago. We are returning to Britain after careful thought.
We want the twins, as much as is reasonably possible, to live an ordinary life in their home country and want to consider the events of the last few days which have been so deeply disturbing.
While it’s heartbreaking returning to the UK without Madeleine, it does not mean we are giving up our search for her. As parents, we cannot give up on our daughter until we know what has happened. We have to keep doing everything we can to find her.
Kate and I wish to thank once again all those who have supported us over the past days, weeks and months. But we would like to ask for our privacy to be respected now that we have returned home.
Our return is with the full agreement of the Portuguese authorities and police. Portuguese law prohibits us from commenting further on the police investigation.
Despite there being so much we wish to say we are unable to do so, except to say this: we played no part in the disappearance of our lovely daughter, Madeleine.”
September 9th, 2007 at 12:54 pm
MISSING MADELEINE
Transcription of McCann parents’ full statement on arrival in UK
09/09/2007
This is a transcription by eitb24.com of the statement read by Gerry McCann as the family arrived back in the United Kingdom.
“Today, Kate, Sean, Amelie and I have returned home as we planned a while ago. We are returning to Britain after careful thought.
We want the twins, as much as is reasonably possible, to live an ordinary life in their home country and want to consider the events of the last few days which have been so deeply disturbing.
While it’s heartbreaking returning to the UK without Madeleine, it does not mean we are giving up our search for her. As parents, we cannot give up on our daughter until we know what has happened. We have to keep doing everything we can to find her.
Kate and I wish to thank once again all those who have supported us over the past days, weeks and months. But we would like to ask for our privacy to be respected now that we have returned home.
Our return is with the full agreement of the Portuguese authorities and police. Portuguese law prohibits us from commenting further on the police investigation.
Despite there being so much we wish to say we are unable to do so, except to say this: we played no part in the disappearance of our lovely daughter, Madeleine.”
Gerry and Kate McCann’s statement upon returning to UK.
September 9th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
http://www.tsf.pt/online/vida/interior.asp?id_artigo=TSF182685
http://www.correiodamanha.pt/noticia.asp?idCanal=181&id=253039
http://www.regiao-sul.pt/noticia.php?refnoticia=76019&origin=dossier&refdossier=3&titledossier=Caso+Maddie+McCann
http://www.tvnet.pt/noticias/detalhes.php?id=9686
i will let these speak for themselves as well. If anyone is interested.
September 9th, 2007 at 1:39 pm
Gerry McCann refuses to answer 40 questions concerning the disappearance of his daughter.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/global/article2418919.ece
September 9th, 2007 at 1:53 pm
Everybody agrees they made a dreadful mistake, ad nauseum. Yes, we see how wrong it is to leave children alone.
So was John Walsh’s wife wrong to leave her son alone in the next aisle in the grocery store? Yes, and for that they are paying for the rest of their lives.
How about we get on with finding this poor girl instead of wagging our fingers at these people.
And Michelle, most of what you posted was in Portuguese, and the rest is rumors.
September 9th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
Fiona- I have seen people endure tragedy by focusing on what they have left. For Gerry McCann to delight in the small, everyday occurances and opportunities of his remaining children, seems like a survival skill, rather than a guilty conscience or a state of pathological denial.
I also think that having ones child be abducted, and not having any sense of closure would create a very unique grief, and I would not want to judge what that could or should look like.
September 9th, 2007 at 2:06 pm
Fiona, I have felt the behavior of the parents has been odd. They fluctuate between being understandably bereaved to acting like they are on an extended holiday.
I still don’t think they killed their child, or I sure hope they didn’t, but if you think about it, hiding in plain sight is not a bad plan. I remember reading when Joseph Duncan was caught with Shasta Groene he continually asked about the welfare of Shasta claiming “they” had been through a horrible ordeal. He had murdered four members of this child’s family, and Duncan wanted to share the pity for being stressed. It’s a ploy and in the right case it might work.
September 9th, 2007 at 2:08 pm
A — good points.
September 9th, 2007 at 3:04 pm
Melissa, oh ok, if you need to translate any of it …. you can use http://babelfish.altavista.com/..
I figured you would say anything written was rumor, but it is news related to this case so I thought some would be interested in it.
September 9th, 2007 at 3:14 pm
C- The point is that raking the McCanns over the coals for leaving their sleeping children alone, while they went across the courtyard to dinner, has been done to death–we get it.
September 9th, 2007 at 3:16 pm
A – if it was only as simple as judging the parents’ grief, then what you say would be very true. But if these parents are guilty of something more sinister, than their behaviour does need to be scrutinised. The facts of this case (inconsistencies in accounts given, the blood evidence, apparent lies about a break-in, changing stories) seem to suggest something untoward is going on. Police officers will need to ask and think the unthinkable.
As for the grief.. yes, I’ve been at tragic funerals where people played football in the garden to return to some sort of ‘normality’ and hold things together when they simply can’t cry any longer. I’ve often seen how people need this grounding to keep things going.. but there’s a difference between doing, thinking and feeling something to hold it together for yourself and your family and writing 100+ entries on a site about your missing daughter that make it sound like you’re having a whale of a time. The entries are so dispassionate about M herself. I can’t imagine at those funerals I’ve been to, people writing on a public blog: ‘Went to my sister’s funeral today. Afterwards, the sun was shining and we had a fantastic kick around in the garden. You should have seen Uncle Jo score those goals – at his age!”. There’s having a stiff upper lip/making the best of things etc but even still, it seems disrespectful to the memory of the dead (or in this case, missing presumed dead) person to discuss this side of events in such detail with so little focus on the person at the heart of it.
If the family are innocent and are doing this to keep themselves sane, fair enough.. but I don’t feel it’s prudent for them to continue to use these coping strategies in such a public environment. If I take the view that they are innocent, I feel someone should advise them to write these thoughts in a private arena if they are helpful to them personally.
Also, I feel that the fact they left these children alone can not be referred to as a ‘dreadful mistake’. It IS negligent. If they are innocent, they will bear the guilt of that forever and I have compassion for that suffering. But beyond that, I feel that there are VERY few parents of their class and social status who would leave three such tiny children alone innocently for such a reason. We can all make split second mistakes – leave kids in cars while we rush on an errand, leave a child in a trolley in an aisle, allow a child to enter a toilet unsupervised. These are understandable. But to leave three tots without a sitter for the frivolous purpose of enjoying a meal? I don’t know a SINGLE person that would do that; never have.
Furthermore, their friend apparently checked on the children at 9.30 ‘but did not enter the bedroom’. That’s odd, why would you check and not check?…. In between that time and the time the alarm was raised, someone allegedly entered the room (although it is apparent they did not do so via the window as this was not tampered with, contrary to initial reports from the parents) and snatched a 4 year old child without arousing any suspicion from anyone in the area, or creating any noise, or arousing suspicion in a vehicle. Another of the McCann’s friends said she saw a man walking away from the McCann’s apartment with a child in his arms at the time Gerry McCann left the restaurant, could describe every last detail of the man (clothing etc) and had no recollection of the child AT ALL. This occurred as Gerry talked to another holiday maker, out with his own child, who has no recollection of this mystery man and child (nor does anyone else).
Part of the abduction story was that ‘cuddle cat’ (M’s toy) was found on a high ledge (leading to the theory that the perpetrator took the child out a high window). Why, when a patio door was unlocked in the adjacent room, obviously the child was not making any sounds and no person was present? How did no one see an adult take a child out a window in a busy resort?
Why did they lie about their alcohol consumption?
Why does their story differ from that of the bar staff? Why did the babies not wake up with their mother screaming and the whole place in disarray? Heavy sleeping is one thing, but…
Why is there blood in the apartment? Why was there blood in the hire car? Why did Gerry say that now he ‘understood why’ the police were treating them as suspects in the light of this information? Why did he say ‘anyone who knows anything about the 3rd of May knows that Kate has nothing to do with this’ – not, anybody who knows Kate knows she couldn’t do this? It’s a bit strange.
If the times are correct, the alleged perpetrator had 30 minutes to enter the apartment, snatch a child and abscond while arousing NO suspiciou. The perpetrator did SO well that there have been NO sightings AT ALL and searches revealed no forensic evidence. No one AT ALL has seen this child. When was this child really seen last? The friend who checked didn’t see her, apparently..
It feels like a web of lies.
3 hours previous to the McCann’s restaurant meal are unaccounted for.
September 9th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
also another very interesting article about the Political Connections involved in this case. Very good article, worth reading. And its in English too
http://gazetadigitalmadeleinecase.blogspot.com/2007/08/dangerous-connections.html
September 9th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
C – I wont even give you the satisfaction of a response, because I DID agree with you, it was irresponsible and a huge mistake, they thought the kids would be safe and they were wrong. I notice you didnt answer about John Walsh’s kid.
Michelle, everything you keep on linking says “undisclosed source”, and as for the article you did post that was in English, apparently anybody can post an article to it. C’mon. Think logically. Blood found in the car was NOT linked to Maddie #1, and what about motive?
September 9th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
think logically?
Now you wouldnt be judging me now, would you?
I am merely providing some links, Im not picking and choosing which ones, just any that seem to have information of any value.(in my humble opinion) If you feel they do not, then maybe you will want to just skip over them then.
and typically when someone is killed accidentally, and I am NOT saying i know this to be fact because I do not…but IF this is what happened…i dont think accidents have motives, think logically Melissa.
September 9th, 2007 at 4:16 pm
And I think they have been kicked around enough for not being perfect parents. What they did is NO different than having a bbq in their backyard with the kids put to sleep.
September 9th, 2007 at 5:46 pm
We need to find this little girl, dead or alive, hopefully the later. She could be anywhere.
One good thing about the media, all around the world people knows Madeline’s story. We can all look for her. I doubt she could be in the U.S., but yeah anything can happen.
Somebody somewhere has got to know something, they need to man up and come out with it.
Until I hear the parents say they did something to their daughter, I don’t believe they were involved. I don’t want to believe they did anything.
September 9th, 2007 at 7:54 pm
Everyone can hate me here too, but I find it reprehensible that they left these very young children alone in the hotel room. I’m definitely not the perfect parent, but dammit, if I stopped at a gas station when my son was a baby, I carried that car seat into the station with me even though it was a huge inconvenience. Would I have left him alone in a room where not only could he have been kidnapped, but he could have choked, strangled himself, any number of things without an adult being there? NO EFFING WAY.
I hope to goodness that they didn’t kill her, but the fact that they’re doctors doesn’t mean diddly to me. Even more reason for them to go on a campaign to keep up their reputation if in fact they were in any way responsible. Do I think they did it? Who the hell knows right now, I’m so cynical from all the cases in the last 10 years I’ve read about, I wouldn’t doubt it at this point. Hopefully, the PLE is more capable than the Aruban police force, which struck me as nothing more than an episode of Reno 911.
I want to find out that they had nothing to do with this, that the evidence isn’t real, but again, with what I’ve seen in the last decade, it just wouldn’t surprise me.
September 10th, 2007 at 5:51 am
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/07/nmaddytime107.xml
Here is a good overview of the Timeline of
this case. Someone had mentioned they werent sure of the times and such so I thought this may be helpful or at the very least interesting to you.
September 10th, 2007 at 6:59 am
KimPossible and C. I see your point but we have kind of decided to move past that aspect of it (their outright negligence) because some people gets very offended at the mere mention of them being accountable for their actions.
Daily Mail (if that is a reputable source) is now reporting to be searching “specific locations for Madeleine’s body”.
let me provide a link so no one accuses me of not providing the source: http://tinyurl.com/376qs8
September 10th, 2007 at 8:08 am
I feel the same way C. After all the cases of parents claiming abduction only to find out they were responsible for the death of their children, I too, am jaded.
I don’t know about the UK, but here in the states all docs have to intern in an emergency room. After which they move on to study their specialized medicine.
If it is the same there I find it hard to believe that the two of them didn’t know what could happen to a child when left alone. That is why I have a hard time accepting that this was pure naivete on their part.
Even still there is not much evidence. What does exist has been corrupted or lost. So who’s really to say.
September 10th, 2007 at 8:55 am
Michelle says:
“KimPossible and C. I see your point but we have kind of decided to move past that aspect of it (their outright negligence) because some people gets very offended at the mere mention of them being accountable for their actions.
Nice. Obviously you’ve missed the point.
September 10th, 2007 at 9:17 am
I think everyone that is bashing them is missing the point A. Yes, they made a HUGE error in judgment, and they are paying the ultimate price, if this isnt being held accountable I sure as hell dont know what is.
September 10th, 2007 at 9:58 am
C, everyone says what they did was wrong, and no I dont think thats why they are being looked at as suspects, I think they just want them the hell out of their country, if they had anything on them they would have been arrested.
Everyone has been saying what they did was wrong since MAY. THEY said what they did was wrong, dont act like they didnt.
Bout fuckin done yet?
September 10th, 2007 at 10:16 am
C.- How do you know what I’ve missed? Quite frankly, I don’t see the need to endlessly rehash the details of the McCann’s poor decision. Not to mention the hateful venom behind the attitude, as some go on and on about how “they would never…(do this and do that)”
And I’m lol at your assessment of me and my not having a clue as to how to care for and protect children. But I hope you feel good about your own abilities on this matter…and that it makes you feel even better to kick others while they are down and out.
btw- where did you hear that their projection of what they did was an “acceptable act”? I’ve in fact read the opposite, how deeply they regret leaving their kids alone.
September 10th, 2007 at 10:45 am
C Says:
“Hope your right about these people”
I say; I don’t know how to apply this statement to anything that I’ve posted. C-are you really reading things, or just pompously reacting to any post that you can?
Perhaps you should look in the mirror to see who really isn’t playing with a full deck.
September 10th, 2007 at 12:35 pm
No points have been lost on me. I get it.
But I will continue to express myself and respectfully allow you to do the same. That is where we differ, when you dont have an argument, you have to make personal insults to me.
It really puzzles me how some of you take all of this so personally. I am here to exchange information-not insults. I stated my opinion on the McCann’s actions earlier and I dont feel the need to belabor the point.
But I will continue, as long as this comment section remains open, to try to “discuss” this case with the reasonable, open-minded adults on here. If you are not one of those, please refrain from referring your comments to me.
September 10th, 2007 at 1:31 pm
Here’s an overview on the BBC website.
http://tinyurl.com/32wvjn
At the bottom of the article is an overhead photo of the locations of apt v. tapas bar . . . fascinating that anyone could conceive of leaving three small children alone in an unlocked apt so far away (in a foreign country, no less) from adult supervision. But, that horse has been beaten to death . . . right?
Anyway . . . as a “reputable” source, I think the Beeb’s as good as any. Once at the article above, one can access a number of comprehensive articles to the right on the site.
One thought about how or whether the McCann’s negligence comes into play . . . yes, certainly, they are paying the ultimate price: if they are innocent. If they are not, then leaving the children alone comes into play. MO
September 10th, 2007 at 1:44 pm
andie thank you so much for that picture…now maybe people will see how very foolish it is to think that it was like being in the back yard. Thank you so much.
September 10th, 2007 at 2:23 pm
Michelle:
“…now maybe people will see how very foolish it is to think that it was like being in the back yard. Thank you so much.”
Michelle–I realize that you view yourself as a very respectful poster, when it comes to the comments of others. What you must not see is that comments such as the one above are really annoying and insulting in a backhanded sort of way.
Nobody here has ever defended (as far as I know) the decision to leave the McCann children unattended as a wise choice. Some of us simply see that the reality of making errors in judgement is a part of all of our lives. The fact that the McCann’s error is in the spotlight is a fact. But to debate the merit of the choice to leave these kids asleep and to blame the crime on this detail is old news.
September 11th, 2007 at 2:00 pm
I didn’t follow much of the McCann story except to know the parents were moving around internationally, pleading for their daughters safe return. The only thing I did note from the beginning was that it seemed odd that an abductor would take just one child from the room when there were three to take. Twins no less. Not much younger than Madeline. But, then I “rationalized” that maybe the abductor had, lets just say, sick and twisted plans for the poor child. Then last week to hear that the parents had become the focus…………wow. So they figured the death was accidental and mom and dad covered it up. Maybe so. Maybe mom and dad had sedated the kids for sleep and Maddie had been given too much that cost her her life. These are the things I don’t get:
Why did mom and dad leave these kids alone when there was a babysitting service available at the hotel that they had used on numerous occassions? Why did they leave a window open on a first floor room to their children while they were hundreds of feet away from their sleeping children? (If I were to have left my three sleeping children alone while I was that far away, you can bet everything would have been locked.) Why would they travel internationally three weeks after their daughter disappeared after stating so much they won’t leave without her? Taking flights to make pleas and appearances is LEAVING WITHOUT HER. Even if you are returning. How did so much of Maddies’ hair and body fluids get into the trunk of the car more than three weeks after she disappeared? And worse yet, as soon as it was learned they were facing possible charges and had been named as suspects, they leave Portugal. Mr. McCann says he doesn’t want people to think they are “running” but that’s exactly what it looks like. After almost five months in Portugal, you happen to have picked three days after you get named as suspects to leave the country? And why is there such a list of questions they won’t or can’t answer about the events surrounding Maddies’ disappearance??
September 11th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
Deb, there is NO evidence that her blood and hair were found in the car, none, just rumors, most everything you hear ask yourself, where is the proof.
September 12th, 2007 at 11:22 pm
I believe the McCann’s have perpetrated a hoax of global proportion for financial gain. I believe the child is safe and being cared for by a collaborator in the scheme. This accounts for educated parents leaving 3 young children alone, the parents bizarre lack of emotion, and the failure of anyone to come forward for the reward money.
September 26th, 2007 at 5:57 pm
How do you know what I’ve missed? Quite frankly, I don’t see the need to endlessly rehash the details of the McCann’s poor decision. Not to mention the hateful venom behind the attitude, as some go on and on about how “they would never…(do this and do that)”
Thanks & Regards
October 7th, 2007 at 7:36 pm
They did it. They threw her body in the ocean, it will never be found. Their friends are close ones, and are all in on it, too. Who knows if they will ever have enough evidence to convict, but they did it. They did it.
April 30th, 2009 at 10:12 pm
I don’t care if all of you condemn me, BUT, I am 150% convinced THEY (mum & dad) did it!!!!!!!!!!!
Stephanie I agree with you 200%.
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