***'Kos dig' starts 26 Sep 2016*** (was: Kerry Needham 'prepared for worst' by investigators)

Doug D wrote:Bluebag:
 
But where did they find the sandals in 2012?
 
2012 dig was the bank alongside the road in the ‘garden’ of the property being renovated, opposite the old woman’s house, so I think we have to assume it was found there, but who really knows? I thought it was reported as a buckle at the time, so it could have just been lying on the ground anywhere and somebody picked it up.
 
The car was miraculously reported as being found right at the last knockings of the 2016 dig on the fly-tipping triangle, by the dodgy bend in the road.

Farmhouse and grounds dig 2012... parts of sandal found.

Dodgy road bend triangle used as a dumping area... toy car found, believed to be Bens which he was playing with that day according to his grandmother, Christine.

Specialist dog alerted to sandal parts? 

5 years and still yet to complete forensic testing? 

Time is obviously ( not ) of the essence?....Or is it?

MayMuse wrote:

Farmhouse and grounds dig 2012... parts of sandal found.

What they found was "scraps of leather".

Which became "parts of sandals" which are now "sandals" with blood on them.

We won't get the full details though.

Oh no.

BlueBag wrote:Ben Needham's toy car discovered at secret fly-tipping dump just hours before cops called off Kos search

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/ben-needhams-toy-car-discovered-9066437

Anyone else confused by the car?

Was it 2012 or 2016?

It'll do well to remember that these past (and present) press reports are championed by the 'intelligent tabloid' (bit of a contradiction there) the Mirror, no less.  This is the same organ that took it upon themselves to journalistically investigate the case of missing Ben Needham by posting undercover agents reporters to the island of Kos, way back when.  They hounded the local gypsy communities, focused on the 'Dino' storyline and filmed Ben's mother and grandmother on location along with the Yorkshire police and local volunteers.  Quite a circus!

So, let's not skimp on a detail - a press report from October 2016..


Revealed: The sandals Ben Needham was wearing on the day he vanished

Police believe the replica sandals may help the search teams ploughing through tons of soil

These are the sandals which could give police a clue in solving the disappearance of Ben Needham.
They were specially made by an island cobbler earlier this week and are near identical to those worn by the tragic toddler when he disappeared.
Police believe the sandals may help the search teams ploughing through tons of soil.
A small piece of leather was found back in 2012 but it could not be linked to Ben.
Frank Harkness is the CSI forensic manager for Yorkshire and the Humber scientific support region, and has worked on hundreds of homicides.
He said: "It gives the searchers a better idea of what they are looking for.
"The woman who made the sandals was quite emotional about it when she realised it was connection with Ben."
Search teams this morning were digging around the last spot where digger driver Konstantinos "Dino" Barkas was working on the day Ben disappeared.
The police chief leading the investigation said they are targeting the ruins of an old farmhouse.
Detective Inspector Jon Cousins said: "It's an area where Dino Barkas was demolishing on that day."

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/ben-needham-cops-resume-search-8955119

Meanwhile, back in toy town..

Ben Needham's toy car discovered at secret fly-tipping dump just hours before cops called off Kos search
Mum Kerry wept when she was shown the little yellow car that Ben was almost certainly playing with the day he disappeared

October 2016

With just hours to go before they called of their Ben Needham search, British police feared they would find no clues as to what happened to the missing toddler.
But then came the major ­breakthrough that linked the ­youngster to a secret fly-tipping site where digger driver Konstantinos “Dino” Barkas dumped his waste.
A little yellow car Ben was almost certainly playing with on the day he vanished in Kos was discovered among the dust and dirt.
And the boy’s gran Christine told how she and his mum Kerry broke down when officers showed them the toy – after announcing it was “ very Likely” he had died under the tracks of Dino’s digger in an accident.
The 64-year-old said: “I was shaken by it and both me and Kerry cried. I just felt sick really. It was a shock.”
And of the car, she added: “I expected it to have no paint on but I was 90% sure it was Ben’s.
"When I saw it I felt disbelief. It must have been dumped at that site by Dino. It didn’t walk there.
“Obviously it had not rusted because it had been hidden in dust and not in the wet.”
The well-preserved yellow metal toy had a number 88 still on the roof and “benzine” written on the bonnet.
It was found on Sunday at the fly-tipping site half a mile away from the farmhouse at Iraklis where Ben and his family were staying when he disappeared 25 years ago.
Police believe the 21-month-old’s body was moved after the accident and the find could support that fear.
The toy car will now be taken back to the UK for tests.
It was one of two Christine said she remembered buying in Kos town in summer of 1991 and Ben playing with them as they walked to the ­farmhouse the day he vanished.
She added: “It was the first time he’d not tried to climb out of the pushchair, so I was quite pleased. He sat happily in, they kept him really busy all the way up there.
“He had one in one hand and another in the other and he was banging them together to make a clanking noise.
“They were going ‘clank, clank’ but I thought it was quite good because it kept him occupied. I remember buying the two cars.
"We didn’t have much money so couldn’t afford much. He had a pull-along bus thing he used to sit on and these two cars. We were building up his toy ­collection because Kerry had just moved to Kos and she only bought a few bits and pieces with her.
Kerry, of Sheffield, added: “You do forget the toys your kids have until you see them again.
"I don’t think my mum wants to believe it though. I vaguely remember this toy car. It certainly looked familiar.
“I was with mum when we bought them from the toy shop in Kos.
“We bought him some farm animals at the same time.”
Kerry spoke after South Yorkshire Police Detective Inspector Jon Cousins confirmed he and his team believe Ben is dead.
He said: “It is my professional belief that Ben Needham died as a result of an accident near to the ­farmhouse in Iraklis where he was last seen playing.
After 21 days of a targeted search across two sites here, this phase of Operation Ben has come to an end.
“During the course of the enquiries we have made over the last 19 months, we have closed off a large number of ­theories about what happened to Ben, many of which have been open for over 20 years.
“However, based on the information that I have now, as a result of an extensive and thorough investigation, it is without doubt that the current line of enquiry is the most probable cause for Ben’s disappearance.
“My team and I know machinery, including a large digger, was used to clear an area of land on 24 July 1991, behind the farmhouse that was being renovated by the ­Needhams.
“The events leading up to and following that incident have been explored by my team of experts to great lengths. The fact that we have not had a direct result during this visit to Kos does not preclude the facts that we know to be true.
“During the last three weeks a number of items have been recovered from both sites.
“Some of these items will be brought back to the UK for further analysis, but I must stress that they are mostly of low interest at this time.

“That said, an item found on Saturday 15 October is of greater significance to the investigation.
“The item, which I have shown personally to some of Ben’s family, was found in one of the targeted areas at the second site, very close to a dated item from 1991.
“It is our initial understanding that this item was in Ben’s possession at or around the time he went missing.
“The recovery of this item, and its location, further adds to my belief that material was removed from the ­farmhouse on or shortly after the day that Ben disappeared.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/ben-needhams-toy-car-discovered-9066437

The dubbed 'intelligent tabloid' don't appear to credit the reader with much intelligence do they.

This is confusing. The digger was clearing "an area of land behind the farmhouse being renovated by the Needhams". I thought this digger was working on a site quarter of a mile away down the hill? 
 "The recovery of this item, (the car) and its location, further adds to my belief that material was removed from the farm-house on or shortly after the day Ben disappeared".
So Ben was killed in an area behind the farmhouse? Why have we not heard before that a digger was working behind the house while the toddler was playing. Watching the documentary "Ben was here" neither of his grandparents mention digging going on behind the house. They talk about how quiet it was and how this lack of noise allowed them to notice the absence of noise from the playing child which alerted them to the fact that he was no longer there. If a digger was operating surely it would have been heard? They also walk behind the farmhouse, pointing out how rough, prickly and inaccessible the ground was for a child and dismiss the idea that he could have gone back there.
Are S.Y. police also claiming the driver who "killed Ben" returned to collect the car and his shorts from the farmhouse? When? The shorts went missing almost immediately.
 Why has it taken 5 years to mention blood on a sandal and another year without testing the toy car? It smacks of a hasty conclusion without any proof. Are they testing the public credulity levels ahead of Sept?

Too many similarities between this and the coverage of the case of Madeleine McCann for my liking.  Carbon copy!

I thought there was talk of "Dino's" family taking legal action.

Never did hear anything further about that.

Just to add to the oeverall confusion..

Ben Needham’s Mum Kerry Visits Kos Dig Site as Police Find Child’s Toy


October 12th 2012

The mother of missing Ben Needham has visited the dig site on the island of Kos shortly after police found parts of a child's toy.

Kerry Needham returned to the Greek island where her 21-month-old son disappeared 21 years ago and spent 30 minutes at the excavation site.
She said: "It broke my heart to go up there. It was painful but I had to do it for the sake of the police.

"I wanted to thank them for everything they are doing. It was wonderful to see our officers from home in uniform with the English word 'police' written on their sleeves.

"I also wanted to pay tribute to all the Greek volunteers who had given their time too.

"Many could not speak English but they patted their heart with their hand as I thanked them. I was crying all the way through."

The 10-day dig began on 19 October. Since then, police have found parts of toy cars, which Ben was known to have played with.
Inspector Colin Hope, who is part of the specialist search team, said: "We have found small parts of what look like tiny cars. We have found some wheels, we have found a bonnet.

"But we have also found plastic bits of toys like little heads from dolls and that kind of thing ... a whole range of toys really, including the sort of items we are looking for."

The team has also found beer cans with a sell by date of 1992. Inspector Hope told the Scottish Daily Record that this indicated they are "down to the level we need to be at and beyond".


He also said the Needham family do not recognise the recovered toys, but that this is "to be expected after the time we are looking at".
Despite the search effort, Kerry Needham said she is still hoping Ben is alive. Speaking about her visit to the site, she said: "It crucified me to be there, but it was worth it because it was important to show how grateful I am to everyone for their help in trying to show the world Ben is still out there somewhere and not laying dead underneath a mound."

The excavation began after an investigation by the Daily Mirror into Ben's disappearance. The newspaper claims Ben may have been buried in a building site close to the family home in a horrible accident.


http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/ben-needham-missing-police-find-toy-cars-397709


Give me strength !!!

"I wanted to thank them for everything they are doing. It was wonderful to see our officers from home in uniform with the English word 'police' written on their sleeves.
"I also wanted to pay tribute to all the Greek volunteers who had given their time too.

No mention of the Greek police. Did they do as bad a job as the Portuguese did allegedly ? Did they need a Greek interpreter ?

You can draw the parallels.

" a whole range of toys really, including the sort of items we are looking for."

Anyone with half a brain would know that if there are other items there besides the kind you are looking for then they are probably related.

They found a rubbish tip for goodness sake - brainless.

I now think these 2012 items are different to the car found in 2016.

They found this in 2016:

It's made by a company called "Summer".

Not Dinky, not Matchbox, not Corgi - all the media got that wrong.

It's model S668 Benzine. "Mercedes Lucky 88 Benzine".

They are diecast cars they were first made in the mid 1970s.

Ben had more than one diecast car according to his mother.

It conveniently turned up hours before they ended the 2016 dig.

But where?

Finding "a whole range of toys" in the area is normal it seems.

The police on Kos had a pretty compelling theory about what happened to Ben Needham, a theory which seems to have been neglected by South Yorkshire Police for some strange reason.

South Yorkshire Police have a long track record in the fabrication business, so who better to investigate a building site.

willowthewisp wrote:

sallypelt wrote:Oh dear!  This is the last time I am going to respond to this post.
 He is NOT saying that it is NOT evidence, period. He is saying it is NOT [the] evidence] [BUT] it is the intelligence. If he said it is "not evidence" and then ended the sentence there, then it would have a different meaning, BUT, he continued with "it's the intelligence".

Forgive me if I am wrong, but wasn't little Ben Needham "bare footed" playing in and around the farmhouse on the day of his disappearance, enjoying his feet being doused with water?

Two years ago a forum member kindly donated to me the book 'Ben' by Kerry Needham. It's the hardback edition, first published in 2013. 

On page 85, Kerry Needham writes: 

"Ben didn't care about wearing only a T-shirt and little buckled sandals any more than he did about being wet". 

She had also referred earlier to Stephen "...dousing Ben with another bowl of water onto his head".
Incidentally a photo of Ben wearing these buckled sandals can be seen on one of the films of Richard Hall's tour last year, here:

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3GoaUH5BKE&t=1027s 

Richard deals with the Ben Needham story in some detail between 7 mins 45 secs and 16 mins 35 secs; the pic of Ben on a motor-bike (scooter really) wearing his sandals is at 10 mins 30 secs. 

In the video Richard queries why South Yorkshire Police became involved again and why they needed to send out a whole team of people to excavate the area around the cottage where Ben and his family were staying - and compares the dig on the island of Kos with the dig in areas of waste ground in Praia da Luz in 2014 in the Madeleine McCann case. 

In his latest tour, Richard dealt in more detail with the Ben Needham case, focusing on interviews carried out with Stephen in the documentary 'Ben Needham - Somebody Knows', link here:  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32xqT0mlXdo 

In his talk, Richard examines a segment of an interview with Stephen Needham which runs for 15 seconds, between 11 mins 21 secs and 11 mins 36 secs. 

Surely one of the clearest examples of 'Duper's Delight' that you could ever wish to see is at 11 mins 32 secs to 11 mins 36 secs.

The sequence where Stephen is placed under hypnosis is also worth detailed scrutiny; it lasts from 35 mins 00 secs to 45 mins 55 secs. 

The reaction of Stephen to 'awkward' questions is especially instructive. 

At one point, faced with a difficult question, there is a shout outburst of nose-scratching. 

If you watch to the end of this sequence, it becomes crystal clear that throughout being placed under hypnosis, he is in control all the time, and indeed his answers are slow, with many pauses, as if he is thinking very carefully about what he can and can't say. 

[NOTE: Stephen maintains that images in his mind of Ben falling off the motor-bike and being run over by the back wheel of the bike were 'put there' by the Greek police insinuating that that is what happened to Ben].

-------------------- 

I cannot accept that Ben Needham was run over by a dead digger-driver. 

I cannot accept that South Yorkshire Police's re-involvement in this case, and their sending an expeditionary force to Kos at great expenditure to the British taxpayer, was a genuine search for the truth. 

In short, I do not believe a word that they have said about the disappearance of Ben Needham. 

Finally, it is becoming ever harder to believe that when a British police officer speaks these days, s/he is telling the truth. 

May all the lies told by British police officers to cover up the truth be exposed one day. 

The sooner, the better.



.

The most likely scenario seems to me to be that Ben was accidentally killed by being run over or falling from Stephen's bike. Stephen was a young man at the time and could well have panicked but since  it was  a result of an accident,  why not just own up after all this time? I'm sure the police could very easily get to the bottom of it if they really wanted to. To me, the Ben Needham case is serving another purpose for the Establishment and Media. They want us to think:
1. Children can and  DO go missing abroad as a result of probable abduction ...................even 3/4     year olds.
2. That they have given the MBM  and BN cases equal  investigation . The 'digging episodes' are  just to
    reinforce that fact in our minds. What other possible reason was served?
3. That the two cases are somehow similar. One minute ...there....next minute...poof! Gone!
4. To deflect our thinking away from the real questions. The whole tardy exercise to resurrect the BN case was in answer to: How come middle class doctors  had all the help they did when the Needhams got next to no help? The old , ' Council House, Single Mother ' argument. Possibly it calmed some heated class war emotions down but it wasn't  on the really  important question list  was it?
5. Evidence, no evidence, statement  contradictions and anomalies, pesky foreigners not doing the job properly  . See.............every case has them.
Personally I think it's a mistake to link the two cases. They're very different.

The enormous delay of not calling Ben's mother for hours is unhealthy.

According to the Textusa site,Kerry Needham has spoken to News Paper reporters about still looking for Ben after South Yorkshire Police,DCI Jon Cousins based his"Inteligance Reports" that Ben was involved with an accident with a"Digger Truck" Sandal Found in 2012,as to what is thought to have happened to Ben Needham,reported missing since 1991.

Sadly I think the driver of the digger may of accidently killed Ben and being a long term local had the knowledge of where and how to dispose of the body but since he has now passed away we might never know. I have followed this case hoping Ben would be found alive it's very sad. I personally don't believe Ben's Uncle had anything to do with Ben's death .

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Post merged.  Mod

The digger theory doesn't fit.

BlueBag wrote:The digger theory doesn't fit.

No but South Yorkshire Police gave it there best shot?

Using evidence from a previous dig,but only when pushed come to shove, was it revealed it wasn't from the latest digs(2016?) but from 2012, so although it wasn't fabricated,it leaves a bitter taste in the mouth not to state the truth,doesn't it?

Who can you trust when stating evidence conclusive to an event in Time?