Madeleine McCann: 10 major problems with Operation Grange’s efits of the current chief suspect

This article examines the claims made on BBC’s Crime Watch programme on 14 October 2013 by Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood, Head of ‘Operation Grange’ - the Metropolitan Police’s unit investigating the reported disappearance of Madeleine McCann.  In this article I will outline problems with these two e-fit sketches he showed to the 6.7 million British people who watched this programme:

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                                   Image A                  Image B

 

For over 6 years and 5 months before this programme, the McCanns and their team of advisers and lawyers had asked us to look for this man:

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[SKETCH OF SUSPECTED ABDUCTOR DRAWN UP BY MELISSA LITTLE, BASED ON JANE TANNER'S CLAIMS, MELISSA LITTLE WAS PAID BY THE NcCANN TEAM] 
 


 


This sketch was based on the claims of Jane Tanner, a close friend of the McCanns. She claimed that she had seen a man carrying a child near the McCanns’ apartment at 9.15pm on the night Madeleine was reported missing. Shortly after they reported Madeleine missing, the McCanns ripped off the cover of Madeleine’s Sainsbury’s Activity Sticker Book, and gave it to their close friend Dr Russell O’Brien, who wrote down what the McCanns and their friends claimed was a timeline of   the evening’s events, including Jane Tanner’s claimed sighting. It stated: “Jane checked 5D [her holiday apartment] . Sees stranger & child”.


C.  Problems with the original suspect

There were numerous serious problems with Jane Tanner’s claim - a claim which the Portuguese, Police always considered to be a fabrication.  

These problems included the following:

·         Jane Tanner kept changing her story

·         Jane Tanner kept on adding new details

·         Jane Tanner eventually described the man in such detail that it was obvious that she could not have absorbed those details, seeing him only for a few seconds in the dark, and had therefor made them up

·         The McCann Team did not release an artist’s sketch of him for 5½ months

·         Jane Tanner said on 13 May 2007 in an informal identity parade that she was sure that the abductor was Robert Murat - but she later completely changed her mind     

·         Jane Tanner then claimed that the man she said she’d seen on the night Madeleine was reported missing was ‘very similar’ to another older suspect with straggly hair and a moustache. In fact he looked nothing like her original artist’s sketch. Moreover, she said she had never seen the man’s face, so how could she say, as she did, that she was ‘80% sure’ that the man she saw and the man with straggly hair and a moustache was the same person?


D.   The Metropolitan Police say they have ‘found’ the man seen by Jane Tanner

To understand the significance of the two e-fits we are discussing, we need to examine just what was said about them by DCI Redwood and the BBC presenters during the Crimewatch programme.  

First, in what he said was a ‘revelation moment’ for him and his team, DCI Redwood told the BBC viewing audience that he had ‘found’ the man seen by Jane Tanner.

He claimed that, 6 years after the event, a man had come forward to say that he thought he might have been the man seen by Jane Tanner. Redwood’s story wholly lacked credibility. According to Redwood, the man, whom he refused to identity:

·         had done nothing for 6 years about his suspicion that he was the man seen by Jane Tanner

·         had been walking back from a ‘night crèche’ at the same time as Jane Tanner claimed to have seen him    

·         was on his own, and had no buggy for the child

·         had been carrying his blonde daughter, who was wearing only pyjamas

·         had no covering for her - matching Jane Tanner’s description

·         had been carrying her in exactly the same way as claimed by Jane Tanner - an unusual and uncomfortable way of carrying a child

·         had been walking around the resort all week dressed most of the time in exactly the same clothes as the man Jane Tanner claimed to have seen, namely a dark jacket and light-coloured trousers, and, finally

·         had kept the very pyjamas his daughter was wearing that night 6½ years ago - which, again, just happened to be extremely similar to the description of hem given by Jane Tanner. 


Quite apart from all those remarkable coincidences, if this man’s account was true, then a plan of Praia da Luz showed quite clearly that he was not taking the shortest route back from where the night crèche was. Why would he do that? Why, when carrying a heavy child back to his home or apartment, would he make a longer journey than strictly necessary?   

I’m aware that the story of this ‘man from the crèche’ comes from a high-level detective in Britain’s premier police force, the Metropolitan PoIice. But in recent years, the Met has been riddled with corruption and police officers prepared to lie. I have no hesitation therefore in suggesting that this ‘man from the crèche’ is probably an invention of DCI Redwood     


E.  The new suspect - a man said to have been seen by an Irish family

Now we come to what DCI Redwood and Matthew Amroliwala, one of the Crime Watch presenters, said about the man ‘seen by an Irish family’. Here are extracts from the programme transcript. The actual broadcast can be viewed here:

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TRANSCRIPT

REDWOOD: “We’re almost certain, now, that the sighting [by Jane Tanner] is not the abductor. But very importantly, what it says is that from 9.15, we are able to allow the clock [A TICKING CLOCK IS HEARD] to move forward and in doing so, things that have not been quite as significant or received quite the same degree of attention are now the centre of our focus”. 

AMROLIWALA: “This was an enormous discovery for the team: an innocent explanation for the suspect who’s been at the centre of the case for six years. Their attention quickly turned to another sighting, which could now be the key to the entire mystery. It was here [FILM OF THE RUE DA ESCOLA PRIMARIA IS SHOWN]

at 10pm that an Irish family witnessed another man carrying a child. They saw him come down the hill from the direction of the Ocean Club, heading that way towards the beach. Could this have been Madeleine, and her abductor?”

REDWOOD: “He was a white man with brown hair and the child that he had in his arms was described as being about 3-4 years of age, with blonde hair, possibly wearing pyjamas - a description very close to that of Madeleine McCann”.

AMROLIWALA:  “Two of the witnesses helped create e-fits of the man they saw. Today, for the first time, we can reveal the true significance of these images”.

REDWOOD: “This could be the man that took Madeleine, but very importantly, there could be an innocent explanation. The efits are clear, and I’d ask the public to look very carefully at them. If they know who this person is, please come forward”.


F.   Problems about the e-fits

If we think about the e-fits briefly, a number of serious problems about them arise straightaway. 

Problem 1: We are given two e-fits by Redwood. He tells us that the e-fits are of ‘the man they [the Irish family] saw’. But, in the opinion of the vast majority of people, myself included, these two e-fits are of two very different men. Apart from the obvious visual differences, these are the main contrasts:

(a)  The man in Image A is older than the man in Image B

(b)  The main in Image A has a fatter face than the rather thin-looking man in Image B

(c)  The man in Image A has a rectangular-shaped profile, in contrast with the man in Image B, whose face is more triangular in shape, with a narrow chin.

     Why would members of this Irish family draw up two e-fits of quite different-looking men, if in fact they are the same man?   

Problem 2:  Those with expert knowledge of computer-imaging techniques have noticed a further difference. The two images appear to have been produced using entirely different computer programs. Image A is blurred and ‘grainy’. Image B is sharp. There is no obvious explanation for why, if these images were produced by the Irish family, the e-fits should have been produced on two different computer programs.

Problem 3:  A third very serious problem about these e-fits is the circumstances under which the Irish family made their claimed sighting. Let’s look at this in a bit more detail. The family are the Smith family from Drogheda, Ireland. Nine of them – adults and children - were apparently walking back to the Estrela da Luz holiday apartment owned by the senior member of the Smith family, grandfather Martin Smith. He, his son Peter, and his grand-daughter Aoife, all made statements to the Irish and Portuguese Police about what they say was a man carrying a child, at about 10.00pm on the evening of 3 May. Each one of the three says the same thing about this sighting:

(a)  they each only saw the man for a second or two

(b)  it was dark at the time

(c)  the street lighting was ‘weak’

(d)  the man had his head down and the child he was carrying was covering his face, and

(e)  all three of them said that they could not possibly recognise the man if they saw him again.

How could anybody possibly draw up an e-fit, never mind two, if none of them had seen his face properly?     

Problem 4: The e-fits were drawn up, as far as can be established, in the spring or summer of 2008, a year after the day Madeleine was reported missing. Again it is hardly likely that any of the Smiths could remember anything sufficiently well by  then to be able to draw up the e-fits, especially bearing in mind what we said under ‘Problem 3’.

Problem 5:  The e-fits were not drawn up by any police force. They were drawn up by members of the McCanns’ private investigation team. Here is some relevant background detail:

(a)  In September 2007, the McCanns appointed a disreputable Spanish detective agency. Metodo 3, as their main private investigators.

(b)  They lied many times claiming that they knew where Madeleine was and that she would be ‘home by Christmas’.

(c)  The McCanns’ lead Metodo 3 investigator, Metodo 3 man Antonio Giminez Raso, was arrested in February 2008, charged with multiple offences, including theft of a large quantity of drugs, and corruption (he was an inspector in the Catalonian Regional Drug Squad at  the time). He spent four years in prison

(d)  Later, two other Metodo 3 men who worked closely on the Madeleine McCann case, boss Francisco Marco and his assistant, Julian Peribanez, also spent time in prison in a case of illegal ‘phone-tapping

(e)   Following the work of this disreputable agency, the McCann Team appointed Irishman Kevin Halligen to be the lead private investigator. He had founded a company called ‘Oakley International’ in July 2007, two months after Madeleine McCann was reported missing. The McCann Team falsely claimed in the British press that Oakley was a major international detective agency. It was nothing of the sort. It was a one-man band founded by Halligen, who used a number of aliases and committed many frauds. For one of those frauds, involving £1.5 million, he was jailed for four years (2009 to 2013)

(f)    Furthermore, Halligen’s role in the McCann private investigation was exposed by an article in the Evening Standard by Mark Hollingsworth in August 2009. Whilst supposed to be finding Madeleine, he and his girlfriend Shirin Trachiotis spent much of the time on a wild spending spree in the U.S., Britain and Italy. Most of the rest of the time, Halligen was seen drinking heavily in the Hey-Jo bar of one of London’s clubs

(g)  Halligen was sacked by the McCann Team after fulfilling only 4 months of his 6-month contract, for which he was paid around £700,000, including expenses

(h)  In Hollingsworth’s article, he accused Halligen and his colleagues of intimidating witnesses in the Madeleine McCann case into silence. If proved true, this would amount to the serious criminal offence of perverting the course of justice

(i)    Hollingsworth also pointed out that Halligen committed further frauds whilst employed by the McCanns -hiring people to work for him on the McCann case and them not paying them       

(j)    Halligen employed two men alongside him, Henri Exton, and Tim Craig-Harvey. According to the McCann Team themselves, all three men had worked for MI5. In addition, Exton had formerly been the Head of MI5’s Covert Intelligence Department. How three ex-MI5 men could help to find Madeleine McCann has never been explained. MI5 agents are more usually concerned to protect the government’s interests.

(k)  In an article published in the Sunday Times on 27 October 2007, Exton claimed that he and ‘his men’ drew up the two e-fits during the spring or summer of 2008, a claim that is probably true. He added that the McCann Team suppressed them, deciding not to release them to the general public.

(l)    If we look at the whole history of the McCanns’ private investigations during 2007 and 2008, therefore, we are entitled to query the precise provenance of these efits. The issue is whether we can trust what Henri Exton, the former Head of MI5's Covert Intelligence Department, says about those e-fits. We might also ask: is their origin as claimed by DCI Andy Redwood and the BBC true - or false? 

Problem 6: On top of all those 5 major problems about the provenance of these e-fits is a further issue. And that is whether the Smiths really did see a man carrying a child, as they claim. That is a very important matter which needs to be examined separately, and in depth. We’ll do that now.


F.   Did the Smiths actually see anyone at all?

On the face of it, why would anybody, still less several members of the same family, make up a story about seeing a man carrying a child - in the case, moreover, of the most famous missing child case ever. Even to suggest this possibility seems highly offensive.

However, in this case more than in perhaps any other, this principle applies: “Accept nothing, question everything”. So, applying this principle, let us first put together what we know about ‘the Irish family’, the Smiths. 

1.    Martin Smith has, since at least 2005 if not well before, owned a holiday apartment in the Estrela da Luz complex in Praia da Luz.

2.    He has admitted that he goes on holiday there at least three times a year. (maybe other members of his family or friends also use his apartment. Maybe he rents it out when he is not there - we do not know).

3.    He has admitted that he knew Robert Murat, the first suspect in the case, since at least 2005 - maybe before.

4.    In his statements to the police, Martin Smith was initially evasive about how well he knew Robert Murat, claiming that he’d ‘only seen him twice, once when he was drunk’.  Later he admitted that he had met Murat several times and had known him for at last two years. That is important because of what follows (see points 13 and 14 below).    

5.    On the night Madeleine was reported missing, Martin Smith was on holiday in his apartment with eight other members of his family, as follows:

(a)  his wife Mary 

(b)  his daughter Aoife

(c)  his son Peter and his wife Sian

(d)  Peter and Siam’s two children T___, aged 13, and C___, aged 6.

(e)  Two other grandchildren, A___, aged 10 and E___, aged 4, children of his daughter B___.

6.    He says that on the evening of 3 May (when Madeleine was reported missing), he and the other eight members of his family dined at the Dolphin restaurant in Praia da Luz. A restaurant bill confirms that.

7.    He says that after that, they all went to the nearby Kelly’s bar, from about 9.30pm to 9.55pm. The till receipts during this period do not substantiate that claim, so we must view it with caution.

8.    He says that as all nine of them were walking back to his Estrela da Luz apartment at about 10.00pm, they all saw a man carrying a child.

9.    As we saw above, concerning this ‘sighting’:

(a)  they each only saw the man for a second or two

(b)  it was dark at the time

(c)  the street lighting was ‘weak’

(d)  the man had his head down and the child he was carrying was covering his face, and

(e)  all three of them said that they could not possibly recognise the man if they saw him again.

10. Despite all nine members of the family apparently seeing the most unusual sight of a lone man, without a buggy, carrying a young blond child clad only in pyjamas in the dark at 10.00pm, neither Martin Smith nor any other member of his family thought of reporting this strange sighting to the Portuguese Police.

11.  From the following morning (4 May onwards), there was a media frenzy In Portugal and Britain, and indeed in many other countries, about the circumstances under which Madeleine - also a young blonde girl, aged nearly 4 - had gone missing. There was blanket coverage of her disappearance on TV, the radio and in the newspapers. In addition, in the resort of Praia da Luz, where Madeleine disappeared, there was a massive police presence, and people from all the villagers round about searching everywhere in the village. Not one of the Smith family contacted the police that day about their claimed ‘sighting’ of a man carrying a child. 

12. They did not contact the police the next day either, nor the next. By 15 May - 12 days later - they had still not contacted anyone.      

13. That very day, 15 May, Martin Smith’s friend Robert Murat was declared a suspect by the Portuguese Police amidst a blaze of publicity.

14. Only on the day following their friend being made a suspect did the Smiths react. According to the Smiths, this came about as follows. Peter Smith is said to have ’phoned his father and asked: “Dad, am I dreaming, but did we see a man carrying a child the night Madeleine disappeared?” Only then did Martin Smith pick up the ‘phone and speak to the Irish police.

15. Later, Martin Smith and his two children, Peter and Aoife, travelled to Portugal and each made statements about what they had seen. Each one of them conceded that 

(a) they each only saw the man for a second or two

(b) it was dark at the time

(c) the street lighting was ‘weak’

(d)  the man had his head down and the child he was carrying was covering his face, and

(e)  all three of them said that they could not possibly recognise the man if they saw him again.

16. No doubt for those very good reasons, they were not asked by the Portuguese police to supply e-fits.

17. They did however give a general description of what they saw, listing these 16 descriptions of their sighting:

(a) an unaccompanied male

UNQUOTE

19. Gerry McCann gave an even briefer description of the person the police were looking for the following day (Saturday 26 May). This was the very day that Martin, Peter and Aoife Smith were in Portugal to give their statements.   

20.  Only months later (October 2007) did it become clear how detailed a description had been given by Jane Tanner of the man she said she had seen. Uncannily, it was identical to the description given by the Smiths in all 16 respects (see point 17 above). Not only that, but the two ‘sightings’ were only 600 yards apart.

21. This could only mean one of two things. EITHER (1) the man allegedly seen with a child must have been wandering around Praia da Luz for 45 minutes between being seen by Jane Tanner at 9.15pm and then by the Smiths at 10.00pm OR Martin Smith had somehow gained secret access to Jane Tanner’s description.

22. Robert Murat, being fluent in English and Portuguese, and a police translator for Norfolk Police when he lived in England, had been heavily involved in acting as a translator for the Portuguese Police during the week following Madeleine’s disappearance. In this capacity, he had undoubtedly gained a great deal of knowledge about the Portuguese investigation. Moreover, he had been interviewed by police at length and made a suspect on 15 May, when Jane Tanner’s description of the man she said she had seen had been put to him. As Murat and Martin Smith knew each other well, it is easy to see how Murat could have passed the description, given by Jane Tanner, to him.

23.  When first questioned by the Portuguese Police on 26 May, Martin Smith was really certain about one fact about the man he said the family had seen. He said he knew Murat well enough to be adamant that the man was not Robert Murat.  

24.  Thus Martin Smith had let 13 days go by without him or anyone else in his family even thinking of reporting to police their claimed sighting of a man carrying a child. And then when they did get round to doing so, it was the day after their friend had been made a suspect. And then the only definite thing they could say about their sighting was that it was not Robert Murat.

25. On 9 September 2007 ,Martin Smith said he saw footage of the McCanns returning to England .He saw Gerry McCann carrying Sean, his two-year-old son, down the steps of a the plane. He was carrying Sean on his left shoulder.

26.  There was, of course, nothing unusual about that. Yet, sometime after viewing this footage. Martin Smith telephoned the police and said he was sure, just by the way he saw Gerry McCann carrying Sean, .that he  was the man he and his family had seen carrying a child on a dark night over 4 months previously. By any standards, this was a strange and bold claim to make, since this is the way most parents carry very young children when they don’t have a buggy

27. The Portuguese Police declined to make further enquiries about the Smiths’ new claim.   

28. However, the McCanns themselves wanted to talk to the Smiths. They did so via the man chosen by them to head up their private investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance. I dealt with that issue in Section E above: ‘Problems with the e-fits’.

29.  A few observations are necessary on Martin Smith’s claimed business interests. If we look at one of his companies, Golf Net Ltd, he describes himself as: “A former senior army officer - with extensive management and leadership skills acquired during a twenty-five year career both at home and overseas -, his entrepreneurship [sic], vision, enthusiasm and perseverance [sic] has assembled [sic] a team of hugely experienced and talented individuals with the combined skill-sets to realise his ambition of creating a global brand. Through the strategic partnerships that he has established, he has positioned Golf Net to rapidly establish a significant international presence. His inventiveness has created an impressive range of unique and innovative products that will be the launch-pad for what will become a major international brand”. None of this can be substantiated from internet searches about him. The Golf Net company scarcely seems to have traded, yet Smith claims that the following men of international distinction are fellow Directors of his:

(a)  Count Andreas von Faber-Castell, Director, Managing Director, Faber-Castell AG

(b)  Mike McDonough, Sales & Marketing (USA), the Bose Corporation, the “leader of core marketing efforts for multi-billion dollar audio products company, Bose…”, an

(c)  John Coleman, Executive Chairman & Director, Former President and COE of Bose Corporation, with “decades of experience gleaned at the helm of one of the foremost brand names in the world of high-end acoustic systems”.

It is a claim that looks highly doubtful.