Theory: Discrepancies surrounding 'crime scene' and sleeping arrangements

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Some excellent observations and very plausible conclusions in this post. A couple of the T7 statements (most notably Matthew Oldfield's) lead me to conclude that it is likely that Kate and Gerry took it in turns to sleep in the unkempt-looking bed under the window (of the 'crime scene' room) while the children slept in the other bedroom (the one Kate and Gerry *claimed* to sleep in). One parent stayed with them in that room every night; usually Kate (never both of them).

This is all my opinion based on statements and common sense... I'd love to hear what everyone else thinks. Also why they would need to lie about the sleeping arrangements...? I believe nothing untoward happened in the 'crime scene' bedroom (the one they claimed was the kids' bedroom) - it was merely a place for one adult to sleep. I don't believe Kate and Gerry slept in the same room as each other during that holiday, never mind the same bed. And I think the reason for that is important, and it's not just because they had three very young children. (All parents are wearily familiar with the 'musical beds' night time routine, and the lack of 'couple alone time' it entails, and there would be nothing suspicious about admitting this perfectly acceptable and understandable sleeping arrangement, so why lie?)


Bianca Ledesma
***First time posting so apologies if this has already been raised...
I am basing my theory on my own routines as a mother of 6 and have had many holidays with small children.
Discrepancies surrounding the 'crime scene' and sleeping arrangements....
Maria De Silva the cleaner stated the morning of MM disappearance she noticed a cot (one cot) set up in GM and KM's bedroom.
The crime scene that evening the cot was no longer in GM and KM's bedroom but now TWO cots set up in the other room.
We are lead to believe all 3 children were sleeping in the one room.
Now i have travelled with toddlers and small children.
The toddlers are ALWAYS in OUR room and portacots set up next or close to our bed so we can check on or tend to them if they happen to wake etc.
Nearly every other parent with toddlers or babies we know also do this.
When i view the so called crime scene of the childrens bedroom, i tried to place myself there and how i would set up a room for my children if putting all 3 in same room, and see what was amiss.
Instantly i noticed things that were off.
1.cots have no blankets or pillows.
(Even if it was hot weather at LEAST a sheet should be there if it cools down during the night)(GM and KM's room has blankets to keep warm and MM 'bed' has blankets,pillow/sheets soooo...? No blankets or pillows for the twins!?)
2. the obvious, MM bed looks unslept in,(staged)
3.this room is NOT the easiest room to do the 'checks' from.
4.the OTHER single bed near window looks slept in (rustled blankets and messy...i explain why in conclusion below)
5.GM and KM's room is the best room to do the checks from.
6.check the TRUE crime scene photo of GM and KM's bedroom,you will notice the single beds pushed together.
There is a large gap on the right...THIS is where i would place a portacot if i had the toddlers sleeping with me in MY room.
7.GM and KM's bedroom has a lamp (this room is perfect to set up for the little ones as i would also have a lamp left on for my small children,we would never leave them in a room on holiday in an unfamiliar place in the dark!)
8.notice the white pillow on the pushed together beds...notice how it is placed vertical.i do this when i have no portacot with me and i place the pillow this exact way to stop my toddler from rolling out and act as a barrier!
9.the curtains in GM and KM's room are left slightly open AND the shutters are left slightly ajar.
(Easy to peek through and do 'checks' without opening the door and disturbing the children).
***Trish and philomena (GM' sisters) BOTH stated that 'MM slept BETWEEN her brother and sister'(makes sense hence the pillow as a side barrier)...
They have to have been told by someone (GM) in regards to the sleeping arrangements as they were not in PDL.
Now if we are to go off the sisters sleeping arrangement account then how does that make any sense when GM and KM state MM was in her OWN bed and the twins in two cots?
The TRUE crime scene is NOT the bedroom where all 3 children supposedly slept...it is GM and KM bedroom.
ALL 3 children slept in this bedroom and it where cadaver odour was detected...in GM and KM's wardrobe.
Here is how i believe sleeping arrangements were set up:
The unkempt bed in spare room near window i believe was slept in by an adult (GM) and the 3 children slept in the PARENTS bedroom with KM.
KM,MM and ONE of the twins in the pushed together beds with MM on outside (by barrier pillow),ONE of the twins in the middle and KM on the outside and ONE of the twins in a portacot at the side of the bed.
Conclusion:
GM and KM's bedroom is the TRUE crimescene and NO children ever slept in the said 'crimescene' room.
NO ONE EVER entered the apartment to do any 'checks'.
It was done from the locked outside front bedroom (GM and KM's) from the porch/balcony peeking through the slightly opened shutter and curtains, with a side lamp on to have a clear view of ALL 3 kids.


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IIRC a change of room on arrival was mentioned and the post makes sense.

Did they claim that Madeleine was taken from the other room in order to stop the investigators from looking too closely at the main bedroom?

I have no doubt that Madeleine died on April 29th but even spending one night in the apartment would leave a trace of DNA in her bed, but there wasn't any to be found.  In fact, the bed appeared to have been unused.

Why did they claim Maddie was abducted from the bed by the door which appeared to have been unslept in rather than the bed under the window which appeared to have been clearly slept in?

Hobs wrote:Why did they claim Maddie was abducted from the bed by the door which appeared to have been unslept in rather than the bed under the window which appeared to have been clearly slept in?

If GM slept in the bed under the window, perhaps they thought it would be a safer move to claim that she slept in the other bed that no one slept in.
Perhaps they were afraid that a cleaner for example saw something in connection to GM in the bed under the window, a book or something and they took a safer option infront of a unsafe option.
The only bed in 5A that no one slept in.

NickE wrote:

Hobs wrote:Why did they claim Maddie was abducted from the bed by the door which appeared to have been unslept in rather than the bed under the window which appeared to have been clearly slept in?

If GM slept in the bed under the window, perhaps they thought it would be a safer move to claim that she slept in the other bed that no one slept in.
Perhaps they were afraid that a cleaner for example saw something in connection to GM in the bed under the window, a book or something and they took a safer option infront of a unsafe option.
The only bed in 5A that no one slept in.

It was kate who said she slept in the bed by the window due to Gerry snoring and not because she was upset with him the night before? And not Gerry , he was in the other bedroom apparently. 

I've always wondered same, as to why they chose the bed by the door,however is that true? 

Many things the McCanns say can be taken with a pinch of salt. 

In any case the bed by the door was out of sight line , if they claimed Maddie was in the ruffled bed by the window MO couldn't have claimed he only saw the twins? 

Many years ago I suggested that the main bedroom was where all three children slept, (not on this forum) it didn't be go down well at that time, but still believe that and makes more sense than the bed and two cots scenario.

MayMuse wrote:

NickE wrote:

Hobs wrote:Why did they claim Maddie was abducted from the bed by the door which appeared to have been unslept in rather than the bed under the window which appeared to have been clearly slept in?

If GM slept in the bed under the window, perhaps they thought it would be a safer move to claim that she slept in the other bed that no one slept in.
Perhaps they were afraid that a cleaner for example saw something in connection to GM in the bed under the window, a book or something and they took a safer option infront of a unsafe option.
The only bed in 5A that no one slept in.

It was kate who said she slept in the bed by the window due to Gerry snoring and not because she was upset with him the night before? And not Gerry , he was in the other bedroom apparently. 

I've always wondered same, as to why they chose the bed by the door,however is that true? 

Many things the McCanns say can be taken with a pinch of salt. 

In any case the bed by the door was out of sight line , if they claimed Maddie was in the ruffled bed by the window MO couldn't have claimed he only saw the twins? 

Many years ago I suggested that the main bedroom was where all three children slept, it didn't be go down well at that time, but still believe that and makes more sense than the bed and two cots scenario.

I feel that the "abduction" could have been planned to take place earlier that week, the "broken" shutter etc.
but it was postponed for some reason or reasons perhaps they didn't felt the first plan was waterproof.

I In addition, was there not suspicion of a semen trace on the sheet/bedspread of the bed by the window ? This too would implicate GM sleeping there for at least one night. Was the quiz mistress THAT exciting ?

polyenne wrote:I In addition, was there not suspicion of a semen trace on the sheet/bedspread of the bed by the window ? This too would implicate GM sleeping there for at least one night. Was the quiz mistress THAT exciting ?

Please exercise a little decorum !!!

A thousand pardons !

polyenne wrote:I In addition, was there not suspicion of a semen trace on the sheet/bedspread of the bed by the window ? This too would implicate GM sleeping there for at least one night. Was the quiz mistress THAT exciting ?

Oh yes.
The semen stain that FSS concluded belonged to the 2 year old little boy,Charlie.

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Out of little acorns do mighty oak trees grow!

This is all supposition based on the testimony of a cleaner, question is - where is it leading?

The bedroom occupied by the McCanns was the nearest room to the patio, the bedroom occupied by the children was closest to the apartment's main entrance door.   When preparing the abduction scenario, wouldn't it have been more sensible to say the children were sleeping in the main bedroom closest to the patio entrance/exit - to facilitate the abductor?  So much easier for the abductor to enter through the unlocked patio door, abduct and leave by the patio door, rather than entering through the patio door, walking around the apartment looking for a child to abduct and then walking back through the apartment to the patio door - or climbing through a closed window/shutter, depending which version you listen to?

Working on the premise that Madeleine 'disappeared' at some time between Sunday 29th April and Monday 30th April - what does the family's sleeping arrangements signify?  Does it really matter in the grand scheme of things?  A couple sharing a twin bedroom push the beds together so they can sleep together - that's what adults do, nothing suspicious here.

The apartment 5a bedroom occupied by the children was the staged crime scene - take note, staged crime scene all carefully prepared before the police were called.  The bed where Madeleine was said to have slept throughout the week was 'arranged' to indicate nocturnal abduction;  the single bed beneath the window, I imagine, was ruffled to indicate abductor exit by window, as propagated by the McCanns within minutes/hours of Kate McCann's staged abduction alert

If Madeleine disappeared at the beginning of the week, what does is matter where the twins slept during the remainder of the week? If Madeleine disappeared on the night of the 3rd May, as claimed by the McCanns and their group of friends, what does it matter where they slept during the week?

I see absolutely no reason to suppose the McCanns faked a Brian Rix bedroom farce in order to create the abduction scenario.  It makes no sense.

ETA:

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Given that the Tanner sighting put legs (in every sense) under the tale of abduction, lying about which bedroom the children slept in makes sense. The notion that a kidnapper entered and exited via the patio doors would, logically, have him fleeing along the dark alley between 5A and the Tapas bar, in which case Jane could not have seen him. It is ridiculous to suggest he would exit via the patio doors and risk walking alongside 5A to reach the T junction road at the top. I don't believe the cleaner is mistaken or lying. She cites Wednesday as the morning when she noticed the cot in the parents' room. If it was in the other room when she cleaned on Monday, that would suggest there was a reason for changing sleeping arrangements between Monday and Wednesday morning.

The abduction story was pre-planned, it wasn't an action plan after the event.  Jane Tanner could just as easily seen a man carrying a child at some other location - indeed the story would have been more plausible without the presence of Jez Wilkins and Gerry McCann having a chat in the street.  The story line was designed to facilitate an abductor - hence the  claimed unlocked patio door.  Leaving by the patio door would be no more hazardous for a potential abductor than by leaving through the front door, or even the window as suggested in the early hours.
 
Whatever fictitious story line you care to consider, I still can't see a reason to lie about the sleeping arrangements within apartment 5a.

The implication was that an abductor had been watching the McCann family to clock their movements, Gerry McCann even had the gall to suggest the abductor was lurking in the apartment when he went to check the children and stopped to relieve himself.  A planned abduction would usually have transport instantly available to whisk the victim away - it's very unlikely the plan would involve carrying a child through the streets to be seen by all and sundry - including the Smith family from Ireland.

The plan was badly thought out but cunningly executed with the help of the UK authorities readily available at the other end of the telephone, so it didn't really matter much how suspicious they looked.  How were they to know that the PJ files would be released before the world once the case was archived?

There lies their problem!

Schematic of the flat above is pretty poor. These two photos from the PJ files show the bedrooms as they found them, with plenty of space for one of the cots to fit in the parents room, as reported by the cleaner and hardly room to swing a cat in the childrens room.
 
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I only posted the apartment floor plan to illustrate the positioning of the patio door in relation to the bedroom occupied by the parents and that of the children, no other reason.

Yes, the children's bedroom shown in the photographs was very cramped but it was only used for sleeping so I can't see that matters much - the accommodation does appear bog basic, hardly putting on the Ritz!

Taking everything into consideration, how does this possible change of sleeping arrangements impact the abduction plan and/or the actual time of Madeleine's disappearance? What significance does it have? If, hypothetically speaking, the implication is that Madeleine occupied a bedroom on her own (which would be more sensible from the perspective of a potential abductor), then there would have been two cots seen in the parents bedroom, not one! Or, if one of the twins was a bit poorly or restless and taken into the parents bedroom for the night, why the need to fabricate? What difference would it make to the overall plan?

Forgive me but I'm really struggling to understand the intended purpose and/or direction of this supposition.

If this was a ‘simple’ stranger abduction carried out on a naturally sleeping child, between 9.15pm and 10pm on the Thursday evening, I can see that there would be a need for possible fabrication around the dining and child checking arrangements – to minimize the culpability of the parents due to neglect.
 
However, if the above scenario is false (which IMO it clearly is) then the need for fabrication on the part of anyone involved increases exponentially. If fabrication can be shown to have happened e.g. by comparing statements such as Maria the cleaner with the T9 statements, then it surely has to be highly significant and a completely relevant avenue of research/inquiry. IMO, every single discrepancy is important and should be logged – we don’t have to understand why something has been fabricated, only to try and show that it has.
 
-      Maria says that there was one cot in each of the bedrooms on Wednesday morning (why would she make that up?);
-      Why did the Mcs deny this – as [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] said, what did it matter? The question is why the denial?
-      Why does the typed timeline, prepared by all the T9 and handed in to the PJ, say MO ‘sees the two twins in their cot’? Why does DW state the same in her rogatory statement: ‘‘Err the twins were still asleep in the cot”?
-      Why does MO state that he could see both of the twins ‘breathing’ through the sides of the cots, and yet the way the cots were positioned, and the solid end of one of the cots, makes that an impossibility?
-      How is the bed by the door so straight if KM and all 3 children sat on it for a story, apart from Madeleine having supposedly slept in it?
-      Why were the beds pushed apart at all – there would have been more room/access if both beds had be left in front of their headboards and the cots placed along the wall by the door?
Etc, etc, etc.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] wrote:1. Maria says that there was one cot in each of the bedrooms on Wednesday morning ....

The question is why the denial?

2. ...... we don’t have to understand why something has been fabricated, only to try and show that it has.

1. Who denied what? If you're suggesting one or both the McCanns denied there was a cot in their bedroom on the morning of Wednesday 2nd May - where is this denial? Even if there was, there could be any number of reasons why.

2. I beg to differ! You (we) may not need to understand but I most certainly do need to understand.

You are not alone, Mr Verdi.  I, too, would like to know the pertinence.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] – I check before making statements of fact. Both Mcs denied that there was ever a cot in their bedroom.
 
Kate McCann, PJ Interview 6 Sept 2007:
 
‘Regarding cleaning, this was provided by the complex on Mondays and Wednesdays. This was never modified, and it is not true that a crib was in her room or in a room other than Madeleine's’.
 
Gerry McCann, PJ Interview 7 Sept 2007:
 
‘It is not true that on a certain day they placed one crib in their room, leaving the other in Madeleine's room’.
 
The point I was making regarding understanding the reasoning behind why a certain action has been fabricated is not essential to establishing that it has been fabricated, is what it is. If we accept Maria the cleaner as a reliable witness then we can accept that there was a cot in the Mcs bedroom on Wed morning and that both of the Mcs are being economic with the truth. From what Maria says, none of us can possibly know why the Mcs deny it, but that doesn’t detract from the value of knowing they are trying to deceive.
 
Hope that makes sense!

To be fair, we hardly know the truth about ANYTHING such is the obfuscation, multiple differences and downright lies. That shouldn’t stop us from at least kicking elements about to try and at least come to a consensus that most agree on (it’s healthy to have debate).

And I too agree, this issue is very important as it’s a clue within (what I believe to be) the crime scene.

For my own take, can I suggest that perhaps the McCanns aren’t lying and that the twins, either in individual cots or together in one, were with one of the parents in “the whooshing curtain” room and that Madeleine was with the other parent in the pushed-together beds.

But why might she have been segregated ?

Adding, this would be convenient as, per a previous poster supposition, Madeleine’s body was “kept” in 5A whilst they concocted their plan

The bedroom door opened from left to right so Matthew would have had a clear sight of Madeleine's bed as he opened the door.
Of course if he had said he had seen her then that would have made him the last known person to have seen Madeleine alive.

No-one slept in “Madeleine’s” bed. No-one did any checking.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] wrote:[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] – I check before making statements of fact. Both Mcs denied that there was ever a cot in their bedroom.

Thank you for the clarification.

The problem with the record of the witness statements is that they are not verbatim.  Without knowing how and why particular questions were posed, it's impossible to effectively interpret the answers.  Comparing the McCanns arguido interviews, they must have had prior knowledge of the line of questioning for the simple reason their replies as regards the sleeping arrangements were very similar - either that or for once they were telling the truth.  I don't believe there was any other mention by the McCanns of the cot in the bedroom on record, the question must therefore have been a result of the cleaner's testimony alone.

The witness statement of the apartment 5a cleaner is not sacrosanct.  Again not verbatim, it's clear (to me at least), that the witness was being led by the PJ questioning - routine policing.

>With respect to her activities performed directly in the apartment, she declares that the last time she entered the apartment was on the Wednesday prior to the events, specifically on the 2nd of May, when she cleaned the apartment.

>She remembers that when she entered Apartment A on the Wednesday......

>While performing her work, she remembers having noticed that the couple was sleeping in the room located opposite the entrance, where she confirmed the presence of a child's bed (crib)

>In the room next to the entrance to the apartment there was a bed placed next to the wall (where she supposed the missing child slept), and also the second child's bed (crib). All these beds were untidy at the time, meaning that they had been used. She also declares that in the room next to the entrance was another bed that had not been used.
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The cleaner could easily have been mistaken.  Cleaning is a drudge, I doubt very much she kept a log of her daily chores or had a photographic memory of every detail (remembering the witness statement was taken on 7th May, five days later and on the Wednesday there wouldn't have been any reason for her to notice anything in particular).

Whatever, it still doesn't explain what relevance the sleeping arrangements in apartment 5a has to Madeleine's disappearance.  There is little point in questioning and logging [sic] every discrepancy if it's not leading anywhere.