Christian Brueckner: To be or not to be

In it's simplest form, I do not trust the press or media.  Indeed I've made that quite clear over the months and years - my cynicism is splattered far and wide across the forum, I don't think I can ever be fairly accused of favouring one media/press source over another.

My problem here on CMOMM is press/media articles/reports being presented as fact, or proof of evidence.  The same criteria applies to the many inaccurate documentaries and other media shows focusing on the case of Madeleine McCann.

I've also made clear on a number of occasions, why I post press and/or media reports/articles - I believe the thread titles reflect my (and others) opinion of the press and media.  They are propagandists of the highest order, they spread mis/disinformation with evil intent.  

For those who are not aware, or have forgotten, I copy/paste press and media articles 1. to continue the legacy left by Nigel Moore of mccannfiles who spent so much time and energy documenting press/media articles over the years and 2. to highlight the absurdity of coverage of such a tragic incident - the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.

The press/media are not a reliable source of information - full stop!

It looks like this latest Christian Brueckner press blitz is fading faster than past reports, I'm happy to say..



Even the gutter press seem to tire of the prolonged saga - it is however weekend again, so still time for Tracey 'Olive Oyl' Kandolah to bash out an exclusive for general amusement.

As for translation, this paper aptly explains the complexity of translating/interpreting from one language to another without further word from my limited ability.

Read and absorb .... professional translators/interpreters are engaged for a very good reason.

Translating from one language to another
Maria Birbili

Maria Birbili is currently a lecturer in Educational Research Methodology at the department of Educational Studies, University of Oxford. After finishing her DPhil on Greek higher education, she worked as a research officer for 18 months. Her research interests include issues involved in the socialization of academics and institutional differentiation, and the training of researchers.

   Collecting data in one language and presenting the findings in another involves researchers taking translation-related decisions that have a direct impact on the validity of the research and its report.

   Factors which affect the quality of translation in social research include: the linguistic competence of the translator/s; the translator’s knowledge of the culture of the people under study; the autobiography of those involved in the translation; and the circumstances in which the translation takes place.

   There is a need for social researchers who have to translate data from one language to another to be explicit in describing their choices and decisions, translation procedures and the resources used.

Once practised almost exclusively by anthropologists, collecting data in one language and presenting the findings in another is now increasingly common among social researchers. As student and staff mobility increases, a considerable number of theses, dissertations and funded-research projects concern studies which involve moving between languages, sometimes even from the very first steps of the research endeavour. As the need for mutual understanding on an international scale increases, more and more organisations and individuals are seeking comparable information across national and cultural boundaries using research instruments prepared in one language and culture for use in others.

Moving between languages can take different forms. For example (taking English as the language in which the research is to be reported): an English-speaking researcher might conduct an interview in a language other than English; a researcher interviews in her primary language which in not English; researcher and participants are ‘fully and fluently bilingual - they slip between the two languages during the interview’ (Rossman and Rallis, 1998:161). In cases of international assessments or cross-cultural research test items, questionnaires or interview schedules are translated from English into the language of different countries and vice versa.

Although not all studies which involve different languages are equally dependent on the precision of linguistic data (for instance, in studies that are predominantly observational), researchers need to be aware that the translation process usually requires both time and effort on their part and can present various types of problems, some of which may not be completely overcome (Phillips, 1960; Lewin, 1990; Broadfoot and Osborn, 1993; Ercikan, 1998). More importantly, however, researchers need to keep in mind that translation-related decisions have a direct impact on the validity of the research and its report.

Factors influencing the quality of translation

The quality of translation depends on a number of factors, some of which, as Phillips (1960:290) says, may be beyond the researcher’s control. In those cases where the researcher and the translator are the same person the quality of translation is influenced by factors such as: the autobiography of the researcher-translator; the researcher’s knowledge of the language and the culture of the people under study (Vulliamy, 1990:166); and the researcher’s fluency in the language of the write-up. When the researcher and the translator are not the same person, the quality of translation is influenced mainly by three factors: the competence, the autobiography and what Temple (1997:610) calls ‘the material circumstances’ of the translator, that is the position the translator holds in relation to the researcher.

Different dimensions of potential translation-related problems

Gaining conceptual equivalence
One of the major difficulties of any kind of research in which the language of the people under study is different from that of the write-up is gaining conceptual equivalence or comparability of meaning (Deutscher, 1968; Whyte and Braun, 1968; Sechrest et al., 1972; Temple, 1997). Phillips (1960:291) sees this ‘in absolute terms an unsolvable problem’ which results from the fact that ‘almost any utterance in any language carries with it a set of assumptions, feelings, and values that the speaker may or may not be aware of but that the field worker, as an outsider, usually is not’. Whether one is trying to translate a survey instrument, an interview schedule or a test, as several researchers caution us, even an apparently familiar term or expression for which there is direct lexical equivalence might carry ‘emotional connotations’ in one language that will not necessarily occur in another. A good example of such a case is the expression ‘civil service mentality’. Although, as one might argue, this expression conjures up a similar ‘image’ in several cultures (for example, that people who have a civil service mentality are, as Moses and Ramsden (1992:102) say, ‘very observant of their rights’), it might not be easy for the English reader to pick-up the full implications the term carries for a Greek unless it is accompanied by more ‘cultural’ information on the (negative) associations and connotations that the term ‘civil mentality’ has in a Greek context.

On those occasions where two languages do not offer direct lexical equivalence several researchers and linguists suggest that one’s efforts should be directed ‘towards obtaining conceptual equivalence without concern for lexical comparability’ (Deutscher, 1968:337; Whyte and Braun, 1968:121; Bassnett-McGuire, 1980; Overing, 1987; Broadfoot and Osborn, 1993; Temple, 1997:610). For many researchers (Sechrest et al., 1972; Brislin et al., 1973; Warwick and Osherson, 1973) the process of gaining comparability of meanings is greatly facilitated by the researcher (or the translator) having not only ‘a proficient understanding of a language’ but also, as Frey (1970) puts it, an ‘intimate’ knowledge of the culture. Only then can the researcher pick up the full implications that a term carries for the people under study and make sure that the cultural connotations of a word are made explicit to the readers of the research report.

Comparability of grammatical forms

A different kind of translation problem occurs when sentences in the language of data collection involve grammatical and syntactical structures that do not exist in English. Syntactical style, as Ercikan (1998:544) points out, is one of the most difficult features to carry over from one language to another. Where sentences are resistant to translation because of incompatibility between languages in terms of the structure, Bassnett-McGuire (1980:32) suggests that the sense of sentences ‘can be adequately translated into English once the rules of English structure are applied’. However, such a process, as Ervin and Bower (1952:597-598) warn us, inevitably involves ‘the introduction of pseudo-information or the loss of information’.

Although obtaining grammatical and syntactical equivalence is not something that can be taken lightly, it does appear that the more important aim of researchers-translators should be to achieve conceptual equivalence.

Making participants’ words accessible and understandable

Seen as sometimes the only opportunity that readers of research reports have to ‘see for themselves’ what participants ‘look like’ (Wolcott, 1994), the use of direct quotations deserves careful attention in discussions about translation. Decisions about translating quotations are of course dependent on the intended function of the quotation in the research text and whether one perceives translated words as a direct quotation (Rossman and Rallis, 1998:162).

One of the first decisions that researchers are asked to make when translating participants’ words is whether to go for ‘literal’ versus ‘free’ translation of their text. A literal translation (i.e. translating word-by-word) could perhaps be seen as doing more justice to what participants have said and ‘make one’s readers understand the foreign mentality better’ (Honig, 1997:17). At the same time, however, such practice can reduce the readability of the text, which in turn can test readers’ patience and even ability to understand ‘what’s going on’.

Researchers who decide to go for the more ‘elegant’ free translation, on the other hand, need to think of the implications of creating quotations that ‘read well’. Even in one’s own language, editing quotations always involves the risk of misrepresenting the meaning of the conversational partner (Rubin and Rubin, 1995:273). In translated quotations the risk of losing information from the original is greater.

The use of translators or interpreters

In some studies, the researcher and the translator or interpreter are not the same person and there might even be more than one translator involved in a research project. These people might be professional translators, bilingual people with knowledge of the topic under investigation (or not), or native speakers employed to help the researcher communicate with respondents who do not speak English.

As Temple (1997:614) points out, the use of translators and interpreters ‘is not merely a technical matter that has little bearing on the outcome. It is of epistemological consequence as it influences what is “found”’. Kluckhohn (1945) suggests that there are ‘three basic problems which arise from the use of interpreters: a) the interpreter’s effect on the informant; b) the interpreter’s effect on the communicative process; and c) the interpreter’s effect on the translation’ (quoted in Phillips, 1960:297). Focusing on the latter, Temple (1997:608) argues that researchers who use translators need to acknowledge their dependence on them ‘not just for words but to a certain extent for perspective’. In doing so, researchers need to constantly discuss and ‘debate’ conceptual issues with their translators in order to ensure that conceptual equivalence has been achieved (Temple, 1997:616).

Techniques for dealing with translation-related problems

Important techniques for eliminating translation-related problems include back translation, consultation and collaboration with other people during the translation process and pre-testing or piloting (for example, interviews) whenever this is possible.

Back translation, one of the most common techniques used in cross-cultural research, involves looking for equivalents through a) the translation of items from the source language to the target language, b) independent translation of these back into the source language, and c) ‘the comparison of the two versions of items in the source language until ambiguities or discrepancies in meaning are clarified or removed’ (Ercikan, 1998:545; Warwick and Osherson, 1973:30). Although it can be helpful, as Deutscher (1968:321) points out, in identifying semantic errors in translations, some researchers (Phillips, 1960; Sechrest et al., 1972; Broadfoot and Osborn, 1993) argue that back translation is far from the ideal solution and can create new problems. For example, ‘it can ... instil a false sense of security in the investigator by demonstrating a spurious lexical equivalence’ (Deutscher, 1968:322). Back translation can also be a very time-consuming procedure, and might require more than one person (or a dictionary) involved in order to achieve good results.

Consultation with other people, on the other hand, involves discussions about the use and meaning of words identified as problematic with people who are bilingual (Whyte and Braun, 1968; Brislin et al., 1973) or having a number of people sitting around a table jointly making decisions about the best terms to use (Brislin et al., 1973:46). Collaboration with other people can also take the form of researchers from all countries involved in a study, jointly producing the research design and instrument.

Whether interviews or questionnaires or any kind of test are to be used, another way of eliminating translation-related problems is to pre-test or pilot the research instrument in the local culture. When pretesting a research instrument, Warwick and Osherson (1973:33) see it as particularly important to ask respondents not only for their answer but also for their interpretation of the item’s meaning. Once a questionnaire or assessment instrument has been constructed, another way of identifying problems is the application of statistical methods (Hambleton, 1993; Ercikan, 1998).

For many researchers, combining some or all of the above-mentioned techniques is seen as the best and most efficient way to deal with translation-related problems. When using multiple methods, as Brislin et al. (1973:51) argue, the weakness of one method could be offset by the strengths of the other.

The need to make translation-related decisions explicit

As is common to all scientific enquiry, reports of research which involves the use of more than one language need to include a thorough description of the translation-related issues, problems and decisions involved in the different stages of the research process (Temple, 1997:613). In addition, researchers need to describe the circumstances within which translation took place and discuss the techniques they used during the translation process. Similarly, if the research involved the use of translators, readers need to be informed about who those people were and what kind of role they played at all stages of the research endeavour.

Conclusion

When collecting data in one language and presenting the findings in another, researchers have to make a number of translation-related decisions. Words which exist in one language but not in another, concepts which are not equivalent in different cultures, idiomatic expressions and/or differences among languages in grammatical and syntactical structures are issues which call for very specific decisions. These decisions along with factors such as, for example, who the researcher or her translators are and what they ‘know’ have a direct impact on the quality of the findings of the research and the resulting reports.

https://sru.soc.surrey.ac.uk/SRU31.html

Exclusive

NewsWorld News

MADDIE MYSTERY I helped Madeleine McCann investigation – Christian B revelations could be tip of iceberg… he’s the rarest of monsters

Alison Maloney

15:27, 13 Oct 2022Updated: 15:27, 13 Oct 2022

FOR 15 years, the disappearance of Madeleine McCann has devastated her family and baffled police across the globe.

This week, there was fresh hope the crime could be solved after German prosecutors charged prime suspect Christian B with a string of sexual assaults against children and women in Portugal, spanning 17 years between 2000 and 2017.

The convicted paedophile, who was 30 at the time of Madeleine's disappearance, has twice been convicted of sex crimes against young girls.

However, former detective Dr Graham Hill - who was sent to the resort of Praia da Luz, Portugal, to advise local police in the days after her abduction - believes the new revelations could just be the "tip of the iceberg".

"What people need to do is to park up the Madeleine McCann case and look at him as a sex offender in his own right," he tells The Sun.

"He's a man that's been committing sexual crimes for long periods of time.

"The likelihood is that he would have committed many, many offences, most of them would have gone unrecorded and unreported. This would be just the tip of the iceberg for him."

Abduction 'spontaneous'

As founder of the Child Exploitation Online Protection Centre (CEOP), Graham - who fronts a new true crime series, The Murder Detective, on C+I from this Sunday - is Britain’s leading expert on the abduction and sexual abuse of children.

He believes the person who took Madeleine did not set out to do so initially, but seized the opportunity during a burglary.

“It tends to be an opportunistic crime. I think it was a random thing that she was taken,” he says.

“There are millions of people across the world that have a sexual interest in children, but the number that will actually abduct a child is very small which is why the crimes are so rare.

“But child abduction is often spontaneous. Offenders have been thinking sexually about children for long periods of time and then they're confronted with a set of circumstances that leads them to act on it. They don't necessarily go out seeking the child.

"In the McCann case there was evidence of a burglary or break in, so I think someone went in there to commit another kind of crime, to steal, rather than take a child.

“Christian B has previous for sexually abusing children but he’s also a burglar and a risk taker, who was known to Portuguese police and was living in the area at the time.

“If I'd been investigating this crime, he would have been a suspect for me early on and he should have been top of their list.

“I’d like to know if the Portuguese police knew about him? And if they did, what did they do to eliminate him from the investigation?

“And when the Portuguese police passed their information to the Metropolitan Police for their investigation, did they include Christian B's name in that suspect list?”


Dr Graham Hill is an expert in child abductionCredit: drgrahamhill1/twitter

Graham, who was sent to help in his role as CEOP behavioural expert, also revealed the heartbreaking first words he heard from Gerry McCann, the distraught father of the three-year-old.

“When I arrived in Portugal, I had a meeting with Gerry McCann and the first question he asked me was, ‘Do you think she's dead?’” he says.

“That's a difficult question to answer but I had to tell him that, statistically, children who are abducted by a stranger usually end up murdered or dead within three to six hours.

“It’s a fallacy that people abduct children and keep them locked up because the logistics of doing that are almost impossible. You’ve got to feed the child, keep them clean, keep them quiet and people who abduct children don't plan in that way."
Murder hits home

Graham's considerable expertise in serious crime is the backdrop to five-part series Murder Detective, in which he re-examines harrowing homicides with the help of the senior investigating officer (SIO) in each case.

Graham, formerly an SIO himself on numerous high profile cases, says he wanted to take viewers through each piece of evidence and help them build a picture of how each crime was solved.

“These are all SIOs that I know and they all picked the case they wanted to feature in their episode,” he says.

"The one that really hit home most for me was the case of Dean Mayley, a 24-year-old man with special needs, who had been protected by his family for many years.

“Only a few months before his death, he was allowed to go out on his own and travel on a bus to visit relatives. But he was attacked, robbed and stabbed to death in a West London street, in 2014, by four teenagers.

“The way in which the family talk about the crime and the investigation is so emotional and SIO Matt Bonner, from the Metropolitan Police, who's dealt with lots of high profile cases said this stood out for him as his most successful case, because of what it meant to the family.”

Police basics missing in Milly case

Despite his own expertise, Graham decided not to include child murders in the series because of notoriety.

“Child abduction and murder is really rare so to pick out those cases, you'd have to go to the most famous one, like Milly Dowler, April Jones and the Soham murders.

“We may visit those in future series but on this one, I picked the officers and they picked the cases.”

Graham was not an investigating officer on the case of 13-year-old Milly Dowler - who was murdered in March 2002 - and he believes killer Levi Bellfield would have been caught much sooner if police had followed one basic procedure.

“There are some really good lessons with the Milly Dowler investigation because one of the things that wasn't done right was the house to house investigation around where she was last seen, in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey,” he says.

“A house to house has to be managed in a particular kind of way. You don't just go bang on doors, you have to methodically go through the voters register and eliminate people.

"That wasn't done thoroughly enough because if it had been, they would have found that one of the houses was empty.

“If they traced the landlord, he could have given them the name of the woman renting it and that woman was Levi Bellfield's girlfriend.

“Everyone thinks murders are solved by CSI type techniques such as fingerprinting, blood spatter analysis and so on but actually, sometimes murders are solved by someone banging on the door and doing the basic, traditional policing techniques. They are still the bedrock of those investigations.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/20075456/murder-detective-madeleine-mccann-christian-b-graham-hill/

It's very worrying to know someone like this is Britain’s leading expert on the abduction and sexual abuse of children.

Directly involved with the case of missing Madeleine McCann and he can't even be bothered to check the available facts and evidence.

" In the McCann case there was evidence of a burglary or break in " ! 

Oh really Dr Hill , do tell us what that " evidence " is please ? 

Surely not the " jemmied shutters " ?   

He's bragging he helped in Madeleine McCann investigation, that went well didn't it.

His show is about re-examining  homicides, where does Madeleine fit into this category.

It's just another way of rubbishing the PJ and Mr Amaral.

crusader wrote:He's bragging he helped in Madeleine McCann investigation, that went well didn't it.

His show is about re-examining  homicides, where does Madeleine fit into this category.

It's just another way of rubbishing the PJ and Mr Amaral.

This is so worrying that the original claim, "Someone's taken her" is still perpetrated by the poor Policing demonstrated by this Ex Policeman. He has obviously failed to take into account the Amaral investigation (which he claims was the reason he was sent to PDL, Portugal).

There was no evidence of an Abduction. So, "I helped Madeleine McCann investigation" didn't have a chance from the moment this guy got involved; right from the 'get go'.

Essential reading for this Ex Policeman is "The Truth of the Lie" by Gonçalo Amaral.

It's a cult .... using the name of a missing child, almost certainly no longer of this world, to sell their wares.

sandancer wrote:" In the McCann case there was evidence of a burglary or break in " ! 

Oh really Dr Hill , do tell us what that " evidence " is please ? 

Surely not the " jemmied shutters " ?   

Behind the shutter is a window, so even if the shutters were jemmied, the window wasn't broken. That rules out the break in.

Gerry McCann publicly stated "nothing of value was taken", that rules out burglary.

What is Dr Hill rambling on about?

Perhaps he means a Paedophile was doing a bit of burglary because there were no children available to snatch and couldn't believe his luck when he found 3 children alone to take his pick from.

Or perhaps the burglar wasn't a paedophile, saw the children alone and thought he would take a gift for his paedophile friend.

Whichever way you look at it, it doesn't work.

It only makes sense when they fit Brückner into their scenario, who was a burglar and a Paedophile.

The McCanns (and their friends) say they didn't have watches or mobile phones, in the restaurant. So two phones and two watches were in their apartment, and weren't taken by the burglar, whom we know is fictional. It wasn't a smart theory to purport.

They didn't.
Their professional liar Clarence Mitchell did.

Kate McCann is VERY clear that they were wearing watches.
And checking them to the exact minute.
In her book she says "At 9.04 BY HIS WATCH"
which is frankly ludicrous.

the only thing that got broken in this case was the ego of graham gill. and some others.

Exclusive

News

FAMILY’S TORMENT Madeleine McCann’s parents left in dark over cops’ claims they will charge suspect over her kidnap & murder, family says

Tracey Kandohla

13:09, 7 Nov 2022Updated: 15:25, 7 Nov 2022



MADELEINE McCann's family say they have been left in the dark over cops' claims they will charge a suspect over her kidnap and murder.

Maddie's parents Kate and Gerry are said to have heard nothing from German cops, who claim they will soon charge chief suspect Christian B for the crimes against their daughter.

The detectives' certainty came last month after the convicted paedophile and rapist was charged with five unrelated sex attacks, two on children.

But Maddie’s great uncle Brian Kennedy - Kate’s maternal uncle - said the couple had not been kept in the loop.

Brian told The Sun: “The family has heard no more about Christian B and have not have heard anything about plans to charge him with Madeleine's abduction in addition to the other charges he is facing.”

The retired head teacher, 83, added: “It seems he is certainly being prosecuted for several other things but has never admitted involvement with Madeleine, so we wait to see.”

He reiterated that Kate and Gerry refused to give up hope saying: “There is no way the family will ever give up whatever the outcome may be. We have not lost hope after all these years."

The Sun revealed last month that detectives hoped to charge the caged paedophile with three-year-old Maddie's abduction and "no body" murder by the end of the year.

Their pledge came as Christian B, aged 45, was charged with a sex offence on a girl just days before the British youngster vanished from a holiday apartment in Portugal in May 2007.

He was charged with four more attacks on another child and three women.

Renowned heart doctor Gerry and ex-GP turned hospital medical worker Kate, both 54, are regularly kept updated by British police running the Maddie inquiry Operation Grange.

But because the key suspect is German, and remains in a native jail for a previous rape of a pensioner holidaymaker, his country’s force has taken over the investigation, with the help of Scotland Yard.

The couple from Rothley, Leicestershire, have previously opened up about their desperate need for “closure" in a heartfelt 15th anniversary posting.

They said in May: "Regardless of outcome, Madeleine will always be our daughter and a truly horrific crime has been committed."
'GRATEFUL'

Kate and Gerry praised three nations' police forces for their continued work in trying to crack the painstaking case.

They stated: "We are grateful for the ongoing work and commitment of the UK, Portuguese and German authorities as it is this combined police effort which will yield results and bring us those answers."

Maddie was just nine days short of celebrating her fourth birthday when she disappeared from the Algarve resort of Praia da Luz.

She had been left sleeping alone with her younger twin siblings while her parents were dining in a nearby tapas restaurant with their seven pals.

Sex fiend Christian B has repeatedly protested his innocence, vehemently denying any involvement in Maddie’s abduction.

He was made an official “arguido’ by Portuguese Police after lead German authorities sensationally named his as a prime suspect in June 2020.

His lawyer Friedrich Fulscher said the new charges had come as a “complete surprise" claiming the allegations were based on “dubious witnesses and on video evidence that no one has been able to find".
'DESERVE JUSTICE'

One of his alleged victims Hazel Behan, who has waived her anonymity to speak out, said last month that the McCanns “deserved justice”.

The former holiday rep, 39, from Dublin said: "As a mother myself I cannot begin to imagine the heartache and torture they have had to endure.

"Madeleine deserves justice too, she deserves for her truth to be told.”

She told The Sunday Times: "Kate and Gerry have never given up hope. I hope they too will finally get the answers and justice they rightly deserve.”

The Sun Online recently told how the McCanns’ had been offered a new lifeline in the hunt for their daughter with the Met Police being handed six months’ more funding to continue searching.

It was feared the inquiry into Maddie’s disappearance was set to be shelved.

A Home Office spokesperson said: "Ministers previously approved a request for £302,470 of funding for this financial year (2022/23) in line with our Special Grant processes.”

Whilst the sum asked for by Scotland Yard has been given the green light by the Home Office, guaranteeing money for Op Grange to continue until at least the start of April 2023 - it is down by nearly £50,000 from the previous financial year (£349,328).
'DISAPPOINTED'

The couple, who have 17-year-old twins A-Level students Sean and Amelie, recently suffered a setback after losing a libel battle against former Portuguese police chief.

Retired cop Goncalo Amaral, who had led the initial investigation into their daughter's disappearance, accused them of covering Maddie’s accidental deathand disposing of her body.

The McCanns have been left “disappointed” by a ruling the European Court of Humans Rights in September.

They had attempted to sue him for libel for suggesting they were involved in the faked kidnap - claims he published in a 2008 book and then repeated in media interviews.

They won the initial case but Amaral appealed, and in 2016 Portuguese judges reversed the decision prompting the McCanns to appeal to the ECHR in Strasbourg.

But European judges rejected the appeal, giving the couple three months to decide whether to appeal again.

The McCanns have not yet stated their intention.

In a statement Kate and Gerry said: "We are naturally disappointed with the decision of the European Court of Humans Rights announced today.

"However, much has changed since we started legal proceedings 13 years ago against Mr Amaral, his publisher and broadcaster.

“We took action for one and only one reason: Mr Amaral’s unfounded claims were having a detrimental impact on the search for Madeleine.

"If the public believed that we were involved in her disappearance, then people would not be alert for possible clues and may not report relevant information to the relevant law enforcement agencies. The focus is now rightly on the search for Madeleine and her abductor(s).

"We are grateful for the ongoing work by the British, German and Portuguese police. We hope that with, the help of the public, hard work and diligence we can eventually find those responsible for Madeleine’s disappearance and bring them to justice."

https://www.thesun.ie/news/9690867/maddie-mccann-parents-german-cops-update/

Christmas is coming, the fund is getting thin
Please put yer money in this bent tin

Martin the Fricker is at it again, I now believe him to be Breuckner's alter-ego. He appears to know more about what goes on behind the bars than the law itself.

Even if there be any truth in this report - so what? If Breuckner is writing letters who cares, even the most feared hardened incarcerated criminals have pen pals in the outside world - perish the thought.

There's more truth coming from the prison source than has ever been uttered by those closer to the case of Madeleine McCann's disappearance - where is the justice?

YAWN !!!

And talking of rambling, on with the motley..

Exclusive: Madeleine McCann suspect's rambling prison letter about prosecutors 'trying to trap me'

Christian Brueckner, 45, has written a letter from prison, after being charged last month over accusations of rape and sexual assault in Portugal and insists he did not commit the crimes

ByMartin FrickerNews Reporter

21:17, 10 Nov 2022

Christian Brueckner has accused German prosecutors of plotting to frame him for a string of crimes.

The Madeleine McCann suspect was charged last month over accusations of rape and sexual assault in Portugal. But the 45-year-old insists he has done no wrong.

In a rambling prison letter he wrote: “There is no evidence at all that I committed any of these crimes. No DNA, nothing.

“The time that some of these crimes are supposed to have happened I was in prison. The prosecution are trying to trap me and hope that I will capitulate under the mental pressure.

"They hope that I will just say ‘yes’ to everything which will give me a chance to escape from this mental torture.

“Certainly there is no evidence at all. Of course not because I have not committed any of these crimes.”

German paedophile Brueckner is serving a seven-year sentence in his home country for raping a pensioner in Praia da Luz, the Algarve resort ­Madeleine vanished from in 2007 when she was three.

Prosecutors now claim he raped a teenage girl there and two women in other Portuguese holiday spots.

And he allegedly exposed himself to young girls. He faces life behind bars if convicted of the offences, said to have taken place between December 2000 and June 2017.

Brueckner wrote: “No one knows who these people are and what’s happened to them. No name, no ­nationality, nothing. Perhaps the victims left for the moon for a while.”

German prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters said he has evidence Madeleine is dead and is “100% sure” Brueckner is responsible. He told how investigators are now working “solely” on that investigation.

Madeleine’s parents Kate and Gerry, from Rothley, Leics, refuse to give up hopes their daughter is alive.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/madeleine-mccann-suspects-rambling-prison-28461839

Oh my giddy good gawd, the Daily Snail has now taken-up the baton, this time a little embellished to capture the readers attention - you know how it works..


BREAKING WIND
Madeleine McCann suspect Christian Brueckner says German police are trying to frame him for multiple crimes in the hope he will crack and confess

   Madeleine McCann chief suspect says police are trying to frame him for crimes
   Christian Brueckner, 45, is already serving a seven-year prison sentence for rape
   Said police were trying to make him confess to 'escape from this mental torture'  

By Chris Matthews For Mailonline

Published: 09:20, 11 November 2022 | Updated: 12:02, 11 November 2022

Madeleine McCann suspect Christian Brueckner claims German police are trying to frame him for multiple crimes in the hope he will crack and confess.

Brueckner, 45, is already serving a seven-year prison sentence for raping an elderly woman in Portugal in 2005.

He said police were trying to make him confess to a string of other crimes so he can 'escape from this mental torture'.

Brueckner spent many years in Portugal, including in the resort of Praia da Luz, around the time of Madeleine's disappearance there in 2007, but denies any involvement and has not been charged, though he remains under investigation on suspicion of her murder.

In a letter from prison obtained by The Mirror, the convicted German rapist wrote: 'There is no evidence at all that I committed any of these crimes. No DNA, nothing.

'The prosecution are trying to trap me and hope that I will capitulate under the mental pressure.

'They hope that I will just say "yes" to everything which will give me a chance to escape from this mental torture.'

German prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters said Maddie is dead and he is '100% sure' Brueckner is the culprit.

He said investigators are working 'solely' on the investigation.

Last month Brueckner was charged with a string of sex crimes — but none of them relates to the disappearance of the British girl.

Brueckner was named as the man responsible for Madeleine's May 2007 abduction two years ago by German police, sparking worldwide media attention.

Until last month no charges had been brought and the investigation had failed to positively link him to Madeleine, despite prosecutors giving the heart-breaking news they had 'concrete evidence' the little girl was dead and that Brueckner was the culprit.

German investigators charged him on October 11 with five offences between 2000 and 2017, when Brueckner was travelling between his native Germany and Portugal.

They include the rapes of two unknown women in Portugal, the rape of a 20-year-old Irish woman in 2004, the sexual abuse of a 10-year-old German girl in April 2007 on a Portuguese beach - close to where Madeleine vanished just a month later - and another sexual abuse case in 2017, again in Portugal.

Brueckner's lawyer Friedrich Fulscher said the new charges had come as a 'complete surprise' to him and his client, and said they were based on 'dubious witnesses and on video evidence that no one has been able to find'.

The charges in relation to the rapes of the two unknown women come after police were told about a video recording of Brueckner allegedly attacking them.

Helge Busching and Manfred Seyferth - two key witnesses and former friends of Brueckner's - are said to have stolen the camera with the recording on it from the German's house near Praia da Luz on Portugal's Algarve coast.

In the footage - which has since disappeared - they describe how an elderly woman and a young girl are raped by a man who they identify as Brueckner.

The charges brought against Brueckner include a rape said to have taken place some time between December 28, 2000 and April 8, 2006 on an unknown woman aged between 70-80 years old.

He is said to have tied the woman up and raped her in the bedroom of her holiday apartment and hit her with a whip while filming her ordeal.

On another day between the same dates he is accused of raping an unknown 14-year-old German-speaking girl at his home in Praia da Luz in a similar way, allegedly tying her up and videotaping the act.

In June 2004, the defendant allegedly gained access at night to the apartment of a then-20-year-old woman from Ireland via the balcony in Praia da Rocha. The sleeping woman was then awakened by the masked suspect at knifepoint and raped.

The accused is also alleged to have filmed large parts of the attack with a video camera he had brought.



In April 2007, the defendant allegedly ambushed a 10-year-old German girl playing on the beach at Salema in the district of Faro in Portugal, wearing only shoes and otherwise naked. He allegedly forced her to watch him perform a sex act.

Ten years later, he is said to have carried out a similar crime against a girl at a playground at Sao Bartolomeu de Messines in Portugal. Prosecutors say the girl ran to her father for help and the suspect was arrested by Portuguese police at the scene.

Under German law, German nationals accused of crimes in other countries can be tried in their home country.

Investigators believe the 45-year-old also killed Madeleine, then three, after abducting her from a holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal, on May 3, 2007. However, he has not been charged with her disappearance.

Brueckner, who has reportedly denied any involvement in the case, was identified as a suspect in the McCann case by Portuguese officials in June 2020.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11416251/Madeleine-McCann-suspect-Christian-Brueckner-says-German-police-trying-frame-crimes.html

I don't usually bother reading press public comments - at least not since I was blacklisted but here I've made an exception. It seems the public tire of this endless ridiculous saga..

The latest story, closely related to former reports loosely based on the same information back in March/April 2022 - and probably before that, is slowly but surely making it's way across tabloidspace.



But, for the sake of posterity and no other excusable reason, here we go..

Madeleine McCann suspect rambles of ‘trap’ and ‘no evidence’ in prison letter

Christian Brueckner stressed his innocence in the crimes he has been accused of committing, claiming the "prosecution are trying to trap me and hope that I will capitulate".

By Aleks Phillips
15:01, Fri, Nov 11, 2022 | UPDATED: 15:01, Fri, Nov 11, 2022

The prime suspect in German investigator’s probe into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann has claimed officials are attempting to “trap” the imprisoned rapist and child sexual abuser. Prosecutors in Braunschweig announced last month they were bringing fresh charges against Christian Brueckner over historic allegations unrelated to the British girl’s vanishing.

In a rambling letter, he argued that there was “no evidence” linking him to the allegations, and stressed: “I have not committed any of these crimes”.

The convicted rapist – who currently resides in Oldenburg prison – was identified as a suspect in Madeleine’s disappearance by Germany investigators in June 2020.

Brueckner has always denied all allegations in relation to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.

On April 21 this year, Portuguese prosecutors named him as an “arguido”, or named suspect, in their investigation into the disappearance, ahead of the 15th anniversary of Madeleine’s disappearance.

READ MORE: McCanns ‘left in the dark’ over any plans to charge Maddie suspect

When the new charges were brought against Brueckner, Mr Wolters clarified that the investigation “continues”, but that it was unlikely he would be charged with any alleged crime in relation to her disappearance before Christmas this year.

However, he said that investigators were “100 percent certain” they had the right man.

In October, Brueckner was charged with the alleged rape of an elderly woman in her seventies in her holiday apartment in Portugal, and the alleged rape of a 20-year-old Irish woman in Praia da Rocha in 2004 – alleged crimes prosecutors had previously linked Brueckner to.

The convicted sex offender – who now resides in Oldenburg prison – is also alleged to have orally raped a teenage girl in her home in Praia da Luz after tying her up and whipping her on an unknown date between 2000 and 2006. He is claimed to have filmed the incidents.

He allegedly exposed himself to a 10-year-old German girl in Faro in 2007 and to a 11-year old Portuguese girl in Bartolomeu de Messines in 2017.

In a letter from his prison cell, seen by the Mirror, Brueckner wrote: “There is no evidence at all that I committed any of these crimes. No DNA, nothing.

“The time that some of these crimes are supposed to have happened I was in prison. The prosecution are trying to trap me and hope that I will capitulate under the mental pressure.

“They hope that I will just say ‘yes’ to everything which will give me a chance to escape from this mental torture.

“Certainly there is no evidence at all. Of course not because I have not committed any of these crimes.”

Brueckner also made the unfounded claim that “no one knows who these people are and what’s happened to them. No name, no nationality, nothing.”

Madeleine went missing in Praia da Luz, a coastal town in the Algarve, after being left asleep with her siblings in the family’s ground-floor apartment of the Ocean Club, on May 3, 2007.

Her parents checked in on the children throughout the evening, until Kate discovered Maddie was gone at around 10pm.

Maddie’s disappearance sparked a Europe-wide missing persons investigation that now has three different police forces trying to bring the McCanns closure.

At the time of Madeleine’s disappearance, Brueckner is believed to have been living a vagrant life on the Portuguese south coast, using a camper van to get around.

He reportedly did odd jobs around the resort before her disappearance, and is believed to have been involved in drug dealing and burglaries in the area.

German investigators believe a call was made from a phone number belonging to Brueckner around the time she went missing, in the vicinity of the Ocean Club.

Mr Wolters admitted to a Channel 5 documentary around the 15th anniversary of Maddie’s disappearance earlier this year that they did not have any forensic evidence linking him to her going missing, but stated they were in possession of other evidence they had not made public.

The prosecutors in Braunschweig said in 2020 – when Brueckner was named as their prime suspect – that they believe he murdered Madeleine. However, the Metropolitan Police’s own Operation Grange investigation into the disappearance maintains it is a missing person case.

Experts have said this variance of opinion may be due to the diverse ways different judicial systems are structured.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1695340/madeleine-mccann-suspect-rambles-letter-prison-evidence-Christian-B

And the point is?

Aside from keeping the name Brueckner in focus - again!

Extraordinary, a German man with a troubled past, writes letters from prison In English - for an English market?

A German man of troubled past with perfect command of the English language?

Now why might that be?

I am fully aware of Isabelle McFadden's alleged prison correspondence with the name Christian Brueckner, the lady is never backward in coming forward with claims of inside knowledge. If you follow Isabelle McFadden on social media, you will better understand her rationale, for want of a better word - and how she weaves her 'personality and life' into the case of a missing child, a child almost certainly no longer of this world.

Sadly Ben Salmon died one year ago R.I.P., in November 2021 he took his own life. I don't wish to bring his name into disrepute.

I'll leave it at that!

For anyone else interested in reading about and/or protracting this German saga, the screenshot is taken from here..

https://tickernews.co/researcher-becomes-pen-pals-with-suspect-in-madeleine-mccanns-disappearance/

I will just point out, Isabella McFadden is frequently wrong about different aspects of the case, yet she presents herself before the world as a researcher, an expert on the case of missing Madeleine McCann.

Sometimes such people can do more harm than good.

Amazing how the media manipulators keep promoting the line "arrest warrant out for Madeleine McCann suspect" and yet years on there is no evidence to suggest that he had anything to do with Madeleines' disappearance.  These warrants are for other crimes, not committed or being dealt with in the UK.  The chances that CB is not guilty of these crimes, that's if they ever even happened.  The gutter press is so transparent.

Now on - A madeleine McCann programme, CBS Reality, on Freeview channel 67. I don't know where to post this.

It's possibly a repeat, I'm not sure.