Prosecution Exhibit 1: 'madeleine' - What's in the book?

ROSA wrote:I'm considering buying the book , mostly for a laugh mind you from the short excerpts I've read so far it's got me faintly interested.

Try your local charity shops , Rosa , I've seen copies of the " account " for 50p ! 

How the mighty are fallen 

A summative overview..

ABOUT THE BOOK

‘The decision to publish this book has been very difficult, and taken with heavy hearts … My reason for writing it is simple: to give an account of the truth … Writing this memoir has entailed recording some very personal, intimate and emotional aspects of our lives. Sharing these with strangers does not come easily to me, but if I hadn’t done so I would not have felt the book gave as full a picture as it is possible for me to give.

As with every action we have taken over the last four years, it ultimately boils down to whether what we are doing could help us to find Madeleine. When the answer to that question is yes, or even possibly, our family can cope with anything …

What follows is an intensely personal account, and I make no apology for that …

Nothing is more important to us than finding our little girl.’

Kate McCann, May 2011

‘It is a sad fact that not a single police force anywhere is proactively looking for Madeleine (as is the case for many other missing children).

I am sure this book will re-energize the search for our daughter and the public will get behind the Find Madeleine campaign once again. It is simply not acceptable that the authorities have given up on Madeleine – especially when no comprehensive review of the case has been undertaken. Our daughter, and whoever took her, are out there. We need your help to find them.’

Gerry McCann, May 2011

madeleine by KATE MCCANN
....................

Operation Grange

Operation Grange is an investigative review by London's Metropolitan Police Service into the circumstances of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. The review was launched in May 2011 following a request to Scotland Yard from Home Secretary Theresa May, with the support of the Prime Minister David Cameron.

Two year later, in May 2013, Operation Grange commenced a re-investigation (previously undertaken by the Portuguese police and archived in July 2008), to follow new lines of inquiry. They said.

https://www.met.police.uk/notices/met/operation-grange/

Operation Grange

On 12 May 2011 the Met announced that, at the request of the Home Secretary, it had agreed to bring its particular expertise to the Madeleine McCann case.

The then Commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson, considered the request and took the decision that on balance it was the right thing to do. This was subject to funding being made available by the Home Office, as this case is beyond the Met’s jurisdiction.
Investigative review
The Met’s involvement, known as Operation Grange, is led by the Specialist Crime Command unit and involved, in the first instance, an ‘investigative review’.  This was a review of all of the investigations that had been previously conducted into the circumstances of Madeleine McCann’s disappearance.

Ongoing investigation

In July 2013 the status of the Met’s enquiries changed to that of an investigation, working with the Portuguese authorities to pursue specific lines of enquiry.

The Portuguese authorities retain the lead and the Met continues to work in support of them.

The Home Office continues to fund Operation Grange.

sandancer wrote:

ROSA wrote:I'm considering buying the book , mostly for a laugh mind you from the short excerpts I've read so far it's got me faintly interested.

Try your local charity shops , Rosa , I've seen copies of the " account " for 50p ! 

How the mighty are fallen 

Thanks for the tip sandancer

Operation Grange

On 12 May 2011 the Met announced that, at the request of the Home Secretary, it had agreed to bring its particular expertise to the Madeleine McCann case.

https://www.met.police.uk/notices/met/operation-grange/

According to amazon.co.uk, the original hardback edition of the book was published on 28th April 2011.

Before the reams of photographs and acknowledgements at the end of the book, Ms McCann (or her ghost writer) has this to say..
....................
A CALL TO ACTION

Please write to the Home Secretary and Prime Minister, urging the British and Portuguese authorities to commission a joint, independent and comprehensive review of Madeleine’s case.
....................

So, some time between 28th April 2011 and the Metropolitan Police announcement on 12th May 2011, the books call to action had a full blown effect?  A notional 14 days for people to place their order, receive delivery, read (right to the end) and then to write to the Home Office and Prime Minister urging a joint independent and comprehensive review of Madeleine McCann's case.

14 days, that's two weeks in pounds shillings and pence, for the Home Office and Prime Minister to receive the public call for action, debate and make a decision, pass that decision down the line to the Metropolitan Police and for them to launch Operation Grange.

That's some doing    and all because the lady said.

Gerald McCann never misses an opportunity to stress ... 'not a single police force anywhere is proactively looking for Madeleine' yet here, within a matter of two weeks, we go from nothing to something.

Call me cynical but something doesn't add up.  Something tells me the McCanns were fully aware of the government's intentions long before the book was published.

Madeleine McCann: text of parents' letter to David Cameron

Here is the full text of the letter from Kate and Gerry McCann to David Cameron, the Prime Minister:

By Andy Bloxham

7:00AM BST 13 May 2011

Dear Prime Minister,

As a devoted father and family man, you know the importance of children. Our beloved eldest child, Madeleine, was abducted from Praia da Luz, Portugal, four years ago. Since then, we have devoted all our energies to ensuring her safe return.

Today we are asking you - and the British and Portuguese governments - to help find Madeleine and bring her back to her loving family.

We live in hope that Madeleine will be found alive and returned to us. One call might be all that is needed to lead to Madeleine and her abductor.

To this end, we are seeking a joint INDEPENDENT, TRANSPARENT and COMPREHENSIVE review of ALL information held in relation to Madeleine's disappearance. Thus far, there has been NO formal review of the material held by the police authorities - which is routine practice in most major unsolved crimes.

It is not right that a young vulnerable British citizen has essentially been given up on. This remains an unsolved case of a missing child. Children are our most precious gift.

Please don't give up on Madeleine.

Kate & Gerry McCann

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/madeleinemccann/8511093/Madeleine-McCann-text-of-parents-letter-to-David-Cameron.html

[This ^^^ was reported to be an open letter, it is undated]

I have to wonder how many parents of missing children received the same letter none I guess
"We will, of course stay in close touch with you through out "

Messrs McCann have an uncanny knack of glossing over - or should I say completely ignoring, matters of importance.

The long term strategy was to control the investigation.  The PJ rendered said strategy inoperable, at least on Portuguese soil, so Messrs McCann were left with no choice but to create their very own self styled investigation.  Which curiously always led in directions opposite to that of the PJ.

All the while pointing fingers - blaming - the Portuguese with second-hand accusations of ineptitude.

madeleine who?

To continue..

Colin Sutton

On Sunday 9th May 2010 the News of the World published a story which suggested that the Met was going to reinvestigate Madeleine’s disappearance and that I would be asked to lead it. This was news to me on both counts. Nobody from the Met had, or indeed ever did, make such a request of me.

The only official news I heard about the reinvestigation was a week or two later when I heard that the idea of such a reinvestigation had been shelved for the time being in the wake of the change of Government. You will recall the note by former Chief Secretary to the Treasury Liam Byrne, apologising to his successor that there was no money left. The rumour in the Met was that, unless and until the Government were prepared to fund it, we would not undertake such an expensive operation which, as desirable as it might have been, was not really something on which Londoners should see their Council Tax spent.

However, before this, just a few days after the NotW story I did receive a call from a senior officer in the Met whom I knew quite well. This officer told me I would do better to avoid the McCann investigation if it did happen, because "You wouldn't be happy leading an investigation where you were told what you could look at and what you could not".

https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/t16061-colin-sutton-revisited#406678

Headlines, hate mail and Kate McCann.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN: Book review by Julie Myerson - 2nd June 2011



A very public agony

One May afternoon in 2007 in Praia da Luz, Portugal, barely 48 hours before their daughter Madeleine disappeared, Kate and Gerry McCann took their three young children down to the beach. It began to rain, and the children were grumpy, but the promise of an ice cream worked its magic.
Kate and the kids sat on a bench as Gerry went over to the shop, about 25 feet away. When he called to Kate to come and give him a hand with the five ice creams, she was "momentarily torn. Would the children be OK on the bench while I nipped over? I hurried across, watching them all the time."

Life as a parent, as anyone with children knows, is crammed with such split-second judgements and (sometimes) misjudgements, so when the McCanns' story hit the press just a couple of days after that afternoon ice cream, parents all over the world caught their breath, recognising the situation. Would we have chosen to eat dinner while our children slept, unguarded, a matter of yards away? Some of us would, some of us wouldn't, but I doubt there is a parent on this earth who hasn't negotiated with their child's safety in similar ways at one time or another.

Kate McCann says her main motive in writing Madeleine was to "give an account of the truth". Given how much false information has been circulated about the family, this impulse to exert a little control excites my full sympathy. One night, exhausted and sad, she switched
on the TV for light relief, only to see a picture of her daughter with the headline "She's dead" as the following day's newspapers were previewed. The McCanns often felt that they were kept in the dark by the police, so, for all she knew, a body could have been found - but time and again, she and Gerry were forced to pick their battles, to shrug off the lorryloads of critical comment, because anything that impeded the search for their daughter had to be ignored.

Much of the comment certainly has been negative. Even now, I am not sure I understand how the McCanns came to be considered as arguidos (named suspects). Although I imagine that the Portuguese police would offer a different version of some of the events described here, no UK official believed that the McCanns were in any way responsible for their daughter's disappearance. That didn't stop the headlines and the hate mail, however, so it seems both understandable that Kate should want to take this opportunity to set the record straight and fair that she should do so.

Yet the book clearly has another reason for existing: Kate wrote it because she knew that there was a market for it. The search for Mad­eleine can continue only if there is money, and all royalties go to the fund set up in her name. With no evidence that their daughter is dead, the McCanns are determined to go on looking. Meanwhile, it's a particularly gruesome limbo they are condemned to inhabit. Kate depicts it here with chilling precision.

Before tragedy struck, this was an ordinary family. Kate tells of her happy Catholic childhood in Liverpool, where her grandad had been "chief clerk for a firm importing nuts and dried fruits". She recalls midnight feasts of pickled onion crisps and dancing to Seventies disco hits. Then came Gerry, youngest in a "boisterous" family of five, growing up in a one-bedroom tenement in Govan. Both he and Kate did well at school and went on to study medicine, she at Dundee and he at Glasgow - which is where, as junior doctors, they met.

These were clearly hard-working and driven young people. Even so, their early married years were tough. There was the hard graft of moving between jobs as he trained in cardiology. She specialised as an anaesthetist, but, wanting more sociable hours, eventually opted to be a GP. Then there was the trying - and failing - to conceive a child. I was startled to read that all three McCann children were IVF babies. Mad­eleine, their first, arrived after many attempts. "Suddenly," Kate writes, "your world revolves around this little bundle, and you don't mind in the slightest."

Madeleine is crammed with clichés of this kind, but I confess that, far from bothering me, they drew me in. Kate McCann is not a writer and makes no claims to be one - the power of her book lies in its straightforward, chatty ordinariness. It is hard, too, not to admire its complete lack of self-pity, bolstered by the McCanns' uncomplicated though sorely tested religious faith. The agony lies in the small, casual detail.

Take how, when friends first suggested a spring holiday in the Algarve, Kate wasn't keen. It seemed like a lot of effort, with three children who were so small - all that equipment to lug around. But, not wanting to spoil things, she came round to the idea. "It was the first in a series of apparently minor decisions I'd give anything to change now."

Another factor was how and where they put their children down to sleep at the resort. The McCanns' apartment was on a corner with easy access from the street. It is now considered likely that someone was keeping an eye on their comings and goings. And it wasn't until a whole year later, when finally they were given access to the police files, that Kate discovered that anyone checking the book at reception would have seen a note stating that the McCann party wished to eat in the tapas restaurant every night because they were leaving young children alone in the apartments and needed to be able to check on them easily.

The story of how Madeleine went missing need not be repeated here, but the book gives us what the press never could: a sense of the misery of that first night and those that followed. The slow breaking of dawn, followed by the sickening job of telling the news to relatives in the UK. Kate's inability to stop banging and bruising her fists on the metal railings of the veranda, "trying to expel the intolerable pain inside me". Gerry breaking down and "roaring like a bull".

The McCanns were soon, and wisely, given access to a trauma specialist, who immediately reassured the couple that they seemed like model parents. "I cannot overstate how much such kind reassurance meant to us at that moment," Kate writes. He explained to them the importance of taking control little by little, "starting with tiny actions as simple as making ourselves a cup of tea".

In fact, kindness and forgiveness - being gentle with yourself in the face of unrelenting shock - is the core, though perhaps unwitting, theme of Kate McCann's book. Her husband was able to shut off his pain for hours at a time in order to deal with the world - something that she admits she occasionally resented. With touching self-awareness, she describes how she could not do the same. She was unable to settle to anything that did not relate directly to finding Madeleine: "I could not even sit down unless it was for a purpose, to eat or to work at the computer."

She conjures a heartbreaking image of the bereft mother, condemned to pace up and down eternally, sniffing for her young. It was two years before she could listen to music or watch television, or allow herself to take pleasure in anything at all without feeling that she was letting her daughter down.

Hugging friends whom she hadn't seen since before Madeleine disappeared, she would find she could "hardly bear to let go", because she knew that the moment she stepped back and saw their faces, she would be reminded of "days spent together with Madeleine". She also says candidly that her sex life with Gerry suffered and that she finally took "a cognitive approach" to getting it back on track.

Years later, even beginning to feel more normal brings its own problems. She worries about what people will think if they see her speaking crossly to her other children in public. Or that, if "people saw me smile or laugh, they'd think it inappropriate". She has a fear that if anyone spots her shopping in Marks & Spencer, they will frown on her "for not going somewhere cheaper like Aldi and putting the pennies saved into Madeleine's fund".

If Kate McCann doesn't feel she deserves to be forgiven, it is striking nevertheless that this is a boldly empathetic and forgiving book. She writes without bitterness about the people whose correspondence goes straight into the "nutty box".

As doctors, she and Gerry have some professional experience of dealing with mental illness, and are not surprised that their tragedy attracts such attention - "within days of Madeleine's disappearance, several people with major psychiatric problems made their way over to Praia da Luz". And although the trauma specialist had warned them that they would lose some good friends (and they did), she is grateful for the "quiet majority". Astonishingly, perhaps, she still believes that "most human beings are inherently good".

Even though I am sure there is a readership for Madeleine, many others will feel free to discuss and comment on the book without having read it. I would urge them to be as kind and non-judgemental as Kate McCann has been. Although she and Gerry come across as remarkably strong - clearly their love for their two remaining children, together with the search for Madeleine, has kept them going - I don't think anyone should underestimate how vulnerable they are.

To endure tragedy of this sort, followed by relentless press attention, leaves you raw, your skin feeling stripped right off. One night almost a year after they lost Madeleine, the couple woke in the night in Leicester to find the whole room shaking. "With the occasional death threat turning up in our morning mail, it is perhaps not surprising that our first instinct was to think we were being attacked."

Thankfully the "attack" turned out to be an earth tremor. You hope for the McCanns' sake that, whether or not they ever discover what happened to their daughter, the agonising rawness - like the tremor - will eventually subside to nothing.

[Acknowledgement pamalam, gerrymccannsblogs]

And it wasn't until a whole year later, when finally they were given access to the police files, that Kate discovered that anyone checking the book at reception would have seen a note stating that the McCann party wished to eat in the tapas restaurant every night because they were leaving young children alone in the apartments and needed to be able to check on them easily.

Where is the note referred to above to be found in the PJ files?

Which book in reception?

What did the note say?

Who had access to the book?

Julie Myerson wrote:Madeleine is crammed with clichés of this kind, but I confess that, far from bothering me, they drew me in. Kate McCann is not a writer and makes no claims to be one - the power of her book lies in its straightforward, chatty ordinariness. It is hard, too, not to admire its complete lack of self-pity, bolstered by the McCanns' uncomplicated though sorely tested religious faith.

The agony lies in the small, casual detail.

Amen to that !!!

Many a true word spoken with misguided loyalty - or borne out of ignorance.

Kate McCann's memoire is like a ping-pong ball lost in the eye of the storm.  Maybe in the initial stages, trying to manage two consecutive investigations - UK and Portugal, proved too much to handle for two middle-englanders with little or no knowledge or experience of crime management.

Again and again she stresses how they were left in the dark as regards the investigation and yet, the word meeting is used no less than 76 times in her aurobiographical novel 'madeleine'.  Granted not all directly relative to the/any investigation but nonetheless shows how busy the McCanns were with their investigative prowess and keeping their profile upfront.

All the same, we were reassured to see some UK police that day in the shape of three family liaison officers (FLOs) from the Leicestershire force, which had also officially logged Madeleine as missing ....

 After the trouble we’d had getting anyone in the PJ to talk to us, that was a relief, although the FLOs would soon find themselves almost as frustrated as we were in this regard ....

The police and judiciary in the country where a crime has been committed have primacy in any investigation ....

The Portuguese police were apparently reluctant early on to accept any help beyond this from their counterparts in the UK ....

However, in addition to the Leicestershire FLOs, they did permit forensic psychologists from CEOP, the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, and an analyst from the National Policing Improvements Agency to come to Praia da Luz the following week ....

Even that may have been unprecedented: we understood this was the first time the Portuguese authorities had ever allowed any foreign force into the country to assist in an investigation ....

In such a situation, an element of pride is bound to come into play, and the relationship always seemed quite tricky. It never amounted to an effective pooling of information, ideas or intelligence ....

It appeared that the British officers were told very little about what was going on and that their role was essentially confined to making suggestions or volunteering resources ....

The local police, not used to disclosing the details of an investigation, were clearly wary of answering all the questions they were being asked ....

According to what we would hear a few weeks down the line, the Leicestershire officers were told in no uncertain terms that if the PJ declined any ideas they proposed or refused offers of additional expertise they must accept this. If they didn’t, they would be excluded from the investigation completely ....

Still, we were very grateful for their involvement, which would substantially improve communications ....

In the coming weeks we would meet DCS Bob Small, who we found straight-talking and honest. A lot of hard work went on at home as well, where DS Stuart Prior, the senior investigating officer, was kind enough to show our relatives round the incident room – and Gerry, too, later on ....

So on and so forth ....

Still it remains a mystery as to how and why UK police took such an active interest in a case being investigated by Portuguese police.  Firstly Leicestershire Constabulary, closely followed by Jim Gumboil (ex of the CEOP) and later Britain's finest, in the shape of no other than the Metropolitan Police - wow!


Such prestige.

Showing relatives round the incident room ! 

Does that happen in any other investigation , or is it just a McCann thing ? 

Jim Gumboil , love it          

Sure thing someone will correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think showing family and friends around a police 'incident room' is common practice.

What is it in reality - a room? 

This is a door ... this is a desk ... this is a chair ... this is a document cabinet ... this is a computer screen ... this is a shredder ... this is a waste paper bin ... this is a kettle ... this is a dog, blimey where did that come from ... err have I missed anything?

As I ran back into the children’s room the closed curtains flew up in a gust of wind.

My heart lurched as I saw now that, behind them, the window was wide open and the shutters on the outside raised all the way up.

Nausea, terror, disbelief, fear. Icy fear. Dear God, no! Please, no!

madeleine by KATE MCCANN
.....................

What an eccentric performance.  Like a scene from the BBC's black (can I say that word?) comedy 'Inside No.9'.

Ms McCann omits to mention that in the very early hours of the PJ investigation, it was swiftly confirmed there was no evidence of raised shutters, open windows, a break-in, a break-out, nor anything else that might assist Ms McCann's somewhat creative mind.


Nothing here ... move along

BlueBag wrote:

And it wasn't until a whole year later, when finally they were given access to the police files, that Kate discovered that anyone checking the book at reception would have seen a note stating that the McCann party wished to eat in the tapas restaurant every night because they were leaving young children alone in the apartments and needed to be able to check on them easily.

Where is the note referred to above to be found in the PJ files?

Which book in reception?

What did the note say?

Who had access to the book?

There's the rub. After stating it was Rachael who managed to get a table booked (without saying when):

"It wasn’t until a year later, when I was combing through the Portuguese police files, that I discovered that the note requesting our block booking was written in a staff message book, which sat on a desk at the pool reception for most of the day. This book was by definition accessible to all staff and, albeit unintentionally, probably to guests and visitors, too. To my horror, I saw that, no doubt in all innocence and simply to explain why she was bending the rules a bit, the receptionist had added the reason for our request: we wanted to eat close to our apartments as we were leaving our young children alone there and checking on them intermittently."
  madeleine by KATE McCANN

It's a clever - not to say sly - construction of words to suggest a passing predator might have set his course by a note in a book. Here's how the paragraph got spun by a UK tabloid ('Kate McCann fears restaurant reservation booking tipped off Madeleine McCann's abductor'):

"Madeleine McCann may have been snatched after perverts spotted in a tapas reservation book she had been left alone at her holiday flat, mum Kate fears ..."
  https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/kate-mccann-fears-restaurant-reservation-127447

The saintly Kate absolves the receptionist but the article classes the book "left open and in full view of other diners" as a blunder and security lapse. Their aim is to sell newspapers. Kate McCann's is to give an account of the truth for Madeleine, Sean and Amelie, "so that, when they are ready, the facts will be there for them to read". And research.

Kate doesn't particularize her discovery of the block booking in the files but it is central to the witness statement of Luisa Coutinho, receptionist at the Ocean Club. Interviewed days after the disappearance, she remembered that a tall thin man made the booking for the group. During her interview she provided a book with the reservations for the Tapas restaurant, and while it is not said this was entered into the evidence there is no book with reservations discoverable in the PJ files. There are a number of reservation sheets, none with any note explaining the reason for the Tapas group's request.

  http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/TAPAS_BOOKING.htm

So to what does Kate refer?

Reading the paragraph again, it can be interpreted that "the receptionist had added the reason for our request" means not a note to a book but information to her statement. As indeed she did:

The man justified his request by saying that the group had many small children whom they would leave alone when they went to dine. She said that at intervals some two parents would go to the apartments to see if everything was OK.
  http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/LUISA_COUTINHO.htm

The receptionist is relating what she had been told about the reservation not speaking from knowledge since she worked only until 19:00. There is nothing to say this 'note' had been entered into any book. There is nothing to say how the book with the reservations for the Tapas restaurant was handled or kept. Kate's horror therefore is a matter between her conscience and herself. It calls to the impressionable reader (or newspaper hack) that here is drama where in fact there is no evidence to say that, even if there was a staff message book, anyone other than staff saw it - that word 'probably' - on a desk or anywhere.

To those who believe the tapas reservation was by way of establishing a record of routine, the idea of a staff message book with the inclusion of 'a note' highlighting that a child was available to be abducted goes with an excursion to the beach as parts of a plan.

Not only What is in the book but Why.

As we were walking up from the beach at about 5pm, I had a call from Cherie Blair, in her final days as wife of the prime minister

She was kind and helpful

This was only five days after the abduction

madeleine by KATE MCCANN
...................

If walking on the beach, the call must have been received on a mobile phone.

What was Cherie Blair doing with the mobile phone number of either Kate or Gerry McCann, only five days after Madeleine McCann was reported missing?

Blair, Brown, Cameron, May - I wonder if the McCanns have had direct contact with Boris Johnson somewhere along the way, or are those heady days of fame and fortune now lost in the myths of time.

Alex Woolfall told us that the News of the World, spearheading a group of other benefactors – including Bill Kenwright, the theatre impresario and chairman of Everton FC, businessmen Sir Richard Branson and Sir Philip Green and Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling [CH, OBE, HonFRSE, FRCPE, FRSL - don't ask cos I don't know]  was prepared to put up a reward ‘package’ totalling £1.5 million.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

They are acronyms you get for copying out someone else's ancient stories about a three headed dog, (Cerberus) but then not understanding that the whole point was that one head was always awake, and allowing all three to go to sleep . . 
for copying someone else's stories about flying broomsticks
for copying someone else's stories about walking through solid objects ( the back of a wardrobe, or a wall in a railway station, or into a walled garden) to reach a secret location
for copying someone else's stories about unicorns and werewolves, and metalworking goblins (Nibelungen)
for copying someone else's stories about mermaids and mermen
for copying someone else's stories about giants spiders (Shelob)
for copying someone else's stories about the deadly powers of the Basilisk
for copying someone else's stories about Trolls, dragons, giants, and all the rest

and rolling it all up (Rowling it all up ! ) into a sort of mash, and then marketing it very cleverly as
something to get children to READ – only then to sell the film and video Game rights for multi millions.

Brilliant.
Never underestimate the gullibility of the General Public

appalling intellectual property theft, will never read buy or watch any of them ever.

Thursday 3rd May 2007

I had finished my run by five-thirty at the Tapas area, where I found Madeleine and the twins already having their tea with Gerry.

The others had decided to feed their kids at the beachside restaurant, the Paraíso. Madeleine was sitting on the Tapas terrace, eating.

She looked so pale and worn out, I went straight up to her and asked if she was all right. Had she been OK at the club when Ella left to go to the beach? Yes, she said, but now she was really tired and wanted me to pick her up, which I did. Ten minutes later, the five of us went back to our apartment.

I was carrying Madeleine. Because she was so exhausted we skipped playtime that evening.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

[Excerpt for research only]

Talking of blame..

Day eighty came and went, and still no Madeleine.

Eighty days was significant for me because that was how long the Belgian schoolgirl Sabine Dardenne had been kept captive by the evil rapist and murderer Marc Dutroux before being found and freed. I clung on to ‘happy’ endings like these but, needless to say, as the deadlines in my head passed I’d be knocked for six again. That same day, 22 July, the Sunday Express ran the headline: ‘MADDY’S PARENTS TO FACE INQUIRY’. For ‘neglect’, according to the newspaper.

By now we were no strangers to this line of attack, but it was still incredibly hurtful as it blamed us, indirectly, for Madeleine’s abduction. We were not hurt so much by what people might or might not think of us but by the painful reminder that, however unwittingly, we’d given this predator an opportunity. We had not been there for Madeleine. And, as I’ve said before and will say again, our guilt over that is a heavy cross we will bear for the rest of our lives. As for the abductor, he must have been smiling smugly to himself and thinking, Keep blaming the parents. Just leave me out of it, hidden and anonymous, to carry on doing what I do – stealing children.

Had everyone forgotten about this man? Whoever he was, he was still out there.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

[For research/study only]

Verdi wrote:Talking of blame..

Day eighty came and went, and still no Madeleine.

Eighty days was significant for me because that was how long the Belgian schoolgirl Sabine Dardenne had been kept captive by the evil rapist and murderer Marc Dutroux before being found and freed. I clung on to ‘happy’ endings like these but, needless to say, as the deadlines in my head passed I’d be knocked for six again. That same day, 22 July, the Sunday Express ran the headline: ‘MADDY’S PARENTS TO FACE INQUIRY’. For ‘neglect’, according to the newspaper.

By now we were no strangers to this line of attack, but it was still incredibly hurtful as it blamed us, indirectly, for Madeleine’s abduction. We were not hurt so much by what people might or might not think of us but by the painful reminder that, however unwittingly, we’d given this predator an opportunity. We had not been there for Madeleine. And, as I’ve said before and will say again, our guilt over that is a heavy cross we will bear for the rest of our lives. As for the abductor, he must have been smiling smugly to himself and thinking, Keep blaming the parents. Just leave me out of it, hidden and anonymous, to carry on doing what I do – stealing children.

Had everyone forgotten about this man? Whoever he was, he was still out there.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

[For research/study only]

Hardly a line of attack when you consider it was their own narrative that they were leaving the children alone at nights and one went missing lol that then is neglect .For anyone else it's neglect followed by charges but no not for this couple, they are above the law it seems. Hopefully that will change.

"As for the abductor, he must have been smiling smugly to himself and thinking, Keep blaming the parents. Just leave me out of it, hidden and anonymous, to carry on doing what I do – stealing children.
Had everyone forgotten about this man? Whoever he was, he was still out there."


And in the past 12 years he has stolen how many children – approximately ?
And in the 10 years before that he stole how many children – again approximately ?

If he believes that that is "doing what I do" I can only observe he is not very good at it.

In the last couple of days, a long standing forum member asked a very simple question, I quote..

Why would you mention something that did not exist?

As always, a simple question demands a simple answer - to deceive.

Anyone who has followed this case over a period of time will be aware of the number of times Gerry and Kate McCann have aimed to deceive, either through their own mouths or by an elected mouthpiece, family, friends and quite frequently Clarence Mitchell.

Kate McCann's autobiographical novel madeleine, is littered with such examples of deception and poetic licence - enough to make even Jane Austen blush from the grave. Some examples, beginning with the most pertinent by way of the books introduction..

~ My reason for writing it is simple: to give an account of the truth

~ It has always been my intention to set down a complete record of what happened to our family, for our children, Madeleine, Sean and Amelie, so that, when they are ready, the facts will be there for them to read.

Enter Hobs !

To continue..

~ I was crying out that I could see Madeleine lying, cold and mottled, on a big grey stone slab.

~ Gerry, meanwhile, was running from pillar to post, urging me to remain in the apartment with the twins so that I’d be on hand if Madeleine was found and brought back there.

~ I was just so overwhelmed by fear, helplessness and frustration, I was hitting out at things, banging my fists on the metal railing of the veranda, trying to expel the intolerable pain inside me.

~ That first weekend I’d felt a burning desire to run up the Rocha Negra, and Gerry and I would in fact do so many times over the next few months.

~ The thought of Madeleine’s fear and pain tears me apart. The thought of paedophiles makes me want to rip my skin off.

~ Haltingly, I told him about the awful pictures that scrolled through my head of her body, her perfect little genitals torn apart.

~ As we ran along the promenade, a small dog jumped out from under a bench and attacked my right calf. It was pretty sore and I was a bit shaken, but I carried on as coolly as I could manage.

~ The only other unexplained detail I remember from that morning was a large, brown stain I noticed on Madeleine’s pink Eeyore pyjama top.
...................

That's a mere drop in the ocean, only a sprinkling by way of example.

We may not know the true reason but everything is said and done for a reason.

I'd lay a bet they're laughing their socks off at us. To that I say .... sometimes the dog turns back and bites you on the bum!

Beware of stray dogs.

I don't know about 'leakage'. Smacks to me of ..

Any evidence they may or may not have found which gave them cause for suspicion of Gerry and Kate can be wholly and easily explained should it come to that.
Clarence Mitchell