A Kate's “Oops… I Think I’ve Just Confessed” Moment

Ringo wrote:

Stella wrote:

Ringo wrote:
without leaving a single piece of concrete evidence to put you in the frame?

We may have that concrete proof very soon Ringo, when the Met take a much closer look at the creche records.

If they find that someone was entering another childs name and they failed to mention it when being questioned. It will be time. It may also open up pandora's box as to what really happened that week.

Yes, and I'm willing to bet the contents of my house that they won't Stella. It's hardly credible that the McCanns would have been busting a gut to get the evidence reviewed if they knew that something as glaringly obvious as this was likely to come to light. Why were the PJ not able to uncover this already btw? What stopped them? They had months at it!

lj wrote:Madeleine was not blonde.

Ringo wrote:
If you know that your subject is a blonde haired child and you are presented with a bunch of dark hair strands then I think it is safe to assume they did not come from that child don't you?

Stella wrote:Ask any hairdresser and they will tell you that a persons hair colour changes from one part of the head to another part.

To be precise, the hair seen on the top of your head will be a different colour to the hair that starts to grow halfway down the back of your head. To get a womans correct hair colour, they will lift your hair up just behind the ear and look at the base by the roots, not the ends. This is a persons true colour.

Almost all children who were born blonde, darken as they age. You can see from the tennis balls photo that Madeleine's hair is now very dark at the roots. The sun fades the dead ends much quicker than the roots. Some people also have multi coloured hair, just as I do. The majority of it is brown, but within those hairs I also have jet black ones from my mothers side and dark blonde ones from my fathers side.

The person who concluded in the FSS that it was not worth testing all the hairs, should loose their job.

Stella wrote:
Goncalo Amaral is the most senior detective you have, with over 30 years worth of experience in witnessing crime scenes. Fluid that has dried up, obviously looks a certain way to someone who has seen it many times before.

If you are not happy with his conclusions, then I suggest you take it up with him direct.

Stella wrote:

Ringo wrote:

Stella wrote:

Ringo wrote:
without leaving a single piece of concrete evidence to put you in the frame?

We may have that concrete proof very soon Ringo, when the Met take a much closer look at the creche records.

If they find that someone was entering another childs name and they failed to mention it when being questioned. It will be time. It may also open up pandora's box as to what really happened that week.

Yes, and I'm willing to bet the contents of my house that they won't Stella. It's hardly credible that the McCanns would have been busting a gut to get the evidence reviewed if they knew that something as glaringly obvious as this was likely to come to light. Why were the PJ not able to uncover this already btw? What stopped them? They had months at it!

Don't underestimate the power of the term 'if new evidence comes to light'.

Too many people have overlooked the creche records. Had their importance been spotted in the beginning, they would never have been released on the DVD. Everyone was looking for a missing girl, or looking at the McCann's and their friends. No one and I mean NO ONE up until a couple of months ago, focused on the handwriting in the creche sheets. Why would they? No other child went missing. The one that did had allegedly been signed out of creche at 5.30. The PJ had just 4 months to deal with all the bogus sightings and numerous statements from all of the OC staff and locals, that must have had all of them tied up for months. Just look at Rebelo. Whilst he was in charge a woman contacts the station to say that she saw the McCann's leave their car boot open all night, for several nights and he never bothered to get a statement from her. But what ties this altogether is the link between the specific movements in the creche, with specific pings on certain peoples phones. What stopped them from getting to the truth? I would have thought that was obvious, too much Political intervention. It got good people fired. Staff relocated to other countries and many of the key witnesses visited by the McCann's financial backer.

Stella wrote:Ask any hairdresser and they will tell you that a persons hair colour changes from one part of the head to another part.

To be precise, the hair seen on the top of your head will be a different colour to the hair that starts to grow halfway down the back of your head. To get a womans correct hair colour, they will lift your hair up just behind the ear and look at the base by the roots, not the ends. This is a persons true colour.

Almost all children who were born blonde, darken as they age. You can see from the tennis balls photo that Madeleine's hair is now very dark at the roots. The sun fades the dead ends much quicker than the roots. Some people also have multi coloured hair, just as I do. The majority of it is brown, but within those hairs I also have jet black ones from my mothers side and dark blonde ones from my fathers side.

The person who concluded in the FSS that it was not worth testing all the hairs, should loose their job.

Stella wrote:

Ringo wrote:
If you know that your subject is a blonde haired child and you are presented with a bunch of dark hair strands then I think it is safe to assume they did not come from that child don't you?

It is both dangerous and very stupid to assume anything based on someones opinion or a photograph.

This is why we cannot take the FSS seriously, or anyone else who thinks they did a good job.

They are employees of the Governement. If the PM says jump, they have to say, how high.

Stella wrote:Ask any hairdresser and they will tell you that a persons hair colour changes from one part of the head to another part.

To be precise, the hair seen on the top of your head will be a different colour to the hair that starts to grow halfway down the back of your head. To get a womans correct hair colour, they will lift your hair up just behind the ear and look at the base by the roots, not the ends. This is a persons true colour.

Almost all children who were born blonde, darken as they age. You can see from the tennis balls photo that Madeleine's hair is now very dark at the roots. The sun fades the dead ends much quicker than the roots. Some people also have multi coloured hair, just as I do. The majority of it is brown, but within those hairs I also have jet black ones from my mothers side and dark blonde ones from my fathers side.

The person who concluded in the FSS that it was not worth testing all the hairs, should loose their job.

Ringo wrote:

Argue away then!

Ringo wrote:Actually I said that they had succeeded in "pulling the wool over most people's eyes" - most people would include the huge number of high profile supporters they have for a start - everyone from John Sentamu to JK Rowling, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of people who have bought Kate's book, the similar number who have contributed to the fund over the years, etc. If there was widespread disbelief of the McCanns' story they would not be given airtime and media space time and again to tell their story in a sympathetic light, not to mention being invited appear at government select committees, at police conventions, to work with CEOP and raise the profile of AMBER alerts etc.

Ringo wrote:This is only a measure of the determination of the small number of people who are on a campaign to get the McCanns arrested for something they didn't do. And it is a small number - compare the number of signatures for Tony Bennett's various petitions with that of the McCanns for a vast discrepancy in numbers in favour of the McCanns. Interestingly, those same people have not been successful in shifting the rating of Kate's book on amazon, where the vast majority of reviews are 4 or 5 star! Kate herself confirms in her book that the vast majority of people that she meets and hears from on a daily basis are very supportive. In my circle of personal friends and family I don't know of one single person who believes the McCanns to be involved with something criminal.

Ringo wrote:No, it's not my word - it is the word of the blogger that we are discussing and which prompted my original comment that you responded to.

Ringo wrote:Like how?

At about 21.05 the witness came to the Club, entered the room using his respective key, the door being locked, went to his children's bedroom and checked that the twins were fine, as was Madeleine. He then went to the WC, where he remained for a few moments.

At 10pm, his wife Kate went to check on the children. She went into the apartment through the door using her key and saw right away that the children’s bedroom door was completely open, the window was also open, the shutters raised and the curtains drawn open. The side door that opens into the living room, which as said earlier, was never locked, was closed.

At around 10pm, the interviewee went to check on the children. She went into the apartment by the side door, which was closed but not locked, as she said before.

Despite what he said in his previous statements, he states now and with certainty, that he left with KATE by the rear door which he consequently closed but did not lock given that that is only possible from the inside. Referring to the front door, while he is certain that it was closed it is unlikely that it was locked as [because] they had left by the rear door.

He walked the normal route up to the back door, which being open he only had to slide, and while he was entering the living room, he noticed that the children's bedroom door was not ajar as he had left it but half-way open, which he thought was strange, having then thought that possibly MADELEINE had got up to go to sleep in his bedroom, so as to avoid the noise produced by her siblings. Therefore, he entered the children's bedroom and established visual contact with each of them, checking and he is certain of this, that the three were deeply asleep. He left the children's bedroom returning to place the door how he had already previously described, then went to the bathroom. Everything else was normal, the shutters, curtains and windows closed, very dark, there only being the light that came from the living room.

So, I actually came in and Madeleine was just at the top of the bed here, where I'd left her lying and the covers were folded down

States that his daughter slept without the covers, as was normal, due to the heat, with the bed sheets folded towards the foot of the bed.

Gerry McCann reacted angrily yesterday to claims he received a string of mystery texts the day before his daughter vanished.
Police applied to Portugal's supreme court to seize his phone records after learning of the alleged messages.
They claim Gerry was sent 10 texts from an unknown number 24 hours before Madeleine disappeared.
And detectives say four messages arrived from the same mystery number the day after she went missing, according to court documents.
But Gerry and wife Kate have dismissed the claims as "utter rubbish".
A source close to them said: "They have had their phone records available for inspection for months. But the police never asked for them. And now they have formally asked, they have been refused.
"Any suggestion of Gerry receiving 10 texts the day before Madeleine disappeared are utter rubbish.
"He hardly used his phone during the holiday and most of the friends with them didn't even have mobiles. "The only time his phone rang was when work called and he explained he was on holiday. There are no mystery texts. Gerry has nothing to hide. It's yet more nonsense coming from Portugal."

Ringo wrote:You forgot the main thing they have been campaigning for and that is a thorough review of all the evidence and which is now happening - by Scotland yard. And - do you have any evidence that the McCanns are using the fund to pay off their mortgage apart from the one or two payments back in the Summer of 2007?

Ringo wrote:Where is your evidence of the rewards that the McCanns are reaping?

Ringo wrote:I was referring to John Sentamu actually who continues to support them. I believe JK Rowling offered advice to Kate when she was writing her book. Do you have any evidence that celebrities that once supported them are now shunning them, having decided that they are guilty after all?

Ringo wrote:Err...because we were talking about whether or not the McCanns were master criminals who had successfully managed to pull the wool over most people's eyes!

Ringo wrote:I have read the files, as have many other people, not to mention the police themselves, who have all drawn the same inescapable conclusion - no evidence whatsoever of any wrong-doing by Kate and Gerry!

Ringo wrote:Why on earth would they? Do you expect celebrities that have supported the McCanns to suddenly start making public pronoincements on Jane Tanner's statement?! Please don't be ridiculous!

Ringo wrote:No evidence whatsoever - that was the final summing up of the Portuguese authorities - that's pretty damned clever if you ask me!

Kate McCann and Gerald McCann are involved in the concealment of the cadaver of their daughter, Madeleine McCann

The obvious and well-known advantages of immediate appreciation of evidence, or in other words, the fulfilment of the principle of contiguity of evidence in order to form a conviction, as firm as possible, about what was seen by Jane Tanner and the other interposers, and, eventually, to dismiss once and for all any doubts that may subsist concerning the innocence of the missing [child's] parents.

Nevertheless, despite national authorities assuming all measures to render their trip to Portugal viable, for unknown motives, after the many doubts that they raised about the necessity and opportunity of their trip were clarified several times, they chose not to attend, which rendered the diligence inviable.

We believe that the main damage was caused to the McCann arguidos, who lost the possibility to prove what they have protested since they were constituted arguidos: their innocence towards the fateful event; the investigation was also disturbed, because said facts remain unclarified.

Ringo wrote:Can you supply the quote where Kate and Gerry called the PJ "sardine munchers"? Although this point is completely irrelelvant to what we were discussing.

Ringo wrote:The simple fact is, which I have to keep repeating is that the McCanns are free people, free to do as they want, and there was no evidence that they have committed any crime. Now, it is 4 years since you believe they did the dastardly deed and we are as far away as it is possible to get from the McCanns ever being arrested and charged with the disappearance of their child. If they are indeed guilty then you would have to concede that they are a pretty crafty, clever pair - or conversely that the police and judiciary system are the dimwits.

Me wrote:So that's two, who are these “huge numbers” of celebs who have come out to support them recently? The "hundreds of thousands" of people who have bought Kate’s book are likely to be the people who do believe them and as the natural supporters of the McCann’s they're hardly going to give the book zero stars are they?

Hundreds of thousands is hardly "most people" though is it.

Hundreds of thousands of people also bought Amaral's book in Portugal didn't they? I'd wager if his book was ever released over here its sales would be equal to if not greater than Kate’s.

Particularly if he could call on the same marketing and publicity machine the McCann's have created.

But many doubters of the McCann's in the public at large probably aren’t even aware of Tony Bennett and his campaigns because he doesn't have the same media team, profile and "fund" supporting him that the McCann's have, does he? I'd also wager that if he did his petitions would garner as many signatures if not more than the McCann’s.

It's a word you used in reply to my post, that i hadn't used or necessarily agreed with.

Where do you want to start. Let's look at a couple to begin with:

Gerry McCann witness statement 04-05-07:

At about 21.05 the witness came to the Club, entered the room using his respective key, the door being locked, went to his children's bedroom and checked that the twins were fine, as was Madeleine. He then went to the WC, where he remained for a few moments.

At 10pm, his wife Kate went to check on the children. She went into the apartment through the door using her key and saw right away that the children’s bedroom door was completely open, the window was also open, the shutters raised and the curtains drawn open. The side door that opens into the living room, which as said earlier, was never locked, was closed.

Kate McCann witness statement 04-05-07:

At around 10pm, the interviewee went to check on the children. She went into the apartment by the side door, which was closed but not locked, as she said before.

In this statement some six days later the story given in the witness statement of the 4th May 2007 has changed and Gerry now says:

Despite what he said in his previous statements, he states now and with certainty, that he left with KATE by the rear door which he consequently closed but did not lock given that that is only possible from the inside. Referring to the front door, while he is certain that it was closed it is unlikely that it was locked as [because] they had left by the rear door.

Then in relation to entering the apartment for his check at 21.15 he claims he entered via the patio door directly contradicting his statement of the 4th May 2007:

He walked the normal route up to the back door, which being open he only had to slide, and while he was entering the living room, he noticed that the children's bedroom door was not ajar as he had left it but half-way open, which he thought was strange, having then thought that possibly MADELEINE had got up to go to sleep in his bedroom, so as to avoid the noise produced by her siblings. Therefore, he entered the children's bedroom and established visual contact with each of them, checking and he is certain of this, that the three were deeply asleep. He left the children's bedroom returning to place the door how he had already previously described, then went to the bathroom. Everything else was normal, the shutters, curtains and windows closed, very dark, there only being the light that came from the living room.

Here's another one:

Gerry McCann Witness Statement 10-5-07

So, I actually came in and Madeleine was just at the top of the bed here, where I'd left her lying and the covers were folded down

States that his daughter slept without the covers, as was normal, due to the heat, with the bed sheets folded towards the foot of the bed.

Picture of bed:


** EDIT - PICTURE WONT DISPLAY HERE'S THE LINK **

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_w-8JKaTohe4/StCTxJ0MqYI/AAAAAAAASiI/XvE179eLde0/s1600-h/a_well_made_bed.jpg


Another you say? Ok from the Daily Mirror:

Gerry McCann reacted angrily yesterday to claims he received a string of mystery texts the day before his daughter vanished.
Police applied to Portugal's supreme court to seize his phone records after learning of the alleged messages.
They claim Gerry was sent 10 texts from an unknown number 24 hours before Madeleine disappeared.
And detectives say four messages arrived from the same mystery number the day after she went missing, according to court documents.
But Gerry and wife Kate have dismissed the claims as "utter rubbish".
A source close to them said: "They have had their phone records available for inspection for months. But the police never asked for them. And now they have formally asked, they have been refused.
"Any suggestion of Gerry receiving 10 texts the day before Madeleine disappeared are utter rubbish.
"He hardly used his phone during the holiday and most of the friends with them didn't even have mobiles. "The only time his phone rang was when work called and he explained he was on holiday. There are no mystery texts. Gerry has nothing to hide. It's yet more nonsense coming from Portugal."

Image for phone records:



** EDIT - PICTURE WONT DISPLAY HERE'S THE LINK **

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_w-8JKaTohe4/SeocDnAHUFI/AAAAAAAARBE/CRq7GsB2E-0/s1600-h/mccann_phone_records.jpg


This list doesn't include the reports they directly gave to 5 different family and friends on the night of the 3rd/4th that the shutter had:
“been forced”, “jemmied open”, “broken the shutter”, “the shutters were smashed”, “the shutters of the apartment had been smashed”.

Which subsequently changed to shutter "raised" in their statements.

They wanted a "review" of the information gathered in order to try and further discredit the PJ. The pertinent question is why they don't call for the case to be officially re-opened if they are serious about finding their daughter. For the price of a stamp they could do this.

But that would involve going back to Portugal to perform a reconstruction and for them and their friends to subject themselves and their statements to proper scrutiny. They clearly don't want this to happen do they, otherwise they'd have done it by now.

The question for you is why?

I have listed them. They have done alright out of it, they have become celebs with a large fund to support them. Remember one of the three aims of the fund is:

To provide support, including financial assistance, to Madeleine’s family.

Do you have evidence that supporters of theirs in the early days still support them now?

They have pulled the wool over some people's eyes undoubtedly. The point is and was how many of these people who proclaim their support have read the files?

There is not enough evidence to prosecute them at the moment because the investigation isn’t complete, that doesn't mean they have been cleared. The police certainly haven't cleared them. Amaral & Rebelo BOTH had the same theory.

Code:

Hardly ridiculous. The point is would these people still support them if they knew all the details in the case files such as the discrepancies over Tanner’s sighting and her fingering of Murat from the back of the refrigerated van?



The question stands how many of these high profile supporters have read the files and know about the issues the files throw up?

Whose report are you talking about? Tavaral's or Menezes’?

Tavaral's report states:

Kate McCann and Gerald McCann are involved in the concealment of the cadaver of their daughter, Madeleine McCann

So that doesn't clear them and even Menezes' report (the Holy Bible for the believers), which says there is no firm evidence against them states:

The obvious and well-known advantages of immediate appreciation of evidence, or in other words, the fulfilment of the principle of contiguity of evidence in order to form a conviction, as firm as possible, about what was seen by Jane Tanner and the other interposers, and, eventually, to dismiss once and for all any doubts that may subsist concerning the innocence of the missing [child's] parents.

Followed by this:

Nevertheless, despite national authorities assuming all measures to render their trip to Portugal viable, for unknown motives, after the many doubts that they raised about the necessity and opportunity of their trip were clarified several times, they chose not to attend, which rendered the diligence inviable.

We believe that the main damage was caused to the McCann arguidos, who lost the possibility to prove what they have protested since they were constituted arguidos: their innocence towards the fateful event; the investigation was also disturbed, because said facts remain unclarified.

And Let's be clear the only time the report or the McCann’s haves gone before a court (in the Amaral case which he won) the judges said:

"What is certain is that since the start of the investigation, there were incongruent and even contradictory situations concerning the witness statements, the telephone records of calls that were made and received on mobile phones that belonged to the couple and to the group of friends that were on holidays with them, the movements of people immediately after the disappearance of the little girl was noticed, concerning the state in which the bedroom from where the child disappeared from was found (closed window? open window? partially open window?), etc., and the mystery would only become even thicker due to the clues that were left by the aforementioned sniffer dogs."

Then:

"Where Amaral differs from the Prosecutors who wrote the dispatch, is in the logical, police-work-related and investigative interpretation that he [Amaral] makes of those facts."

Then finally:

"We need, to stress the following: the facts that led to the applicants' constitution as arguidos within the inquiry were later on not sufficiently valued by the Public Ministry's Prosecutors to lead to a criminal accusation, but those very same facts, seen from a different angle, may lead to a different conclusion from that of the prosecutors."

It was a press report based on information provided by Clarence the cross eyed liar to discredit the investigation. It was a comment the McCann’s never criticised or disagreed with was it?

No the simple fact is there was no evidence strong enough to convict on the of the information so far gathered in an investigation which everyone, the PJ included, knows is INCOMPLETE.

It is only incomplete because the main witnesses, the people who last saw the girl, saw the "abductor" and the first people to arrive at the crime scene REFUSED to go back to Portugal to allow the PJ to complete the investigation.

If they want the investigation to be completed then all they need to do is request it be opened again and go over there and allow a reconstruction to be set up and allow themselves to be questioned.

But you can’t be cleared when their actions specifically remove their ability to clear their names and you can’t blame the Police when the refusal of the main witnesses to come back to Portugal actively prevents the PJ from completing their investigation, can you?
So again hardly criminal masterminds when all they are simply doing is refusing to allow the police to continue and complete the investigation. Again the question is why?

Ringo wrote:
You're absolutely right - it is impossible to quantify precisely how many people believe the McCanns to be entirely innocent and how many believe them to be wholly guilty. One can only go by one's impressions of what one sees and hears as one goes through life, and it is my considered opinion that the general feeling in this country at least is that the McCanns are no longer suspected of their child's disappearance, that most people are sympathetic towards them. This is my impression, and clearly you have a different one. Neither impression can be shown to be true for certain without a national opinion poll which is highly unlikely to ever be carried out now.

Ringo wrote:Tony Bennett is always boasting about the huge number of hits his website has received as a result of the publicity that he does receive (mostly negative it must be pointed out), yet the conversion rate of hits to signatures on petitions is remarkably low.

Ringo wrote:You seemed to be disagreeing with my comment that the blogger who called Kate a dimwit was in the wrong! Is Kate a dimwit? No, clearly not, so you agree with me then?

Ringo wrote:I'm not even going to begin to address each of these points, suffice to say the Rebuttal to Tony's 50 Facts deals with many of these more than adequately. Many of these so-called contradictions are based on misinterpretation, mistranslation, bad journalism, and there is nothing there of any substance. In any case I thought we were talking about how the McCanns "continue" to contradict themselves - how so?

MMRG quote: the McCann’s changed their story after the police and the managers of the complex declared there was no sign of forced entry, saying they must have left the patio doors open.

Actually: They didn't change their story. Kate said the side door was closed but unlocked, the door to the bedroom was open, the window was open, the shutters raised. As you can see, that's what they told the GNR. Kate's statement was made before the PJ or the manager of the complex said there was no sign of a forced entry. Her statement has been unchanged throughout.

Ringo wrote:Why would they want to further discredit the PJ? They have already been discredited largely, what would be gained from further discrediting them? It is an absolute nonsense and fallacy that the price of a stamp would re-open the case, and I have already had this discussion on here before.

Ringo wrote:This is yet more nonsense and been done to death. Jez Wilkins was the first person to refuse to take part in a reconstruction, in fact the McCanns were prepared to take part in one. I can't believe people are still trotting this one out after all this time!

Nevertheless, despite national authorities assuming all measures to render their trip to Portugal viable, for unknown motives, after the many doubts that they raised about the necessity and opportunity of their trip were clarified several times, they chose not to attend, which rendered the diligence inviable.

We believe that the main damage was caused to the McCann arguidos, who lost the possibility to prove what they have protested since they were constituted arguidos: their innocence towards the fateful event; the investigation was also disturbed, because said facts remain unclarified.

Ringo wrote:No evidence then, of any fund money spent on themselves?

Ringo wrote:Well I know personally many people who supported them in the early days, who still support them - and of course the people I have already mentioned. I know of not one single high profile person who has said publicly that they are withdrawing their support because they don't feel that they can continue to support them because of their suspicions, do you?

Ringo wrote:Yawn. I am not going to get into yet another pointless discussion about this. They are no longer arguidos because there was no evidence to show that they had anything to do with Madeleine's disappearance. You can choose to interpret that as they are secretly still suspects, but that is not true.

Ringo wrote:It is ridiculous to expect celebrities to issue a statement about Jane Tanner's sighting!! Incidentally Jane Tanner never fingered Murat from the back of the van, your post here is littered with inaccuracies, it's really quite tiresome.

After speaking to “the people that Kate and Gerry brought in”, Miss Tanner received a telephone call from Bob Small (a senior Leicestershire Police Officer, who was assisting the PJ in the Algarve) who told her that the “Spanish Police” wanted to see her! Yes: he did say, according to Miss Tanner, “the Spanish Police”. It is likely, by that time, that covert plans had been made (on some pretext) to induce Mr Murat to walk across the top of the road, north of Apartment 5A, where Miss Tanner said she had seen the “abductor” and was thus the precise context in which she believed she could make an identification.

Mr Small told Miss Tanner to not to discuss anything with anyone, including her husband. She claims she followed this instruction to the letter: but is it realistic to believe she did not tell him anything: or is she lying on this point? If she is being untruthful, why?

Mr Murat was under suspicion but had not been made an “Arguido”. He been around the Ocean Club a lot from 4th May 2007 onwards and had interpreted the PJ’s interviews with Catriona Baker, Stacey Portz , Leanne Wagstaff and Amy Teirney (Folio 457). It is possible that between 6th May 2007 (when his name was mentioned by Lori Campbell) and 13th May 2007 the news that a local suspect had been identified had reached the ears of the “Tapas 9”. It is even conceivable that they knew the suspect was Mr Murat. Unlike her husband and others of the “Tapas 9”, Miss Tanner had never been introduced to Mr Murat.

The ill judged "pick up"

Arrangements were made for Miss Tanner to be collected by Mr Small and his PJ colleagues in a car park near to Mr Murat’s home: this was probably around 7.30pm on Sunday 13th May 2007 while Dr Amaral waited for news in a meeting room at the Public Ministry, preparing to pounce if Miss Tanner’s identification was “successful”.

Miss Tanner dramatizes that she was “worried sick” that the “Spanish Police” were about to cart her off to destinations unknown and got her husband to walk with her to the rendezvous with Mr Small. If, as she claims, she did not discuss the identification operation with her husband, what precisely did she say to him? What did he think was going on? Who looked after their kids and what did they tell them? It is beyond belief that Russell O’Brien and some of the other “Tapasniks” did not know what was afoot.

Why the police arranged Miss Tanner’s pick up so near to their main suspect’s home was at best foolish and was asking for trouble. On their way to the car park - and just outside his home - Robert Murat (who had met Russell O' Brien on the morning of Friday 4th May 2007) stopped, got out of his green VW van and chatted, showing the couple posters he had made to “Find Madeleine” and generally rattling on about nothing in particular. This was the first time Miss Tanner had been introduced to Mr Murat, but given the events that were about to follow it is amazing she did not cry out “That’s him… that’s the ‘person’ I saw: the abductor”. But she didn’t say a single word.

In April 2008 she told the Leicestershire Police that she was concerned that there “was some strange conspiracy going on” (to abduct her) and that Mr Small had “scared the daylights out of her”. She continued: “But that made me even more suspicious because it was like, so I think at that point, I think I actually spoke to Stewart (Stewart Prior the lead UK Police Investigator in Luz)”. She knows she had spoken to Mr Prior and thus had no reason to believe that she was about to be abducted. Her histrionics in this regard are absurd.

The discussion Miss Tanner had with her husband about the identification charade are very important. He had already met Mr Murat and would be able to identify him and point him out to her. Was it pure coincidence that he accompanied Miss Tanner to the pick up by Mr Small? Was it bad planning that the pick up was just outside Mr Murat’s house? Was it misfortune that they happened to bump into Mr Murat? Or is the whole sequence far more sinister?

Miss Tanner was taken away by Mr Small and the PJ and she says Russell O’Brien wrote down their car registration number, presumably so he could rescue her if the Spanish Police abducted her. Miss Tanner was driven to another location and hidden in the back of an undercover surveillance vehicle (a refrigerated van) which was driven to a position near the side entrance to Apartment 5A, facing north.

The identification of Mr Murat as the abductor

Miss Tanner then, apparently, saw three people walk across the top of the road: but Mr Murat was the first to do so. It is not clear exactly what she told the PJ at the time but, however she would like to spin the story now, it was enough to make them believe Mr Murat was the “abductor”, notwithstanding the fact that he looked nothing like the “Egg Man” or her verbal description. The sighting was reported to Dr Amaral and the Public Ministry and plans made to arrest Mr Murat.

Mr Murat’s home was searched on 14th May 2007. He was made an “Arguido” 15th May 2007 and his face was on every TV screen in Europe, including those at the Ocean Club.

Welcome corroboration by the "Tapas 3"

A report on Sky News caused Rachel Mampilly to scamper into the Tanner’s apartment saying she recognised Mr Murat from her sighting of him at the Ocean Club on the night of 3rd May 2007. Fiona Payne corroborated this and Russell O’Brien added that he had met Mr Murat, while the search for Madeleine had been taking place on the night and early morning of 3rd and 4th May 2007, and had entered the interpreter’s telephone number into his mobile’s memory at that time.

Miss Tanner claims that she had not told her friends anything about her outing in the refrigerated van and that their reactions to Mr Murat’s exposure on Sky News were spontaneous. However, in her April 2008 interviews with the Leicestershire Police, Miss Tanner stated that her friends suggested that she should speak to Mr Small about Mr Murat. How did they know she had Mr Small’s contact details if she had not discussed the identification charade with them? Miss Tanner stated:

“Cos I’d got, I’d got his number from the day before (for/from?) them and you know, they sort of, you know, to say, oh is this, is this relevant and also I wanted to tell him that I’d seen him (Mr Murat) on the way to doing the surveillance as well as, yeh, just for that so it’s just to make the point really that I think at that point, they didn’t know that Robert Murat had said he wasn’t there on that night”.

Later in the interview, Miss Tanner said:

“…. Get to the truth of the matter and the truth is, you know they, when they asked me to ring Bob Small to make these statements, we didn’t even know that he’d, erm, hadn’t, hadn’t said he was there on the night and they didn’t know that I had done the surveillance………… I mean when I got back, I didn’t even tell Russell what I’d done cos I took everything seriously what the police said in terms of, you know, not telling anyone”

A procedural error or a perversion of the course of justice?

Miss Tanner telephoned Bob Small and relayed her friend’s concerns, but it is not clear whether or not she told him about the compromising, supposedly accidental, encounter with Mr Murat- outside his house – “five minutes” before identifying him as the “abductor”. In most jurisdictions this encounter would have invalidated Miss Tanner’s identification evidence. It would also have raised suspicions that there had been a deliberate plot for her to bump into the prime suspect (accompanied by someone who knew him) so that she would see what he was wearing and, based on such knowledge, identify him as the “abductor” some “five minutes” later.

Whether this suspicion is true or incorrect, it does not alter the fact that the identification exercise was gross incompetence by all involved. Mr Murat denied being at the Ocean Club on 3rd May 2007, which made his position even more serious because it conflicted with evidence from the “Tapas 3”.

There is nothing in the CD to indicate whether the supposedly accidental encounter was reported to Mr Small, although the subsequent reaction of the Leicestershire Police (in the interview with Miss Tanner in April 2008; see below) suggests that it was. The critical unanswered question is whether or not Mr Small reported the evidentially corrupting incident to the PJ and to the Portuguese judiciary and if he did why they accepted Miss Tanner’s evidence without demur.

Other statements by the Tapas 3

On 15th May 2007, Mr O’Brien, Fiona Payne and Rachael Mampilly made statements to the PJ putting Murat in the Ocean Club late on 3rd May 2007 (folios 1957). Their evidence appears to conflict with that from both Portuguese Police Officers and Mark Warner’s staff (Folio 1330 et seq) who say Mr Murat was not there that night. Activity on his own and his mum’s computers tend to confirm that he was at home, among other things, looking at mild porn sites (Folio 1166)



Then in her rogatory statements in 2008 she then backtracks from that identification (but corroborates she was in the back of a truck)
4078 “About the seventeenth?”
Reply “Yeah, about the seventeenth, yeah”.
4078 “Right. And can you summarise what you did then, between the third and the seventeenth?”
Reply “Yeah, I mean, it’s a bit like groundhog day really. There was the interview on the day after and then, I can’t think it was that night they came back about two, well about half one, to pick me up again to go back to do the sketch, so I think that was the night of the fourth or it could have been the fifth, but I think it was the night of the fourth. And then, erm, we did, I think I was re-interviewed again a week afterwards, actually on the Thursday a week afterwards, erm, and that was a long one, that was the one that sort of went into the middle of the night, so that was, yeah, that was the Thursday after that. And then, I can’t remember exactly what day the surveillance was, but then there was the, the surveillance when, erm, they took me round the back of the van for the surveillance day and I think that was probably, maybe the Tuesday or the Monday of the week before we went back”.
4078 “Okay. And can you just go on to tell me a bit more about that surveillance?”
Reply “Yeah, erm, well I was actually talking to, I think it was the, it was some of the people that Kate and Gerry brought in, I was actually talking to them about what had happened at that point. And Bob SMALL rang, erm, rang me on my phone and sort of said, well he scared the living daylights out of me, because rather than saying ‘The Portuguese Police want to talk to you’, or you know, ‘I want to pick you up to see the Portuguese Police’, he said ‘I need to pick you up and take you to see the Spanish Police but you can’t tell anybody not even Russell’ and all this, so it was sort of a bit and because he’d said Spanish Police, I thought there was some sort of a strange conspiracy going on, so it was like, oh, but, I mean, he just got”.
4078 “Got it wrong”.
Reply “He just got mixed up. But that made me even more suspicious because it was like, so I think at that point, I think I actually spoke to Stewart then, because I thought, I didn’t even know who Bob SMALL was at that point, so it was like, you know, and that, we were obviously worried about the Press and everything at that point, we thought it could be anybody, you know, trying to ring, and at that point I thought it could even be the person I saw ringing. So, erm, we, erm, so, yeah, and I did tell Russell where I was going, because I thought ‘I’m not just going and getting in a car with somebody who is taking me to see the Spanish Police’. So Russell, we walked, so I arranged to meet Bob SMALL in a car park at half seven or something at night or whatever it was, so Russell and I walked up to, erm, to meet Bob SMALL and, by chance, erm, we walked up, we’d missed the throng of Press that were at the top of the road, we actually walked up by Robert MURAT’s house and he came down in his car, in his van at that point, stopped, and he knew Russ, he’d met Russell earlier in the week, so he actually jumped out to say ‘Hi’ to Russell and he was showing us, erm, things in the back of his car as to what he was doing with the, erm, because they’d set up a stop where people could come and give their own evidence”.
4078 “Yeah, I can remember that”.
Reply “So he’d actually jumped out and I’d never, I’d never, I hadn’t met him at this point, so I didn’t really know who he was and I wasn’t really taking it in because I was worried sick I was about to be abducted by the people”.
4078 “By the Spanish Police?”
Reply “And taken to the Spanish Police, so I was a bit sort of like, you know. Erm, and so we stopped to talk, that was probably a couple of minutes, and he was trying to show us all this stuff, but I was, at that point, I was thinking ‘Oh shut-up I need to go and meet Bob SMALL’”.
4078 “Do you remember his car?”
Reply “It was the green, it was the green, I think it’s a green PASSAT, he was in a green, it’s the one that had been used for the, erm, post, the what’s it, you know, the anonymous information post where people could, because that’s what he was showing us, he was actually showing. And I remember thinking at the time ‘He’s very keen to show us’, you know, ‘show us what he was doing’, but, you know, we thought ‘Oh great’, but. So we then carried on and I met Bob SMALL and Russell wrote down the number plate of the car just in case I was taken away. And, erm, then Bob drove me up to where, erm, the rest of the team were to do the surveillance. Erm, so I went off in the back of this like refrigerated, well it was pretending to be a refrigerated, erm, van and took it round to the point on the road and obviously, in hindsight now, I realise they were probably calling Robert MURAT to try and get him to walk across, across the top of the road so that, you know, I could see. But it was a bit odd because there was a car, where we were parked there was a car that moved just at that point that he appeared and then two other people walked by, so I didn’t really, but I didn’t even recognise it as the person I’d been talking to five minutes before, well, you know, half an hour before, so. Erm, and then, erm, then went, I think because it has gone a bit wrong because this car had been there and then tried to set it up elsewhere, but again I couldn’t really see, I couldn’t really see that well and, you know, it didn’t look, it didn’t jog, jog any memories”.
4078 “Now you are left with that mental image in your head about the man carrying the child”.
Reply “Umm”.
4078 “And you said, you described his hair quite well. Having seen MURAT then and obviously in the papers since, could you link the two of those?”
Reply “I don’t think so. I mean, I don’t, phew, I don’t, I don’t think it, no, there doesn’t, there’s no, but then the person I see in the paper doesn’t really look like my recollection of the person I met on the way to meet Bob SMALL. It’s really annoying because normally I would have probably taken more notice but I was so worried about what I was going to do, because I didn’t know at this point at all, I didn’t really take any notice, but I think it was too short and I remember it being, being long into the neck and not so. Again, I don’t really, when I saw Robert MURAT outside his house he looked quite little to me, but then when you see him on the telly he seems quite bit, so I can’t, again, I don’t think the build, the build was right, I don’t”.
4078 “So you don’t feel, in your heart of hearts”.
Reply “No”.
4078 “You don’t feel it was the same person?”
Reply “No, I don’t, no”.

Ringo wrote:You've made this point already, and again I will repeat it is irrelevant to the point I was making.

Ringo wrote:Me, I can't find the report I am referring to at the minute but it was the one that concluded that there was no evidence against them, when the case itself was shelved. No evidence, no matter how you want to dress it up, means no evidence. But you seem to think it means some evidence but just not enough - that is not what it means.

Ringo wrote:Your post is so full of incorrect statements that I am now quite exhausted trying to respond to every single one of them. I now officially give up replying to your posts unless you make them alot more succinct and leave off with all the innaccuracies which I simply haven't the time to point out to you.

I joined in with this thread to make the point that Kate is neither a dimwit, nor that her book contains an "almost confession". Let's try and keep to that subject rather than attempt to debate every single aspect of the case on one single thread!

Ringo wrote:Me, you have attempted to shoe-horn as much as you can into one post and in so doing have gone right off the subject of the thread. To remind you -

Ringo wrote: I joined in with this thread to make the point that Kate is neither a dimwit, nor that her book contains an "almost confession". Let's try and keep to that subject rather than attempt to debate every single aspect of the case on one single thread!

Ringo wrote:You may think that this bulldozer approach is a clever tactic to silence me or show me up and perhaps it is, as I literally could not be bothered to read your post in its entirety and even less will to reply to each point that you are making, and you will therefore come to the conclusion that you have made your case so convincingly that I couldn't possibly answer.

Ringo wrote:Actually, nothing could be further from the truth, however as I have debated all these points before until I am blue in the face, I have simply chosen not to get involved in yet another fruitless discussion about them

Ringo wrote:not Jane Tanner's statement or whether or not she "fingered" Murat (if she had her statement to that effect would have been in the files, it isn't, therefore we can safely say she didn't!)

Ringo wrote:Back on topic:

We have established that you think Kate is neither dimwit nor criminal mastermind, both points on which I agree fully!

Now, do you think her book contains an "almost confession" or not?

Ringo wrote:There really is no need TO SHOUT AT ME, ME! You really are being very insistent and determined to take this thread off-topic aren't you?

Ringo wrote:OK, I will indulge you one more time and then perhaps I can steer you back on track.

Ringo wrote:If Jane Tanner had confirmed with certainty that the man she had seen carrying the child on the night of the 3rd May was Robert Murat, then this would have been a crucial piece of evidence.

Ringo wrote:There is absolutely no way that if she had positively Id'ed him that a sworn statement would not have been taken. But what actually happened is that the ID parade was bungled and inept as you suggest and JT said that she could not be sure if it was him or not. According to Kate's book (obviously you will choose not to believe this next bit because of the source) one of the officers in the van made a call to check whether he needed a signed statement from JT saying she couldn't be sure but was informed that it wouldn't be necessary. That is why there is no statement in the files.

Why the police then chose to search Murat's house the next day and take him in for questioning the following day (note: not arrest him as you claim), you would really have to ask them. Presumably they were on his case and determined to find whatever they could on him at that time. JT didn't rule him out, and two other Tapas friends had said that they'd seen him around the OC on the evening Madeleine went missing so it's not really surprising that they carried out the search and questioning.

Robert Murat, anonymous amongst plain clothes police officers, goes up the road in the same way as the alleged abductor. Jane Tanner is adamant: it certainly is Robert Murat that she saw that night. She definitely recognises his way of walking. But does he resemble the description she painted previously?

Ringo wrote:What all this has to do with whether or not Kate is dimwitted or her book contains "almost confessions" I have no idea. If you haven't read the book then I'm surprised you've even joined in on this discussion. Perhaps you could at least comment on that part of the book which has been included in the blog in the OP and tell me whether that constitutes an 'almost confession' in your view.

Me wrote:

Ringo wrote:There really is no need TO SHOUT AT ME, ME! You really are being very insistent and determined to take this thread off-topic aren't you?

Not at all I’m trying to have a conversation with you. You seem to want to pontificate at me without backing up your assertions. You also have shown an inability or unwillingness to expand upon your attempts to discredit my points.

By EMPHASISING (not shouting) i was trying (again) to get you to add some meat to the bones of your point.

It was and that's the only reason and the only evidence they had to search his property and make him an Arguido (Freudian slip with arrested). Remember they had to get a search warrant from a Judge. What evidence did they use to get that warrant granted?

Good you seem to now be agreeing with me. If she didn't "rule him out" and when you look at the description she gave of egg man, i take it you now accept that her description of the abductor did indeed change, because Murat looks nothing like egg man. Agreed?

I have no doubts she did indeed identify him and that was the basis both for the search and the Arguido status.

Let's also remember the other friends also claim to have seen him only AFTER the undercover operation (the 15th May if i recall) and more importantly in relation to your point, AFTER the search took place on the 14th May. So their statements cannot have provided a basis for the search warrant being issued.

Lest we also forget that later it was proved he wasn't there (again from memory it was shown he was at home at the time on his PC looking at mild porn sites!)

Amaral is unequivocal about this ID:

Well if you follow the thread i came in at the point you started suggesting kate McCann was a criminal mastermind and pulling the wool over most people's eyes. I didn't make a comment on the original blog post, i was replying directly to one of the points you raised.

In relation to the idea of a "confession" as i have said i haven't read her book so i have no idea whether it amounts to a confession. What i have seen of the point highlighted leads me to believe her choice of phrase was odd but on balance no i do not personally think it constitutes a confession.

candyfloss wrote:

Ringo wrote:

lj wrote:
You mean the same FSS that said they did not test hairs from the car because they were not blond enough??

Can I see the source for that? It's the first I've heard of it!

Examination and results
Reference objects
I received [obtained] information from the pillow-case SJM/1, the tops SJM2, 4 and 5, and the hairbrush SJM/36 belonging to Madeleine McCann or used by her. The hair found on these objects was used in substitution of [in place of] reference samples of her hair, [which were] not considered to be authentic samples of her hair.

No hair was recovered from the pillow-case SJM/1 nor the hairbrush SJM/36.

A total number of twelve [12] hairs or hair fragments were recovered from the tops SJM/2, SJM/4 and SJM/5. All of these appeared to be hair and not down, being mainly blonde in colour. One of the hairs was brown and distinctly darker than the other hairs, suggesting, at the least, that this was a hair from someone else.

The remaining eleven hairs/fragments varied in length from 4 millimetres to 45 millimetres [~1/8" to ~1,3/4"]. I could not conclude that all hairs were from the same person. If they had been from Madeleine McCann, then they are not representative/typical/characteristic of a sample of her hair, given the length of that seen in photographs of her.

Objects from the Renault Scenic - licence plate 59-DA-27
The following objects recovered from the scenic were subjected to examination:
1A, 1B, 1C, 1D,
2A, 2B, 2C, 2D, 2E,
3,
4A, 4B, 4C,
5A, 5B, 5C,
6A, 6B, 6C,
7A, 7B, 7C,
8A, 8B, 8C,
9 and
11 (2 objects).

There were more than two hundred hairs, down or fragments of hair and down. The majority appeared to be different from the blonde reference hairs recovered from SJM2, 4 and 5. Furthermore, no blonde hair consistent with that seen in photographs of Madeleine McCann was found.

Approximately 15 hairs, down or fragments were blonde and fair, presenting a similarity with the reference material. All were of insufficient length to make a solid [definitive] comparison. Furthermore, they are too short to do mitocondrial DNA tests. Folicle root material is insufficient for standard DNA tests.

Four hairs - one from 7B and three from 7C - were sent for Low Copy Number DNA testing. The results of those tests will be presented by my colleague John Lowe.

Conclusion
In the objects recovered from the Scenic, there were around 15 blonde/fair hairs similar to the reference hairs from SJM2, 4 and 5. However, as it was not possible to do solid [definitive] or significant [forensically meaningful] tests it is not possible for me to determine if, or not, these could have been from Madeleine McCann.

The conclusions expressed in the present deposition are based on information available at the date of the examination. In the case that there are changes to that information, or additional information becomes available, it may be necessary to reconsider my interpretation and conclusions. That re-evaluation will be most effective when done immediately prior to any judgement.

A.L. Palmer

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




Very scientific, the hairs weren't Madeleine's because they didn't look like the hair in the photo's??????????

Ringo wrote:
WHEN YOU WRITE IN CAPITAL LETTERS IT LOOKS LIKE SHOUTING, CAN YOU SEE THAT? Never mind, you've stopped doing it now, thankfully so we can let it pass.

Ringo wrote: I don't know - what evidence did the PJ present to the judge to get the dogs in to search the McCanns rented villa, hire car and personal effects?

Ringo wrote:You have conveniently side-stepped the issue of the lack of a signed statement to what would have been the most critical piece of evidence in the case. The 100% positive ID of a man carrying a small child away from the apartment on the night of the abduction. Please put yourself in the position of the police in that van with Jane Tanner following what you claim is her confirmation that the man she saw that night is Murat. Did the police then say to each other, "that's great Jane but unfortunately we cocked this one up a bit so we won't bother to get you to sign any statement confirming what you've just said, in fact we won't trouble you with this matter again, we won't conduct another ID parade, we won't in fact ever ask you to repeat what you've just told us today, many thanks and off you go". Does that actually seem plausible to you?

Ringo wrote:As I have said, and as is clear in Kate's book JT said she could not say for sure one way or the other if the man she saw that night was the same as the one parading in front of the van. In fact she didn't even recognise Murat as the man she had met only half an hour earlier. Now, you may have no doubts that she positively ID'ed him but this is based on your beliefs only, not on any actual evidence. Amaral, who wasn't in the van with JT to the best of my knowledge has said quite a few things about this case which have turned out not to be strictly accurate. In fact let's not forget the inconvenient truth that he is a convicted perjuror. Anyway, didn't Amaral's camp put it about that Murat was in the process of sueing JT and the other two? Any news on the latest there?

I hadn’t met him at this point, so I didn’t really know who he was and I wasn’t really taking it in because I was worried sick I was about to be abducted by the people

Ringo wrote:No, I said she would have had to have been a criminal mastermind to pull this huge series of deceptions off, involving large numbers of co-conspirators, over the course of 4 very high publicity years. You seem to believe that anyone could quite easily have done the same, which is a matter of opinion and one which I don't share at all.

Ringo wrote:Jolly good - on this then we are in agreement. Pity it took so many pages to get there!

Me wrote:
Ah the convicted perjurer line again. This is in relation to the Cipriano case, based on the evidence of a child murderer who was having an incestuous affair with her brother and murdered her daughter.

This from a convicted murderer whose story changed so many times and who couldn’t identify the persons responsible for torturing her.

Let’s be clear exactly what Amaral was found guilty of. He was found guilty of “false testimony” because he upheld, under oath - five months after the 'events' - the version that he had been given by his staff, that Leonor Cipriano had been injured when she tried to commit suicide by throwing herself over the railing of the stairs inside the PJ building in Faro.

This was considered to be a false testimony because the facts that Amaral testified to, could not be proved.

However his defence, according to what the papers in Portugal said throughout the trial, and to statements that his lawyer made to the media, outside the court building, was that he could not have given another version of the facts because this was what the inspectors who witnessed the episode, reported to him.

So you can use that as a stick to diminish his credibility or you can look at the facts and draw your own conclusions as to the validity of that charge and his involvement in it.