Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

by **Tony Bennett** 23.11.12 22:36

NOTE: This article was published on 19 October 2010 and was a very detailed response to an absurd article in The Sun on 1 September 2010. In short, the article in The Sun claimed that a gypsy gang leader had confessed, to Raymond Hewlett - while the pair were drinking late one evening together - to organising the abduction of Madeleine McCann, apparently to order for a wealthy North African family. He was said to have confessed to this in a letter written 'on his death bed'. This letter was then allegedly brought by a 'mystery man' to the home of Hewlett's son, Wayne, a builder who lives in Telford. Wayne had then burnt the letter, but after doing so, had gone to the McCann Team and The Sun and told them what was in the letter. I have reproduced all of my original article, which ran to 51 pages and consisted of around 20,000 words. Except, that is, for five sentences in the original article which I have had to cut because the McCanns considered they libelled them. I know that my articles are often criticised (probably correctly) for their excessive length and wordiness. I apologise in advance for that, but in this instance I wanted our readers to have as much information as possible about Raymond Hewlett, and how his name came to be dragged into the Madeleine McCann matter. I will need to place this article up here in four parts - and it may need considerable re-formatting, so please be patient while I attempt that. Finally, I have acknowledged various sources within the article, but in places have relied substantially on excellent analysis of Raymond Hewlett on the 'winnower' website. As always, however, responsibility for any mistakes is mine.

Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

An analysis of another farcical article in ‘The Sun’ about the disappearance of Madeleine McCann

October 2010

On 1 September 2010, The Sun published yet another sensational article about the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. It claimed that a paedophile who had recently died - Raymond Hewlett - had written a letter ‘on his deathbed’, shortly before he died, claiming that he knew what really happened to Madeleine McCann. That was quite some claim. In this article, we examine that claim in detail.

Picture Raymond Hewlett

The Sun article was one of the most preposterous ever written by a tabloid newspaper on the reported disappearance of Madeleine McCann, among all the hundreds of other sensational and speculative articles that have been written about the case. We will analyse why it is so preposterous. We will first of all reproduce the article, by-lined by Antonella Lazzeri, not noted for her accurate reporting, and Andy Crick. Then we’ll analyse the article.

A. The Sun article

The article was headed: “ I ‘know’ who took Maddie”.

The article ran:

QUOTE

By ANTONELLA LAZZERI and ANDY CRICK - Published: 01 Sep 2010

[size=16]MADELEINE McCann suspect Raymond Hewlett confessed on his deathbed that he KNEW what happened to the little girl, The Sun can reveal. In a letter to his estranged son Wayne, he denied having anything to do with Maddie's disappearance.

Picture Gang claim…Hewlett just before he died

But he said he knew she had been stolen to order by a gipsy gang who kidnap children for wealthy couples unable to have kids or adopt.

]Picture Vanished…Maddie]

Hewlett, a serial paedophile seen near the spot where Maddie was snatched in Portugal, said they had a ‘shopping list’ of potential targets - such as a little girl with blonde hair like Maddie. Private detectives working for Maddie's parents Kate and Gerry are ‘extremely interested’ in Hewlett's claims. A source close to their ongoing investigation said: “What he says fits the No1 theory, which is that she was stolen to order”.

Hewlett died of throat cancer in April, aged 62, after persistently refusing to meet the McCanns' detectives. He became a suspect because of his appalling record of rape and abduction of children. And he was living as a nomad in Portugal with his second family when Maddie vanished from the McCanns' holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in May 2007.

[PICTURE: Shocked…son Wayne]

Hewlett's letter to builder Wayne, 40, was delivered to the son by a mystery man - thought to be a solicitor or a private eye - a week after he died. Most of it was an apology for how his vile crimes had affected his first wife Susan and Wayne. But then he went on to write about Maddie, who was nearly four when she went missing.

Wayne, of Telford, Shropshire, said: “It was a bolt from the blue and I shook when I read it. He stated he didn't want to go to his grave with us thinking he had done such a horrible thing. He said he had had nothing to do with taking Maddie but did know who had. He said a very good gipsy friend he knew in Portugal had got drunk and 'let it out' that he had stolen Maddie to order as part of a gang.

Picture: Wayne Hewlett

“My dad said this gang had been operating for a long time and had snatched children before for couples who couldn't have children of their own. Maddie had been targeted. They took photos of children and sent them to the people they were acting for. And they said ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.

“Dad said the man told him it was nothing to do with snatching children for a paedophile gang or for a sexual reason. He said there were huge sums of money involved. And he totally believed what this man was saying”.

The account fits with others surrounding the Maddie mystery. Several strange men were seen taking photos of children around the Ocean Club resort in the days before she vanished. And The Sun revealed earlier this year that a British expat thought he had seen Maddie in a white van driven by a gipsy couple the day after she was lost.

[Picture Hope…parents Kate and Gerry McCann]

Wayne, who had no contact with Hewlett for nearly 20 years, said his father's letter seemed ‘very genuine’. He added: "I don't know if this is what happened to Maddie or not, but it does make sense. I can't believe he'd go to those lengths to make up some elaborate lie when he was so weak and ill”.

Wayne said he considered going to Kate and Gerry with the letter but was worried it could cause them more heartache if it gave them false hope. He added: "I actually burned it because it unnerved me so much. To have a letter from someone you hated for so long was just mind-blowing. I couldn't deal with it”.

Wayne did not contact The Sun about the message. We learned of its existence through a friend.

But now he intends to sit down with the Maddie detectives to tell them everything he knows. The McCanns' spokesman Clarence Mitchell said last night: “We are extremely grateful to Wayne for coming forward with this information and the detective team will be interviewing him as a matter of priority”.

UNQUOTE

B. Raymond Hewlett - the background

A very useful and full summary of the life of Raymond Hewlett can be found at this link:

]http://raymondhewlett.blogspot.com/p/raymond-hewlett-timeline.html

We would warmly recommend that blog for anyone wishing to research Raymond Hewlett’s life further.

Born on 24 January 1945 in Blackpool, Hewlett was one of seven children. He left school with no qualifications. At the age of 16, at the instigation of his father, he joined the Scots Guards. After merely nine months, he was dishonourably discharged for causing disorder, being absent without leave and stealing a regimental bicycle.

At the age of 18, he married Susan Ginley. Over the next five years, they had four children. To one of them, Gina, born in 1966, he later wrote self-pitying letters while in prison. It was the previous year, 1965, that their son Wayne was born - the one to whom Hewlett alleged wrote his death-bed letter. But many years previously, Wayne had said on the record that he hated his father, whom he described as a ‘monster’. He said that, as a boy, Hewlett had beaten him ‘savagely’.

During those five years of bringing up four young children, Hewlett was arrested for a variety of offences, ranging form burglary to possession of firearms.

In 1972, aged 27, when living at Todmorden on the Yorkshire/Lancashire border, Hewlett was jailed for one year after raping a 12-year-old girl he had lured into his car and knocked out with paint-stripper. He was sentenced to 18 months - but served only 12 months of that sentence. Upon release he returned to Todmorden. In 1975, the year Lesley Molseed was murdered (see below), his address was Dineley Avenue, Todmorden.

In 1978, aged 33, he attempted to rape a 14-year-old girl. During this attempt Hewlett held a gun to her head. This time he received a four year sentence - but served only 16 months of that.

He began to live an itinerant lifestyle, which included spells living in Manchester, Blackpool, Telford (Shropshire), and Forres in Scotland. He appears also to have been a ‘trawlerman’ for a period.

In 1980, now aged 35, he finally left Susan Ginley for Anita Cox, whom he married two years later. There were reports that Hewlett frequently and viciously attacked Anita.

In 1988, Hewlett wasjailed for six years, after abducting a 14-year-old newspaper delivery girl at knifepoint in Northwich, Cheshire. He fled to Ireland, but was later identified as the attacker by forensic evidence and brought back to face trial in Britain. Two years into his sentence, he was, unwisely, granted home leave from Leicestershire's Stoken Prison, but absconded. He was re-arrested when he arrived back in Britain from Ireland in 1991.

Between 1991 and 1997 he seems to have spent most of his time in Ireland, though he was spotted in Milan, Italy, in 1995.

There, it is said that he linked up with ‘a network of paedophiles’ that would hide out and have ‘safe houses’ throughout Northern Ireland and the Republic. The existence of these networks is one of the most dangerous aspects of paedophilia; their existence promotes their perverted practices and often helps them to evade justice. His bolt-holes included places in Fermanagh, favoured as it was close to the Irish border, Dublin, Cork, Kildare, Laois, Westmeath, Donegal, Cavan, Sligo and Louth. He is said to have visited at least nine counties during his time in Ireland.

While he was there, he was involved in a number of incidents, including:

· Living in Enniskillen, Fermanagh, where he caused alarm. Local schools had to send warning letters home to parents, describing Hewlett as ‘a high risk offender with every likelihood that he will reoffend’.

· He was also investigated for the attempted rape of a nine-year-old girl in Co. Fermanagh

· Hewlett was the chief suspect in two other attempted rapes in Co. Down and Co. Cavan, where he was questioned over the rape of another nine-year-old girl, after his then wife told the Gardai [Irish Police] that she suspected her husband was the rapist

· In 1993, he lived in a commune in Co. Donegal, where commune members eventually asked him to leave after concerns about remarks made by their children concerning Hewlett

· While living in Co. Louth near the Cooley Mountains in the Dundalk area, he was suspected of attempting to abduct and sexually assault a young girl across the border in Co. Down.

He was known to have lived for a period one mile from Tralee in Co. Kerry, spent a period on a gipsy camp in Letterkenny, Co. Donegal during part of 1998, and was even spotted as late as 2002 living in a small apartment above a chip shop in Belmore Street, Enniskillen.

Later he married Gabriella,a candle-maker in the Italian mountains. They had a son, Marco. Gabriella left him, apparently after she learnt from Italian police about Hewlett’s criminal record.

He also met his fourth wife, a German, Mariana Schmucker, in Italy, possibly in 1996, when she was just 19 and Hewlett was 51. By this time, Hewlett was a mechanic on a tourist boat, while Mariana had been the cleaner for the boat's owners on island of Elba.

For a while he and Mariana went to live in County Donegal, Ireland, where he had lived previously. By his time, Mariana was pregnant.

Hewlett then migrated to southern Portugal, saying he spent periods in France and Spain on the way. But he didn’t stay there in Portugal; he also spent long periods in Germany. A son, David, was born to the couple in 1998. It was to be the first of seven children the couple were to have over the next ten years.

However, a year earlier (1997), Hewlett had been photographed together with Schmucker in Forres, Scotland. Police seemed to be aware around this time that Hewlett was planning to return from Scotland to Italy.

The Hewlett’s next six children were born in Germany, Portugal and Spain, over the next nine years, as the Hewletts lived what has accurately been described as a ‘nomadic existence’. Their son David was killed in December 2008. The Spanish police investigated the death, which Hewlett said happened as a result of himfalling out of the van as family drove through Spain en route to Germany.

Hewlett seems to have arrived in Portugal, from Germany, in the summer of 2002. By then, his modus vivendi, according to him and others, would be to stop somewhere and ‘decide whether to hang around’, depending on the weather and how easy it was to make money. Hewlett would also busk on the street, playing his guitar.

We will be looking more closely below at the life of Hewlett from around the time of Madeleine McCann’s disappearance to his death.

Picture Raymond Hewlett in hospital, Aachen, Germany, 2009

He died of throat cancer in December 2009, and according to a report in the Lancashire Telegraph in April 2010, ‘was cremated at a pauper’s funeral’ in Germany. Interestingly, a report in the Daily Express dated 9 December, and headed: ‘Tell all before you die, Maddie suspect urged’ appeared to give advance warning of his impending death. By then, even the McCann Team accepted that Hewlett was not a ‘suspect’, so the headline was incorrect. But it was a headline which no doubt sold a good few extra copies. Amongst other things, the Express report, by-lined by ‘Allan Hall in Berlin’, told us:

“[Hewlett], wanted for questioning by detectives working for Madeleine McCann's parents, is close to death…he can no longer speak because of throat cancer…Hewlett's lawyer, Detlev Wagner, said: ‘He could not talk to them even if he wanted to. He is gravely ill. He does not have long for this world’. Wagner claims that his client was ‘poised to broker an interview with the detectives’ but broke it off because he found the lawmen ‘too pushy. [The McCanns’] investigators, who have been trying to quiz Hewlett since May, fear that Hewlett could take the secret of Madeleine's disappearance with him to the grave. The Briton…came to the attention of investigators after an English couple [the Thompsons of Osama bin Laden fame - see below] came forward with new information. They alleged he was near to the Praia da Luz holiday resort in Portugal where Madeleine, then three, vanished in May 2007. Hewlett looks strikingly similar to a sketch of a suspect with a pock-marked face seen lurking around the apartment where the family stayed in May 2007”.

We will deal with a number of controversial points in this article in Section E below.

C. Did Raymond Hewlett murder Lesley Molseed?

There has been a persistent suspicion, not least by senior police officers, that Raymond Hewlett killed 11-year-old Lesley Molseed. Yet two other people have been convicted of her murder, the latest in 2007. What are the facts? Is it reasonable to still suspect Hewlett of this murder?

Lesley Molseed's body was found on Rishworth Moor near Ripponden, West Yorkshire, on 5 October, 1975. Hewlett was 30 years old at the time. She had been stabbed a dozen times with a knife. Lesley had been abducted three days earlier while running an errand for her mother near their home in Rochdale, also in Lancashire. The investigation into her murder was conducted by Detective Chief Superintendent Max McLean, who in 2001 said that the prime suspect was Raymond Hewlett, and he was ‘confident’ that he could find him.

The first person to have been convicted of Lesley’s murder, however, was Stefan Kiszko, in one of Britain’s worst-ever miscarriages of justice. He served 16 years in prison for an offence he undoubtedly did not commit. Amongst other controversies in the case, the Birmingham-based Forensic Science Service (FSS), which also examined DNA evidence in the Madeleine McCann case, claimed that they had found Kiszko’s DNA in relation to Lesley Molseed - but later Kiszko was ruled out because he was sterile and obviously could not have produced the sperms said to have been his.

The second person convicted of Lesley’s murder, on 12 November 2007 - a full 32 years after she was killed - was Raymond Castree, who has always protested his innocence. His defence barrister, Rodney Jameson Q.C., told Bradford Crown Court that there was ‘an overwhelming possibility’ that the man who sexually assaulted Lesley and stabbed her twelve times was Raymond Hewlett.

Castree was convicted, on a majority 10-2 jury verdict, primarily on DNA evidence. Castree’s DNA was taken in 2005 after he was arrested on suspicion of violently assaulting a prostitute in Manchester. He was not charged in connection with that matter, but was arrested and subsequently convicted of Lesley’s murder when his DNA was said to match DNA found on Lesley’s pants. Castree's explanation for this was that the DNA must have been planted by police on the tape holding the DNA from Lesley’s pants, speculating that he might have been framed by two police officers he had crossed swords with back in 1979. Castree’s conviction was indeed based on the DNA results provided by the FSS. Lesley Molseed's clothing had been destroyed, but the FSS claimed to have found Castree's DNA on a piece of tape they said was ‘used to swipe Lesley's clothing’. He and his defence team also alleged possible cross-contamination. As the BBC reported, ‘Castree’s defence team had tried to argue it was ‘overwhelmingly probable’ that a convicted paedophile called Raymond Hewlett was Lesley's murderer’.

The book ‘Innocents’, written by a retired detective and local journalist, Jonathan Rose, named Hewlett as Lesley’s murderer, providing many details and witness statements - and establishing a previously unknown link between Mr Hewlett's family and friends of the Molseed family.

Why was Hewlett for a long time the chief suspect in the Lesley Molseed murder case? There was a great deal of circumstantial evidence, which we summarise here:

(1) He lived at that time in Todmorden, on the Lancashire/Yorkshire border, less than 10 miles from where Lesley died.

(2) Crucially, he left for Ireland the day after Lesley Molseed was murdered. Hewlett and his girlfriend Rosalee Dolan (see also below) first fled to Burnley, where they stayed with two friends, Michael and John Goodall, then went to Liverpool and after that fled to Ireland.

(3) On the very day of Lesley's disappearance, Hewlett's turquoise Morris 1000 van was seen parked in the lay-by on the A672 Oldham-Halifax Road next to the isolated spot where Lesley's body was found*. A passer-by also noted a tartan blanket, which Hewlett had apparently stolen in Scotland, wrapped around its windscreen and side windows.

(4) No fewer than 14 witnesses also described a ‘blue’ Morris 1000 van parked in another a lay-by at Ripponden, near where Lesley’s body was found, on the day of Lesley's abduction.

(5) One witness, Christopher Coverdale*, saw a man, together with a girl matching Lesley's description, walking up the hillside next to the lay-by.

(6) Hewlett arrived back in Todmorden at 5pm on the day Lesley probably died and told his then teenage girlfriend, Rosalee Dolan (sometimes misspelled ‘Rosalie’), to provide him with a false alibi.

(7) In 1992, 17 years after Lesley’s murder, Rosalee Dolan made a statement to police that she had believed, at the time, that she had been providing an alibi for Hewlett about the ‘theft of a car’ and admitted that she had lied**.

[* This is an extract from the book ‘Innocents: "At 1:45 p.m. on the Sunday, Christopher Coverdale, a self-employed contractor from Rochdale, drove past the scene. As he approached the lay-by he saw a man and a little girl on the embankment above the lay-by. His attention was on these people, so that he had not noticed any car. He thought it foolhardy to be on the moor in poor weather conditions, especially with a child. He recalled the child was wearing a blue, hip-length gabardine coat with the hood up. He believed the child to be a girl, because he could see uncovered legs. The man was facing towards the road, reaching down the embankment and pulling the child up by the hand. Coverdale described the man as being a 30 to 35 year-old white male, with light-brown or fair hair cut short and giving the appearance of being receding. He was five feet six to five feet eight, plump and dressed in a mid-brown jacket with a check pattern, matching trousers and a beige or mustard-yellow cardigan. This was the first description obtained of a man and a child. Dibb [name of detective] was anxious to act, and he personally took Coverdale to the lay-by. It was not the cold which caused Jack Dibb to shiver when, asked to show the place where the man and child were standing, Coverdale pointed out a spot within yards of the place where Lesley had been found”.]

Hewlett was re-investigated for the Molseed murder and interviewed again while serving a six-year prison sentence for a sexual offence committed in 1988. In 1993 he was once again interviewed by the police, when he gave ‘no comment’ answers to all questions put to him. He was released without being charged. In March 2001, Hewlett was named by Detective Chief Superintendent Max McLean as the prime suspect in the Lesley’s murder.

[** NOTE: We reproduce here some extracts from Chapter 22 of the book ‘Innocents’, concerning evidence given by Rosalie Dolan, Raymond Hewlett’s one-time girlfriend, to police in 1992, soon after Stefan Kiszko was released from prison.

“In 1992, Detective Superintendent Trevor Wilkinson began a re-investigation into Lesley Molseed’s death.Woman Detective Constable Alison Rose was given the task of going through a box of documents, and came across ‘Action No. 588 - an interview of Raymond Hewlett by Detective Sergeant David Paxton. After Kiszko's arrest, of course, Hewlett was no longer under suspicion. D/Sgt. Paxton’s concerns included the fact that Hewlett had owned a Morris 1000 van.

“D/Sgt. Paxton had visited Hewlett's address in Todmorden and was told by Susan Hewlett that her husband had left the area ‘shortly after’ the discovery of Lesley Molseed's body.

“On 7 November 1975, D/Sgt. Paxton interviewed Hewlett at Burnley Police Station, where he was being held after being arrested for theft in Scotland. Hewlett told Paxton about a trip to Scotland he said he made on 20 September 1975 in a car he had stolen from Morecambe, together with his brother-in-law Martin Ginley and two friends, John and Michael Goodall. They were all arrested in Lachgilfield in Ayrshire, charged with breaking into caravans and remanded in Barlinne Prison until 25 September when they were bailed to attend court on 6 November 1975. Hewlett said he had returned home by train. Before then, in early September, Hewlett had taken Rosalie Dolan on a trip to Scotland in the blue van. Earlier (September 1975), Dolan and Hewlett had run away to Scotland for ten days - touring and sleeping in Hewlett's blue van. When it became cold, Hewlett had broken into a caravan and stolen a Scottish tartan which they used to keep warm. They returned to Todmorden and continued to meet weekly each Sunday.

“Hewlett stated that on 5 October 1975 he was at home with his wife until 2pm, when he went out for a walk in Central Vale Park, Todmorden, with a girl named Rosalie Dolan (then aged only 15 - a fact from he kept from D/Sgt. Paxton).

“Hewlett said he had been with Dolan until 5pm that afternoon and claimed to remember meeting a man who had owned the model shop on Halifax Road. He had then gone to the home of a friend, Gerald Shawcross, until 6.30 pm, when he returned home.

“Paxton found it suspicious that Hewlett could account for his movements on the Sunday[5 October] in fine detail, but was unable to provide details about what he had done on the Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday. Hewlett's explanation as to why he had left Todmorden so soon after the Molseed killing was that he had left for southern Ireland on the following Friday with Rosalie Dolan and remained there until 24 October, when he returned to his wife.

“Hewlett told Paxton that the Morris 1000 van had been obtained in Scotland and was a blue, ex-GPO, van. He said he had swapped a Hillman Imp for the van before Martin Ginley then sold on the van for £10. Hewlett said he was as unable to say who had the vehicle on 5 October - the day it was seen at the lay-by.

“Susan Hewlett had limited knowledge of the blue van. She thought her brother had sold it without Raymond knowing. Rosalie Dolan had confirmed Hewlett's alibi. Gerald Shawcross confirmed Hewlett visitong to his house, but did not recall the actual date.

“W/D/C Alison Rose traced Martin Ginley, who stated that he did not remember Hewlett having a Morris 1000 van and did not recall being present when Hewlett allegedly exchanged a Hillman Imp for that van.
Rose also interviewed John and Michael Goodall, who said the trip to Scotland in 1975 had been taken with the intention to rob a post office that Hewlett knew, but the plot was ended by their arrest for breaking into the caravans.

“The Goodalls [who lived in Burnely] said that Hewlett had arrived at their house in the early evening of Thursday 9 October 9, the day after Lesley's body had been found.) He had arrived in a blue Morris 1000 van, similar to a GPO van, in which all four had driven to a housing estate in Rochdale, where Hewlett said he wanted to visit his sister-in-law Margaret Ginley (Martin Ginley's ex-wife) in Rochdale. In the event, it appears he did not do so. The following day Hewlett and Dolan had left for Ireland in the van.

“Rose then visited Margaret Ginley. She lived on the Kirholt Estate, opposite the homes of James McGurgon Baillie and William McCondichie, who were close friends of Danny Molseed. The Molseeds, including Lesley, had been frequent visitors to the Baillie household. Margaret Ginley told WDC Rose that Raymond and Susan Hewlett were frequent visitors to her house and that her daughter Carol frequently visited the Hewlett house in Todmorden.

“Rose interviewed Carol Ginley, who told her that following her weekend visits to Todmorden, Raymond Hewlett would take her home. Sometimes they travelled on Hewlett's motorbike but Carol remembered that at least on one occasion she had gone home in a light blue van similar to a GPO van.

“Hewlett had denied ownership of the blue van when he was interviewed by Paxton in 1975. He had also denied visiting the Rochdale area in 1975. Rose had proved both those assertions to be false; Hewlett still owned the van at the time of Lesley's murder and he was still visiting Rochdale (Margaret Ginley) in 1975.

“Rose then established contact with Rosalie Dolan. Dolan had moved to Australia, but first spoke to WDC Rise by telephone and was then flown back to the UK at police expense. Dolan said that on 5 October, Hewlett had arranged to meet her at Todmorden market place at 5 pm. He arrived over two hours late for their meeting. Dolan said that Hewlett ‘appeared bothered’ and asked her: ‘Will you cover for me with the police?’ He made mention of theft of motor cars and Dolan agreed to cover for him. Hewlett told her to simply repeat to the police what they had done on the previous Sunday (28 September) and rehearsed the story with her. He told her that he might have to go away and asked her to go with him. She agreed to do so.

“On the day that Lesley Molseed's body was found, according to Dolan, Hewlett asked her (Wednesday 8 October at lunch-time) to run away with him again. Dolan had taken clothes with her on Thursday and Hewlett met her from school that day. They spent Thursday the night with the Goodalls in Burnley and then set off for Liverpool early the next morning. On the way, Hewlett told her that the police were looking for him, using the cameras on the side of the motorway, so they drove on ‘A’ and minor roads.

“Dolan said that, although they had little money, Hewlett decided to abandon the blue Morris van in Liverpool. That night they travelled by ferry to Dublin and then made their way to Cork, using the name of ‘Dolan’ for their lodgings. Hewlett then obtained employment picking mushrooms. Rosalie earned money by cleaning and washing for the man in the flat below them. Hewlett changed Dolan's birth certificate so it would appear that they were actually married. Dolan saidthat during that period Hewlett had been ‘quiet and withdrawn’. Hewlett and Dolan returned to England after three weeks in Ireland. The day after their arrival, Hewlett told Dolan that he was going to store their luggage at the railroad station before going out to find work and for her to wait for him on a bench. She waited for him, but he did not return. She spent the night under an upturned boat on the beach before going to the police to get help to get home.

“Rose showed Dolan the ‘Crimewatch’ reconstruction of the Molseed case, which had been broadcast some time before their interview. Dolan told the officer that the van seen at the lay-by on 5 October 1975 was similar to the vehicle Hewlett had then owned and had abandoned in Liverpool. She also recalled the damage repair to the front passenger door.

“Rose took Dolan to the A627 murder scene. Dolan recalled having visited there places but did not recall the circumstances of being there.

“In September 1991, Hewlett, on the run form Stoken Prison, was arrested as he entered Holyhead, arriving on a ferry from Ireland. He was with a woman and her three children. The woman's nine-year-old daughter complained that Hewlett had indecently assaulted her, entering her bedroom at night, fondling her and masturbating over her. The mother was advised to report the matter to the Royal Ulster Constabulary as the alleged offences had occurred in their jurisdiction. (Note this indicates the molestation had occurred in Northern Ireland). Hewlett was returned to Stoken Prison”.]

That concludes our edited extracts from Chapter 22 of ‘Innocents’. Hewlett was re-interviewed by detectives about the Lesley Molseed murder in 1993. He gave ‘no comment’ answers to all questions put to him. He was never formally charged with Lesley’s Molseed’s murder as there was ‘insufficient evidence’.

In March 2001, Hewlett was named by Detective Chief Superintendent Max McLean as the prime suspect in the Lesley’s murder.

Hewlett was described by one judge as ‘extremely dangerous’ and once featured on a Crimestoppers list of ‘Most Wanted Paedophiles’.

D. How did Raymond Hewlett get connected with the disappearance of Madeleine McCann?

In this section we trace how the name of Raymond Hewlett came to be associated with the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.

Hewlett had gone to Portugal, probably during 2002, and admitted that he had been to Praia da Luz that year, but later said he had not been back there since then. However, in May 2007, when Madeleine disappeared, Hewlett was living around 35 miles from Praia da Luz. At the time, he was said to have been moving between three towns - Vila Real de Santo Antonio, Fuzeta and Tavira - all within 60 miles of Praia da Luz. He was apparently surviving by picking up, and then selling, unwanted jumble and old car parts.

As part of their enquiries into Madeleine’s disappearance, the Portuguese located Hewlett and his family during the summer of 2007. They visited him twice, inspecting his van and voluntarily giving the police a DNA swab.

It appears that on 10 June 2007, 38 days after Madeleine disappeared, Hewlett and his family left Portugal for Morocco. He explained: “A friend gave me a broken old Mercedes and I stripped it down into parts. I knew they were worth a fortune in Morocco because I'd been there for a couple of months in 2005. You can even get good money for Mercedes nuts and bolts there. I knew people on the docks at Faro and I got the captain of a ferry to take us over for free. We stayed in Morocco, on a campsite, for two months and came back in the August. I made 300 euros from the car parts”. News articles claimed that there was no public ferry service between Faro and Morocco, but it is clear that there is commercial traffic from Faro to Morocco.

During early 2008, there were reports of a man with a ‘pock-marked face’ (see artist’s sketch in next section) having been seen close to the McCanns’ apartment in Praia da Luz. We now know from the Portuguese police files (though we did not know at the time) that they showed photographs of Hewlett to the 13-year-old girl who claimed to have seen someone near the apartment. However, she was very clear that Hewlett was not the man that she had seen. It was also revealed later that Portuguese police had spoken to Hewlett’s wife, who had apparently given him an alibi. It later emerged that the Portuguese police had established that his bank card had been used in Lisbon (3 hours away from Praia da Luz) at the time of Madeleine’s disappearance.

By August 2008, Hewlett was now in Spain, undergoing treatment for throat cancer. A report at the time said that ‘Portuguese police, acting on unknown information’ had swooped on his truck, but it was uncertain whether this was referring to the police’s earlier interview of Hewlett in 2007. It was apparently in December 2008 thatHewlett's 10-year-old son (referred to as 8-year-old in some articles) David was killed, apparently through having fallen out of the family van while the family was travelling from Spain to Germany. Spanish Police investigated the death. Hewlett was not, so far as we know, charged with any offence relating his son’s death.

By about April or May 2009, Hewlett had reached Aachen in Germany. His health was deteriorating, and his German-born wife was apparently able to get state benefits. He was now diagnosed as terminally ill with throat cancer. He was receiving treatment in a hospital. It is not known how he qualified for the cost of treatment or whether he was paying privately, or whether someone else was meeting his hospital bills.

Hewlett was apparently first brought to the attention of the British media by a British couple, Alan and Cindy Thompson.

Picture: Alan and Cindy Thompson, who once claimed they had ‘found the secret lair of Osama bin Laden’ in Pakistan

It was in late May 2009 that the Thompsons gave an account of conversations they say they had had with Hewlett in Portugal. Their accounts sparked a sudden blaze of publicity about Raymond Hewlett’s name being linked to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, which we shall examine in detail in the next section.

There is perhaps good reason for being more than a tad sceptical about the Thompsons’ claims. For ten years previously, in the spring of 1999, as the media reported: “A British couple called Alan and Cindy Thompson were driving through Pakistan, in the very area that they're now talking about as being bin Laden's location. After driving for 11 hours on dirt roads they came to a checkpoint and were detained by armed Pakistani guards. The next day the Dawn newspaper, one of the biggest newspapers in Pakistan, reported that this couple had found the secret lair of Osama bin Laden”.

By late May 2009, the McCann Team, along with the general public, had had access to most of the Portuguese Police files for several months, and would have seen the references in those files to Hewlett. But according to the McCann Team it was the Thompsons who led them to Hewlett.

From what we can now see from an examination of all the press reports, the McCann Team appears to have organised publicity linking Hewlett to Madeleine’s disappearance before they sent their new private investigation team, consisting of retired Cheshire Police detectives, Dave Edgar and Arthur Cowley, to interview Hewlett. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, Hewlett declined to see them, an occasion which led to another strong burst of publicity once again linking Hewlett’s name to Madeleine. Accompanied by many photographs of Hewlett, Madeleine, and of Dave Edgar, the McCann Team’s then senior detective, Edgar returned to the U.K. having failed to interview Hewlett. A major question mark in all this is why, instead of quietly sending their private detectives to the hospital in Aachen to talk to Hewlett, the McCann Team first made sure that there was front-page publicity in the British press linking Hewlett to Madeleine’s name.

The following month, it was reported that Hewlett had been discharged by German doctors, who apparently said that they could do nothing for him. Hewlett, Mariana and their six young children were now said to be living in ‘a squalid flat’ on the fourth floor of an Aachen tower block. Hewlett claimed at the time that he had ‘only weeks to live’.

Again amidst much publicity, the McCanns’ private detectives returned to Aachen for a second time, but this time Hewlett was deemed to be too ill to undergo intensive questioning.

In the same month (June 2009), it was also reported that West Yorkshire Police were also investigating his possible involvement with an indecent assault back in 1975, when he was 30. He was apparently interviewed in early June in Aachen by two detectives, Detective Chief Superintendent Max McLean and another officer from West Yorkshire Police.

On 14 June 2009 Hewlett gave an interview to a Sunday Mirror journalist saying that he maintained his innocence regarding the McCann case. He said he had never seen Madeleine in real life and offered to take a lie detector test or any other test. He said he had only seen Madeleine on ‘missing’ posters and once on a TV in a bar. He also said:

"It's obvious why they're interested in me. But they can all think what they like. I didn't kill the McCann girl. It's the truth and it's never going to change. There is a person who can say where I was that day, but why should I bring them into this? I've done nothing wrong. I would say to the McCanns that I know what it's like to lose a child because it's happened to me recently. I've been through hell and now I've got another hell which I don't deserve. I know for a fact that I didn't do anything wrong, but if people aren't listening, what can you do? I didn't kill the McCann girl”.

Later that year, as we now know from The Sun article, Hewlett was alleged to have written a letter saying he knew who took Madeleine. There was no reference to this, however, in what he told reporters at the time.

In a typically hyped piece in the Daily Mirror, journalist Simon Wright claimed: ‘There is a mountain of circumstantial evidence against Hewlett’.

Hewlett apparently died of cancer in December 2009 (although some reports said his death was due to ‘natural causes’), but this was not reported in the British press until April this year (2010). He was cremated in Germany. It was just one week after Hewlett’s death that a ‘mystery man’ was supposed to have suddenly appeared at the home of Hewlett’s estranged son Wayne Hewlett - but this is contradicted by reports from Hewlett’s family in April 2010 that they were completely unaware that he had died four months earlier.

Indeed, it was The Sun itself which, in first breaking the news of Hewlett’s death, reported that Hewlett’s family was unaware of his death. Here is the report, by-lined by Neil Syson:

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

‘Maddie perv’ Raymond Hewlett dies with his secrets

10 April 2010 - The Sun, Neil Syson

A PAEDOPHILE who was a prime suspect in the hunt for Madeleine McCann has died - taking any secrets he had to the grave.

Convicted child rapist Raymond Hewlett, 64, died of throat cancer and was cremated at a pauper's funeral in Germany four months ago. His ex-wife Susan, 64, and children in Telford, Shropshire, were unaware of his death.

Two private detectives hired by Maddie's parents Kate and Gerry went to Aachen, Germany, at least three times in a bid to interview Hewlett. But a source said: "He always wriggled out of it, saying he was too sick to see them. He was never eliminated from the inquiry."

Maddie, of Rothley, Leics, was three when she vanished on holiday in Portugal in May 2007. Ex-soldier Hewlett bore a close resemblance to a straggly-haired man seen lurking near the McCann apartment.

He was in Portugal when Maddie was snatched and left for Morocco three weeks later. And he told a pal he knew gipsies who sold children to perverts. Hewlett's German second wife Mariana, 35, refused to comment

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

TO BE CONTINUED IN PART TWO

by **Tony Bennett** 23.11.12 23:02

We are fully justified, in the light of The Sun’s own account five months previously, to question the truth of Wayne Hewlett claiming via The Sun in September this year that he knew of his father’s death one week afterwards.

We now go on to examine in close detail the burst of publicity about Hewlett during May and June 2009.

E. May and June 2009: A crescendo of stories connecting Hewlett to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann

The sudden rash of stories about the possible connection of Raymond Hewlett to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann appears to have begun with a report in the Daily Mirror in May 2009, just over two years after Madeleine had been reported missing.

The May Mirror article

The Mirror quoted a couple, Alan and Cindy Thompson, who explained how they had met Hewlett, his wife and six children, who were in a converted Dodge truck, travelling from campsite to campsite in the Algarve and southern Spain. The Thompsons claimed that Hewlett told him that ‘some gipsy tourists offered to buy my daughter just before Madeleine went missing’. They also recalled him mentioning a ‘business’ trip to Morocco, where there were ‘several alleged sightings of the little girl in the months after her disappearance’.

The claim that Hewlett got information about Madeleine from a gipsy has resurfaced in the latest Sun story. The Mirror story thus put into circulation a number of the key elements which have sustained this story of a connection between Hewlett and Madeleine McCann for a year-and-half.

A later Mirror report said: “Officers from Leicestershire Police have said they want to speak to two British holidaymakers who tracked down Hewlett”. Other newspapers claimed that British detectives were ‘on their way’ to interview Hewlett. One report stated: “Detectives from West Yorkshire are currently waiting for permission from the German authorities to question Hewlett…”

But Alan and Cindy Thompson didn’t merely meet Hewlett. According to a later Mirror article, the Thompsons not only raised the alarm after realising that Hewlett and his family had been staying at a campsite an hour from Praia da Luz, but also “helped to trace him to the hospital in Germany where he is being treated for throat cancer”. Just how were they able to do that, without being in touch with Hewlett either directly or indirectly? Or had they perhaps kept in touch with Hewlett since meeting him in 2007?

The Press Association report

This was followed by a full Press Association report dated 23 May 2009, just over two years after Madeleine had been reported missing.

Unlike a lot of the newspapers and the tabloids especially, the Press Association is a reliable source of news, whose journalists check their facts unusually carefully. Thus this sentence: “The McCanns' investigation team wants to interview the 64-year-old in the next few days in the hope he can shed some light on the little girl's disappearance”, could only have come from a source right at the top of the McCann Team - their official, and chief public relations officer, Clarence Mitchell.

TWO SENTENCES REDACTED AS THEY ARE CONSIDERED LIBELLOUS BY THE MCCANNS

Most of the sequence of the Hewlett press stories that we will now refer to has been helpfully collected on the website: ]www.raymondhewlett.blogspot by ‘winnower’.

We will now sketch out the development of the story of the alleged connection between Hewlett and Madeleine McCann, with the help of quotes from some of the newspaper articles of that time.

The overall theme of these articles perhaps be conveniently summarised as follows: “Hewlett is a wicked paedophile whom the Portuguese Police failed to investigate properly, along with all their other abject failures. Hewlett knows the layout of the Ocean Club Complex and was in the area of Praia da Luz at the time. He fled to Morocco suspiciously soon after Madeleine’s disappearance. There is load sof other circumstantial evidence connecting Hewlett to Madeleine’s disappearance. Only the McCanns’ private detectives are following up this important lead”.

The Press Association article began impressively: “A convicted paedophile who is being investigated over Madeleine McCann's disappearance said he was familiar with the layout of the Portuguese holiday complex where she went missing, it was reported today”. Being investigated by whom? By the McCann Team, of course. The report continued: “The McCanns' investigation team wants to interview the 64-year-old in the next few days in the hope he can shed some light on the little girl's disappearance”.

Enter Peter Verran

Then we get on to the main source for nearly all the stories connecting Hewlett to the Madeleine McCann case: Peter Verran. This is how the Press Association article explained his involvement:

“A former soldier who met Hewlett at a campsite in Morocco in May 2007 told the Sunday Mirror he admitted parking a van close to the McCann's complex on several occasions. Peter Verran, 46, said: ‘He brought Madeleine up straight away. He said his three-year-old daughter looked like her. He was worried that because there had been reports that Madeleine may have been spirited away to Morocco, people might think his child was her. Then he suddenly said, 'Madeleine's not in Morocco'. I asked him what he meant and he said he knew Praia da Luz really well. He knew the Ocean Club complex where the McCanns had been staying. He said he’d been there many times and had often parked his van close to the apartment. He said he knew the layout of the place, the flat and the restaurant where the McCanns and their friends had been eating when Maddie disappeared. He had a lot of detail about the layout. He said there was no way that the child could be taken without the parents seeing. He said they were lying’.”

We are required to believe, then, that Peter Verran was reporting this alleged conversation with total accuracy. One important point at least was incorrect; it appears that Hewlett did not travel to Morocco until 10 June, thus Verran could not have met him in Morocco in May.

Strangely, also, the final two important sentences of what Hewlett said somehow got buried in the welter of front-page tabloid stories that followed in the weeks to come. From what we now know of the precise alleged circumstances of the alleged abduction, perhaps Hewlett was right to say: “There was no way that the child could be taken without the parents seeing. They were lying”.

We are then given some particulars about Peter Verran. He was an ex-Scots Guard, and previously lived in Telford, Shropshire, and Blackpool. In passing, we might note that Hewlett too was a Scots Guard for nine months, and that he too lived in Blackpool and Shropshire for a while. Indeed his wife and his children now live in Shropshire. In other articles, we learn that he was in the British Army for six years before going on to work with people with learning disabilities. Another article said he now had an antiques business in Fowey, Cornwall. He was said to be in Morocco ‘on honeymoon’.

The Press Association reported that West Yorkshire Police Officers would question Hewlett first, then the McCann Team’s investigators hoped to do so.

Then there was a quote from Clarence Mitchell: “Mr Hewlett has denied any involvement in Madeleine's abduction. Our investigators hope he will see sense and co-operate by giving them whatever information needed so they can eliminate him from the investigation. It's clear the man is ill and it is clear he has information that our investigators need. It is also clear that our investigators will be speaking to him in the near future”. Mitchell was quoted as saying that he hoped the British police would ‘facilitate’ an interview with Hewlett for the McCann detectives.

Mitchell was 100% wrong in saying that the McCann Team’s investigators ‘will be speaking to Hewlett in the near future’. They never did, in fact. Mitchell also claimed that it was ‘clear’ that Hewlett had information that would assist the McCanns. That, too has not been established. Hewlett and his wife did however go on to speak to journalists.

The Press Association report continued by quoting a spokesman for West Yorkshire Police: “We have made contact with the German authorities. We are just waiting for clearance so we can actually go and speak to him regarding that incident”.

They added that on Friday 22 May: “The McCanns' private investigators flew back to the UK from Portugal, where they have been chasing up information received from the public since a blaze of publicity around the second anniversary of Madeleine's disappearance. It is understood the leads include the names of a number of suspects”. It gave the impression of an active investigation hot on the heels of several ‘suspects’. The press lapped up and recycled these seemingly promising reports of many new ‘leads’.

Sunday Mirror, 24 May

A story by-lined by Simon Wright in the Sunday Mirror on 24 May developed the story helpfully for the McCanns. This time the Sunday Mirror article added these details:

Hewlett had been outside the McCanns’ apartment ‘many times’ and knew about the layout of the Ocean Club complex in great detail
He had parked his van ‘close to the complex on several occasions’
Peter Verran, who at the time had been on a campsite at Chefchaouen, Morocco, was now quoted as saying that Hewlett was ‘obsessed with the Madeleine McCann case’; it was said that he had spoken ‘exclusively’ to the Sunday Mirror. He claimed that he met Hewlett at ‘the toilet block’ where Hewlett immediately started talking about Madeleine and said he also had a three-year-old daughter.

Peter Verran is then quoted as saying: “[Hewlett] said it was common knowledge among locals that Praia da Luz in general and the Ocean Club in particular was a magnet for Romanian gipsies who abduct and then sell children”. As far as we are aware, that claim is totally without foundation. No-one has been able to trace any credible media reports of gipsies stealing very young children to order.

Next, Simon Wright slants his story to make Hewlett’s actions sound very suspicious. Verran is quoted as saying: “I asked [Hewlett] why he'd left and come to Morocco. He told me he'd had to leave Portugal in a hurry. He said he'd packed his family up in half an hour and just driven out of the area. That was just after Maddie was taken”. Here we have classic examples of tabloid journalism. The double claim of ‘leaving in a hurry’…‘half-an-hour’ to pack up, combined with Hewlett allegedly fleeing to Morocco ‘just after’ Madeleine was taken, would have created an obvious suspicion in the minds of readers that Hewlett was directly involved in abducting Madeleine.

A honeymoon for the Verrans: dining together with the Hewletts

As we hear more of Verran’s story, it is clear however that his information about Hewlett did not come merely from a conversation in the toilet black, as we heard earlier.

Verran told the Mirror: “Me and Nisrine would eat meals with Hewlett's family…thekids were a bit weird. They were very withdrawn and couldn't speak properly. They never went to school and spent all day playing in the mud”.

We can deduce from this that there was on ongoing relationship between Mr and Mrs Verran and Mr and Mrs Hewlett and their family, where they were happy to eat together while the Hewletts’ ‘very withdrawn’ children ‘played all day in the mud’. Indeed, Verran is quoted later as referring to ‘the three months they were all together’. This would be the period June through August (see below), though the Sunday Mirror on 21 June told us that the Verrans “shared a Moroccan campsite with Hewlett between June and November 2007”. Unfortunately Verran never gave us the date he first encountered Hewlett in Morocco. It is reasonable to assume that it was after 10 June when Hewlett said he travelled to Morocco from Portugal.

One would like to know a lot more about what brought these two families seemingly quite close together. As the Verrans were said to be ‘on honeymoon’, it was clearly a long honeymoon, maybe lasting until November if the Sunday Mirror report is correct, and a strange one if they were regularly dining with the Hewletts.

And it is clear that the relationship continued after they parted company in August. The Verrans says they returned to Britain in November 2007 and ‘had occasional texts or phone calls from Hewlett’ after Hewlett told them he was ‘back in Tavira’. Verran then adds that, in June 2008, he rang the Hewletts only to be informed that he had throat cancer. Then, at some future date, Verran continues: “He called to ask for money and I sent him £50. I couldn't bear the thought of his kids starving. I even offered to pay for him to come back to the U.K. I didn't get a reply and we lost touch”. Sending Hewlett £50 seems inconsistent with Verran’s claim (see below) that ‘Hewlett was never short of money’.

Verran then adds how shocked he was to learn about Hewlett’s past as a serial molester of teenage and younger girls: “Suddenly this week he was in the newspapers linked to Maddie's disappearance. I could hardly believe my eyes. It was such a massive shock. It makes my blood run cold. We haven't been able to sleep much since the news broke. I just thought he was an odd drifter. I pray he hasn't had anything to do with it”.

Then we have a classic bit of media spin. Verran is quoted as saying: “He went on and on about the McCanns and kept telling me all his theories about what he thought had happened. Looking back, maybe it was a way of making sure we didn't think he had anything to do with it”.

Once again, the reader could be forgiven to thinking there was something deeply suspicious about Hewlett theorising about the Madeleine McCann case, whereas in fact at this time (June 2007) millions across the world were following and discussing the case eagerly - and many were giving generously to the McCanns’ fund in the hope that the funds could be used to find Madeleine. Suspicion of Hewlett in the reader’s mind would be increased by reading the following quote from Verran: “Most of the time he stayed on the campsite. He was never short of money…I don't know where he got his money from. He said he'd made cash from car boot sales”.

Further on in the article we are told: “One day in August 2007, Hewlett announced he and his family were leaving. He said his wife's visa had run out and his passport was out of date. They packed up and left quickly”.

The Mirror gave details of his previous criminal record, but added that he was apparently wanted for questioning by two police forces: “Hewlett is also wanted for questioning by West Yorkshire Police over a child sex attack in 1975 and by Greater Manchester Police investigating the 1975 abuse of an eight-year old girl”. It was perhaps all the more remarkable that the Thompson knew where Hewlett was, but the combined efforts of West Yorkshire and Greater Manchester police forces had been for years unable to locate him.

One question arises: Did Peter Verran genuinely come up with all this new information about Hewlett just because he read a newspaper article that very week? Or had he had some prior contact with the McCann Team?

Hewlett to give a DNA sample

The next newspaper to take the ‘Hewlett story’ further was the Daily Star on 25 May. They reported, under the headline: ‘Madeleine suspect in DNA test’, that the McCanns’ private detectives (former Detective Inspector Dave Edgar and former Detective Sergeant Arthur Cowley) had by now flown to see Hewlett in Germany in order to get him to take a DNA test, and to ‘hunt for clues’. A similar story was repeated in the Daily Express.

The one thing that cried out for explanation, but which the newspaper could not tell us, was how getting hold of Hewlett’s DNA could possibly help the McCanns’ private investigation. Did they already have a sample of DNA somehow collected by the Portuguese or Leicestershire Police in connection with Madeleine’s disappearance? Of course not. Did it even occur to the newspaper to ask why Hewlett’s DNA could help the investigation? Once again, this had all the hallmarks of a Clarence Mitchell-placed newspaper story. It seems that Mitchell’s mesmeric hold over the British press was so powerful that they could not raise this obvious question.

The Star article continued: “German authorities want the 64-year-old…to have a DNA test in the next few days…the McCanns' investigators cannot force him to co-operate”. Another newspaper was more definite: “German police also plan to take a DNA swab from Hewlett to check it against traces obtained during the Madeleine investigation conducted by Portuguese police”. But as far as we can see, these were all claims supplied to the media by the McCann Team. We have been unable to trace any quotes on this subject from German police spokesmen at the time.

Mitchell was of course quoted in the article: “[The McCanns’ private detectives] hope he will give them whatever information needed so they can eliminate him from the investigation”.

Not for the first nor the last time, Mitchell was sounding like the Head of Communications for the Metropolitan Police. In an article in the Daily Mail the same day, they reported that: ‘Although Hewlett is ‘a person of interest’ to the McCanns' investigation, their spokesman has stressed he is only ‘one lead among many’.

Hewlett knew Praia da Luz ‘very well’

The Mail’s headline loaded with innuendo: ‘Monster boasted he knew Maddie resort ‘very well’.’ Pausing there, it is doubtful of course whether anyone remotely connected with Madeleine’s disappearance would be likely to boast of such knowledge. The article included a declaration by Hewlett’s wife that Hewlett was ‘innocent of anything to do with Madeleine’s disappearance’. The Mail report repeated the claim that ‘Hewlett lived in the Algarve but packed up and left for Morocco ‘shortly after’ Madeleine disappeared’. They also quoted Hewlett himself, who apparently the previous week has said: “I've done nothing wrong - nothing, nothing”. Many other newspapers carried similar reports that day, including the Daily Telegraph, the Irish Independent, the Liverpool Echo and the Yorkshire Post.

Hewlett’s mobile ’phone to be checked

The Liverpool Echo had a new angle on the story, however, reporting that: “The ’phone of a convicted paedophile may be checked to discover where he was on the day Madeleine McCann disappeared”. There was a different quote from Mitchell within the article: “It's clear the man is ill and it is clear he has information that our investigators need”. The Daily Express added: “It is also clear that our investigators will be speaking to him in the near future”.

The McCann Team seemed very sure that Hewlett could yield useful information.

Leicestershire Police interview the Thompsons on 24 May 2009

It was the Daily Mirror who then broke new ground in the developing story. An article by Ryan Parry & Stephen Moyes on 24 May claimed that: “The couple who raised the alarm about paedophile Ray Hewlett told yesterday how detectives who interviewed them asked: ‘Do you still have his mobile number?’ Alan and Cindy Thompson were questioned for three hours at the weekend by officers from Leicestershire Police's Madeleine McCann task force [the article said that the interview had been carried out at Limehouse Police Station, east London]. Cindy, who handed over the foreign number, said yesterday: ‘The detective who interviewed me asked for Ray's number. He didn't say what they'll do with it, I just hope it helps in some way’.

The report went on: “Officers hope to use the number to access ’phone company records dating back to May 3, 2007, the day Madeleine vanished from the Portuguese resort of Praia da Luz. The records will show which mobile ’phone masts Hewlett's ’phone connected to on specific dates. The information may help officers track Hewlett’s movements the night Madeleine went missing and over the following days.

“Alan said the detective who spoke to him was keen for information about the dilapidated Dodge truck Hewlett was driving at the time Madeleine vanished and which he later took to Morocco. Alan added: ‘The officer asked what sort of truck it was and where I thought it was now. I told him it was a very distinctive blue Dodge truck with English plates, maybe beginning with a D or a G. I also told them that friends in Portugal told me that the truck is in Alvor, a town near Albufeira in the Algarve”.

For that story to have appeared at all, the Thompsons were clearly in direct and immediate contact with a Daily Mirror journalist. The story helped to perpetuate in readers’ minds that Hewlett might well have been in Praia da Luz on the very day Madeleine was reported missing.

‘Doctors refuse to allow Hewlett to give a DNA test’ - reports on 26 May

‘Docs bar DNA test on Maddie suspect’, ran the headline on the Daily Star on 26 May, in an article by Jerry Lawton. A sub-heading added: ‘Hospital turns away ex-coppers’, saying that they had been refused entry into the hospital. What these and other newspapers failed to tell its readers was that, back in 2007, or possibly in 2008, the Portuguese police had already taken a DNA swab from Hewlett and ruled him out for that and for other reasons from any involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance.

Quite why the McCanns or any British police force would want Hewlett’s DNA, though, is a mystery. As the Sunday Tribune very sensibly pointed out in an article on 21 June: “While Hewlett allowed a blood sample to be drawn for DNA profiling, this might be yet another crafty ploy. He is undoubtedly well aware that the Portuguese police did not find any DNA evidence from the missing child against which a suspect’s DNA could be compared”.

The Star made a further misleading claim, namely that ‘[Hewlett’s] description matches a man with a droopy moustache seen carrying off a little blonde girl that night’. This was misleading in two separate respects.

First, the artist’s impression of a ‘man with a droopy moustache’ showed a man probably in his 30s, and with plenty of hair, not 62 as Hewlett was. Second, the man described as having been seen by the McCanns’ friend Jane Tanner was said to be aged around 35, had longish black hair, and Tanner made no mention of a moustache. Leaving aside the major question marks over Jane Tanner’s changing stories about the man she claimed to have seen, the Star badly misled its readers by suggesting, in effect, that Jane Tanner might have seen Hewlett take Madeleine away from the McCanns’ apartment.

The Daily Express the same day had a different ‘take’ on the story. Leading with the headline: ‘Portugal police ignore 4 new Madeleine leads’, they claimed that ‘a source close to the [Portuguese] investigation’ had told four callers ‘in the past week’ who had rung in with potentially useful information: “She is dead…don’t bother us with new information”. That would have reinforced public perceptions, generated by false media reporting of the facts, that the Portuguese investigation was not only bungling and incompetent but also, in part, deliberately not trying to ‘find Madeleine’.

The Express then quoted ‘a family friend of the McCanns’ - one of the stock phrases used by the press to refer to their spokesman Clarence Mitchell - saying: “It's a disgrace frankly. It's beyond frustrating. It is exactly the attitude that we have been up against for months. They closed the inquiry and were not prepared to lift a finger. Yet Kate and Gerry's team are still providing the Portuguese with information”.

The Express added that Hewlett was now considered ‘a vital lead’ by the McCanns, quoting their senior investigator Dave Edgar as saying: “If he has nothing to hide he should speak to us. His evidence may be crucial but we won't know until we have spoken to him. "We want to know where he was when Madeleine McCann went missing. We want to eliminate him from our inquiry as quickly as possible. It is a matter of urgency because of his medical condition. We can't get through the hospital authorities. We have sent a message to Mr Hewlett that we want to speak to him”.

The Express added this quote from ‘the McCanns’ spokesman’: "Raymond Hewlett is now well aware that the investigators helping Kate and Gerry McCann wish to speak to him. Clearly, if he is to be eliminated from their inquiries, it is incumbent on Mr Hewlett to talk to the investigators”, while the ‘family friend’ was quoted as adding: “You would have to ask yourself why Hewlett was not prepared to co-operate”.

The Express did reveal, however, that the McCanns’ detectives had spoken to Mrs Hewlett. Investigator Dave Edgar was quoted as saying: “We spent 10 minutes with Mariana last night. We sent a message through her that we need to talk to him”.

The Sun confronts Raymond Hewlett - 27 May

The suspicions against Hewlett were mightily stoked by an article in The Sun on Wednesday 27 May. Two Sun journalists had tried to corner Hewlett and interview him, in the process capturing the moment the two journalists challenged him with some questions. The article, complete with dramatic photograph, blared: ‘CONFRONTED - This is the moment The Sun confronted paedophile Raymond Hewlett over Madeleine McCann's disappearance”.

The article continued: “We stepped in to grill the convicted child abuser after he stonewalled private eyes acting for Maddie's parents Gerry and Kate. British fugitive Hewlett emerged as a suspect after it was revealed he lived near Praia da Luz when Maddie went missing from the Portuguese resort - and was said to be obsessed by the case.

We caught up with the foul-mouthed fiend as he sat in a wheelchair, gawping at passers-by including children, outside a hospital in Aachen, Germany. He is being treated there for throat cancer.

This is how the confrontation unfolded:

THE SUN: Can you speak to us about Madeleine McCann?

HEWLETT: I don't know what you're talking about.

[Picture: Wanted ... child passes Hewlett before we quizzed him]

SUN: Did you have anything to do with the disappearance of Madeleine McCann?

HEWLETT: No answer

SUN: Could you tell us where you were when Madeleine McCann disappeared?

HEWLETT: It's got nothing to do with you.

SUN: Why don't you eliminate yourself from the inquiry for the sake of the McCanns?

HEWLETT: I don't have to speak to you. F*** off.

SUN: Why haven't you spoken to the detectives?

HEWLETT: I will. Just f*** off out of here. I've done nothing wrong.

SUN: Well, you've been on the run for more than 30 years and you're wanted for questioning by West Yorks Police.

HEWLETT: What for? I don't believe it.

SUN: A sexual assault on an eight-year-old girl in 1975.

At this point Hewlett, who lives in Aachen with partner Mariana, 33, and their six kids, let fly with another four-letter volley before leaping from the wheelchair and dashing inside the hospital.

[ Picture: The McCanns' detectives flew home yesterday after their attempts to talk to Hewlett foundered ]

But they insisted an interview WILL be arranged later.

[Picture: Missing...Maddie]

Meanwhile in Portugal, the team was working on fresh information about another suspect seen lurking near the McCanns' apartment when Maddie, then three, vanished in 2007.

Pursued

The man was the subject of 100 pages of the Portuguese police's file on the case - but was not pursued after insisting he was in the nation's capital Lisbon at the time.

A source close to the private probe said the suspect has a rented apartment in Praia da Luz and is of "significant interest". His alibi was described as "a bit shaky".

It also emerged there have been SEVEN sex attacks on children of British tourists in the Algarve over the last four years. All involved kids molested during break-ins.

Written by a.west@the-sun.co.uk

Sunday Mirror 31 May

The Sunday Mirror continued the story on 31 May with an article by-lined by Justin Penrose, headed: ‘Cops probe Maddie pervert’s quick escape from Portugal’. The claim now was that “British police probing the disappearance of Madeleine McCann want to know why paedophile Raymond Hewlett left Portugal so quickly after she vanished”. The article referred to Leicestershire Police questioning Peter Verran ‘about his three months in Morocco with Hewlett’. Again Verran was quoted as saying that Hewlett left Portugal ‘shortly after’ Madeleine vanished. Readers were again not told that ‘shortly after’ meant 38 days after.

Another quote from Verran increased the innuendo against Hewlett. The Sunday Mirror article continued: “Police also wanted to know how the convicted paedophile and drifter could afford to flee to North Africa, which would have cost him around £1,000. They want to find out if he was paid a large cash sum - and how he got his six children there without passports. Verran said: ‘If he managed to get six in there, was no reason he couldn't get seven’.” The article added: “The [Leicestershire] detective took note of Hewlett's two mobile numbers and email address to track calls and messages at the time Madeleine was taken”. The article did not make clear, however, that most mobile telephone companies do not hold mobile records for longer then two years.

The following day, the Leicester Mercury had a different angle on the story. They claimed: “Hewlett has said he was prepared to meet with the [McCanns’ detectives]. Their spokesman Clarence Mitchell told the newspaper: Clarence Mitchell, said: “Hewlett has indicated he is prepared to speak to the private investigators helping Kate and Gerry. That interview is in the process of being arranged. It is likely to take place in the next few days”. We will go on later to examine the Sunday Mirror’s report of an interview presumably between one of its journalists and the Hewletts. There has never been any mention, however, of Hewlett ever meeting with any of the McCanns’ private investigators, despite Mitchell’s professed optimism.

The paper went further, claiming: “Detectives [i.e. the McCann private investigators] have also revealed that four new witnesses have been uncovered. All are reported to have been living near Praia da Luz at the time the youngster, from Rothley, disappeared.Mitchell was again quoted: “Our investigations are continuing to provide a number of leads and a number of names have been suggested to them as people of potential interest. They are working through these”. Plainly, the McCann Team wanted the public to focus on what we might term ‘the Hewlett angle’. The newspapers were buzzing with new stories. Mitchell added: “The recent flurry of activity has brought strength to Kate and Gerry”.

Picture Dr Kate McCann and Dr Gerald McCann

The long Sunday Mirror article 14 June 2009: Hewlett interviewed

The Sunday Mirror’s Simon Wright developed the story further on 14 June, with a headline: ‘But I didn’t kill Maddie’, and a sub-heading: ‘Key suspect talks for first time’. If there was any doubt that the paper was once again placing Hewlett at the heart of the mystery of why Madeleine McCann disappeared, further sub-headings like these left us in no doubt:

‘YES I'm a convicted paedophile

‘YES I lived near Praia da Luz

‘YES I look like police drawing

‘YES I did flee area to Morocco’.

This was a very long article; we’ll pick out the highlights. Here are some extracts:

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

CONTINUED IN PART THREE

by **Tony Bennett** 23.11.12 23:04

This was a very long article; we’ll pick out the highlights. Here are some extracts:

“Broken, frail, with only weeks to live, Raymond Hewlett is the man the McCanns fear could take the secrets of their daughter's disappearance to the grave…he sits hunched up in a squalid, cramped, sparse German flat, gasping for breath as he finally breaks his silence. He wastes away on the fourth floor of a tower block, close to death. Doctors discharged him from hospital, telling him there is nothing more they can do for him, and his weight has plummeted to just 7 stone. His voice so weak it is at times barely audible.

“He is holed up on the apartment with wife Mariana, 33, and six young children. The family arrived there six weeks ago as his health deteriorated, and Mariana is able to get state benefits. ‘It's obvious why they're interested in me’, croaks Hewlett, 64. ‘But they can all think what they like. I didn't kill the McCann girl. It's the truth and it's never going to change’. [Hewlett]…speaks out for the first time in a bid to clear his name amid the mountain of circumstantial evidence against him.

“In hiding ever since he was named in connection with the case, he admits he was in the Algarve at the time Madeleine was snatched and, as our pictures show, he looks strikingly similar to a sketch of a suspect with a pock-marked face seen lurking around the apartment. Five weeks after she disappeared, he left Portugal for Morocco for a two-month-long ‘business trip’. He is REFUSING to give an alibi for the night Madeleine, three, vanished. ‘I have an alibi but why should I share it?’, he says, struggling for air with each syllable. There is a person who can say where I was that day, but why should I bring them into this? I've done nothing wrong. Why should I have to prove it? My life's been made a misery for something I know nothing about and a crime I've not committed. I'd take a lie-detector test. The only time I've seen Madeleine McCann is on missing posters. And I saw her on TV in a bar once. But I've never seen her in real life. Yes I've been to Praia da Luz, but not since 2002.

“But those claims contradict what former Scots Guard Mr Verran, 46, says Hewlett told him - that he was in and around Praia da Luz at the time Madeleine disappeared in May 2007.

“The McCanns' private detectives first became aware of father-of-six Hewlett in February this year when his name was given to them during local door-to-door inquiries. His distinctive live-in Dodge truck, large family and bizarre nomad lifestyle singled him out. The McCanns' investigators began searching for him, keen to eliminate him from inquiries. Portuguese detectives told U.K. officers they were unaware of his existence until the McCann team uncovered his name.

“But bizarrely, Hewlett tells the Sunday Mirror he was visited twice by Portuguese police over the Maddie case and gave detectives a DNA swab and fingerprints, although he was never arrested or quizzed. The McCanns' investigators are unsure whether to believe him or the detectives in Portugal. Hewlett says that Portuguese police, acting on unknown information, swooped on his truck while he had throat cancer treatment across the border in Spain in August 2008. He also says that local police helping in the search for Maddie visited him, wife Mariana and their children in the summer of 2007.

"He says: ‘They checked that all the children living with us were ours. Our youngest girl looks a bit like her. But they saw everything was O.K. and they left. The police came again in August last year and told Mariana it was about the McCann girl. They asked for me and Mariana told them I was in hospital. They came to see me and asked permission to take DNA and fingerprints. I was very sick and barely able to speak to them. They asked where we parked in the Algarve in the first half of 2007. I told them, 'You know where we've been because you know us round there. I knew why they were asking, because I'd seen the TV and newspapers. By then, that McCann kid's photo was in every shop and supermarket you went in to. I've got previous convictions for child-sex crimes so my heart sank. I thought, 'Oh no, here we go again’.

"I was miles from the UK but it didn't make any difference. I'd tried hard to build a new life. But the reality for me is that my past convictions will never go away. I gave them their DNA and fingerprints. I knew they were just doing their job but I was angry. I had cancer and no money’.

“At the time Madeleine vanished, Hewlett and his family were moving between three towns in the Algarve - Vila Real de Santo Antonio, Fuzeta and Tavira - all within 60 miles of Praia da Luz. Hewlett…was a mechanic on a tourist boat and Mariana worked as a cleaner for the boat's owners on the Mediterranean island of Elba. They embarked on a tour of Europe in the converted Dodge truck. He had installed beds for their children, a sink, cooker and shower. At that point the couple had four children - David, 10, who died when he fell from their moving truck in December last year, Michael, nine, Anya, eight, and Jobe, seven, who were all born in Germany. Yanina, six, and Paul, three, were born during their travels across the Algarve, and the youngest Daniel, now six-and a-half months, was born in Spain.

“Hewlett says he was 60 miles away - in Vila Real de Santo Antonio - when Maddie was taken. Crucially, he says he cannot specifically remember being there that day. Hewlett said: ‘May 3 was a Thursday and I was always in Vila Real Santo Antonio on Thursdays. My routine never altered. That's 60 miles from Praia da Luz. If you asked people there if we were there on that day, I don't know what they'd say. Maybe they can't remember. If you ask them if we were normally there, they'd say yes. If it wasn't for the fact that we were living the way we were, I wouldn't be able to say so clearly that that was where I was. As far as I'm concerned, I don't have to prove anything. Our truck was our only vehicle. I didn't have another vehicle to go anywhere in. It's a high profile vehicle. Once you see it, you never forget it. It was like that purposefully because I wanted people to see us. I didn't want to be hiding’.

“But he claims that a female friend who shot a home video of him and his family on May 5 - two days after Maddie vanished - could vouch for his whereabouts on May 3. The 30-min video - seen by the Irish Sunday Mirror - shows Hewlett, Mariana and their seven children laughing at the camera and playing games with each other at a market they regularly attended in the Portuguese town of Fuzeta every Sunday, less than 40 miles from Praia da Luz. His youngest daughter Yanina bears a striking resemblance to missing Maddie. He says: ‘The friend who made the video would remember where I was two days earlier. She could tell anyone where I was. But I haven't asked her and I don't intend to. Why should I ask her? Why should I keep dragging people in to this. I don't like being in it, so why should I keep putting people's names forward so that they get bothered with it too? I could ask her, but if she says no, then sorry, the answer is no’.

“A month later, on June 10, Hewlett left Portugal and took his family to Morocco. He said: ‘A friend gave me a broken old Mercedes and I stripped it down into parts. I knew they were worth a fortune in Morocco because I'd been there for a couple of months in 2005. You can even get good money for Mercedes nuts and bolts there. I knew people on the docks at Faro and I got the captain of a ferry to take us over for free. We stayed in Morocco for two months and came back in the August. I made 300 euros from the car parts’. Shaking with pain, he repeats: ‘I didn't kill the McCann girl’.

Hewlett was last month tracked down by the McCanns' detectives to a hospital in Aachen, Germany, where he was undergoing treatment. The detectives had hoped to put a series of questions to him but he refused to see them and they were forced to return to the UK empty-handed. This week, they travelled there for a second time but he was deemed too ill to undergo intensive questioning.

The Sunday Mirror then rounded off its article with a list of bullet points, meant top underline their claim about ‘a mountain of circumstantial evidence’ against Hewlett, under the heading: ‘Why McCanns want to quiz him’. Here is that list:

Because…

1. He's a convicted paedophile who has served U.K. jail sentences for sex attacks on children [/size]Lived an hour's drive from Praia Da Luz at the time Maddie vanished

2. Bears a striking resemblance to the pock-marked suspect seen acting suspiciously near the Ocean Club

3. He refuses to give a specific alibi

4. Gave DNA samples but was never quizzed or eliminated

5. Told a friend he knew the Ocean Club complex and visited Praia da Luz

6. He fled across sea to Morocco ‘soon after’ Madeleine was taken
Picture: ‘Droopy moustache’ man ‘Pock-marked face’ man

Then the Sunday Mirror adds a list of further bullet points under this heading: ‘Why Hewlett claims he's innocent’:

He says he was 60 miles away from Praia Da Luz on May 3, 2007
He insists he hasn't even been there since 2002
His only way of driving to Praia Da Luz, his converted Dodge truck, was home to wife and six children
He appears on a home video filmed on May 5, 2007 - just two days after Madeleine vanished - looking totally calm and relaxed
Insists he has alibi from un-named pal he doesn't want to 'drag into it'

Analysis of the Sunday Mirror article 14 June 2009

This article deserves very close analysis. It claims to be a record of a conversation that presumably took place a few days before the article was published. We are not told who Hewlett spoke to, though we are told that Hewlett gave the Irish Sunday Mirror a copy of the video his female friend made of the family in a market place in Fuzeta on 5 May 2007, two days after Madeleine disappeared.

The lead-up to this interview appears to have been as follows. The article tells us that: ‘The McCanns' private detectives first became aware of father-of-six Hewlett in February this year when his name was given to them during local door-to-door inquiries’. We are not told where these alleged ‘house-to-house inquiries’ took place, but it sounds impressive. The picture painted is of the McCanns’ private detectives spending hours, days, weeks, going from door to door in search of clues.

Then the McCann detectives are said to have traced him, in May, to the hospital in Aachen. Hewlett is then quoted as saying he doesn’t want to speak to the McCanns’ detectives. Then we are told that the hospital authorities have refused to allow the McCann detectives into the hospital. We are told that he is terminally ill, with only a few weeks to live, etc., yet despite all that, the Mirror journalist is able to visit him at home in his flat. Hewlett has apparently been discharged from hospital. In that time, he has, despite his health, consented to a long interview with a journalist. One question arises: was Hewlett paid by the Mirror for his story? If so, how much?

Next let us look at the different claims made about the Portuguese police and Hewlett. According to the article: ‘Portuguese detectives told U.K. officers they were unaware of his existence until the McCann Team uncovered his name’. That was of course flatly contradicted by Hewlett and the Portuguese police.

Hewlett’s account is that police visited him twice. First, in ‘the summer of 2007’, when local Portuguese police are said to have visited him and his family on their campsite. And then, in August 2008, when he was in Spain, when he is said to have given the police a DNA swab and fingerprints.

The article says that the McCanns' investigators are unsure whether to believe Hewlett (who said the police had checked up on him twice), or believe the detectives in Portugal (who said they had no knowledge of Hewlett…‘unaware of his existence’).

The article makes the claim the Hewlett ‘looks strikingly similar to a sketch of a suspect with a pock-marked face seen lurking around the apartment’. Now we have a different artist’s sketch, a man with a ‘pock-marked face’, said to match Hewlett. Earlier we saw how ‘the man with the moustache’ was supposed to have looked like Hewlett, and was also supposed to have looked like the man Jane Tanner said she saw. However, this supposed sighting was of someone seen in the days before the McCanns were in Portugal that year. It is also a moot point, to say the least, whether there is any resemblance between the drawing of a ‘pock-marked’ man and Hewlett, let alone the claim that they looked ‘strikingly similar’.

Then we have confirmation that Hewlett left Portugal for Morocco on 10 June. That was more than a month and a week after Madeleine McCann was reported missing - 38 days. That is hardly consistent with the media’s repeated claims that Hewlett ‘fled to Morocco shortly after Madeleine disappeared’.

The Sunday Mirror contrasts two claims about where Hewlett was on 3 May, when Madeleine disappeared. Hewlett says he was in Fuzeta at the time. But the Sunday Mirror says: “Those claims contradict what Verran says Hewlett told him - that he was in and around Praia da Luz at the time Madeleine disappeared”. But according to the statements of Verran that we’ve referred to in this article, he has not previously been reported as saying that Hewlett was in Praia da Luz, merely that he was living about an hour’s drive away. The Sunday Mirror appears to be guilty, therefore, of bending Verran’s claims about where Hewlett was living at the time, to suit their story. Verran had never alleged that he was ‘in and around’ Praia da Luz the day Madeleine disappeared. Only that he was an hour’s drive away. Moreover, the Portuguese police noted that around the time of Madeleine’s disappearance, Hewlett’s credit card had been used in Lisbon.

Other newspapers develop the Hewlett story after 14 June

The Daily Express continued the story the next day, with the headline: ‘Maddie: I didn’t kill her says paedophile’. The Express story, however, focussed on yet another angle - namely, whether Hewlett had personally ever seen Madeleine or not. Hewlett had told the Sunday Mirror reporter: “The only time I've seen Madeleine McCann is on missing posters. And I saw her on TV in a bar once. But I've never seen her in real life”.

Now the Daily Express told its readers: “Detectives working for Madeleine's parents Kate and Gerry McCann yesterday said they were keen to interview Hewlett. They wanted to clear up suggestions that he had seen Madeleine twice before she vanished, at the age of three, in May 2007”. This came about because there were also claims, as set out in a later article by the Independent on Sunday (see below) and elsewhere, that he had told a German newspaper that he had once seen Madeleine.

The Independent on Sunday reported: “In an apparent about-turn on Thursday, Hewlett told a German newspaper: ‘Yes, I saw Maddie’. However, he later recanted the statement. He allegedly admitted seeing Madeleine twice, apparently describing to the German paper ‘a distinctive mark in her right eye’.” As far as we are aware, however, no-one knows which German newspaper this is supposed to have been. It seems highly unlikely, whatever the circumstances, that Hewlett would admit to having seen Madeleine twice, even if he had done so. Possibly, as it was a German magazine that he had been speaking to, there was a mistranslation somewhere along the line.

Did Hewlett over own a white Mercedes van?

A few days later, on 19 June, a report by Stephen Moyes in the Mirror raised yet another new point. Under the heading: ‘Maddy man’s lie - Paedo’s story falling apart’, it claimed that ‘Maddie suspect’ Hewlett was ‘today sensationally back in the frame’ after ‘being caught lying’.

The Mirror reported: “The paedophile insisted he drove only a distinctive blue truck at the time the youngster vanished. But former pal Peter Verran, 46, says Hewlett, 64, had a white Mercedes van - similar to one seen near the McCanns' apartment…he said Hewlett told him he had driven from Portugal's Algarve to Spain in the Mercedes van around the time Madeleine vanished”.

This of course was hearsay evidence. Verran had never seen this white van. It is important to remember that Verran is the only source for the claim that Hewlett also had a white van. Moreover, Verran does not appear to have mentioned this white van in any of his earlier interviews with newspapers. He appears to suddenly recall a conversation about a white van. The possible existence of a white van had never been mentioned until a couple of weeks previously. As a Mirror article said: “Last month it was revealed a witness had seen a man apparently staking out the McCanns' apartment, standing near a white van”. Did Verran embellish his account to bring a white van into his story?

A fuller version of the Mirror story said: “Pervert Raymond Hewlett's lies were unravelling last night…”, and repeated Verran’s claim, adding: “Ex-Scots Guard Peter Verran, 46, decided to contact the Maddy inquiry team after being disturbed by Hewlett's claims in our sister paper, the Sunday Mirror. Mr Verran, who befriended Hewlett on a campsite in Morocco in June 2007, said: ‘He told me he owned a white Transit-type van before his blue Dodge truck. He said he'd swapped it for the Dodge in order to leave Portugal and travel to Morocco. The white van didn't have enough room for the whole family, so he sold it to a pal who traded on the same market as him in Fuzeta, about 40 miles from Praia da Luz’.”

One interesting point about Verran’s claim is that he had earlier told the media that Hewlett had to ‘flee’ Portugal (on 10 June), ‘packing up everything in just half-an-hour’. How could Hewlett have swapped his white Mercedes van for a blue Dodge truck within that half-an-hour?

Furthermore, we heard earlier, and from many sources, that Hewlett and his family were living in a camper van, or truck, and moving from place to place in Portugal and other countries, yet Verran claims: “The white van didn't have enough room for the whole family”. The obvious question that arises there is: ‘If there wasn’t enough room for the family in the car, where were they all living?’ Verran doesn’t tell us that.

Still a further reason for doubting Verran is that he seems to be more than willing to play out all these issues in the media. He doesn’t quietly tell Leicestershire Police about the white van. Instead, he tells the McCanns’ detectives - and the McCann Team then makes very sure they get yet another front-page headline out of it.

Indeed, to help the publicity along, the McCann Team came up with a very strong line for the Mirror, who quoted ‘a source close to the Maddy inquiry team’ - probably by Mitchell. Or if it was by someone else, Mitchell would certainly have approved the quote.

The source was quoted as saying: “This new information could be very significant. Hewlett has repeatedly said that he could not have been at the scene without someone remembering his distinctive truck. But if he was driving a Mercedes van at the time, his reasoning is shot to pieces. And it would raise the question of why he lied about the vehicle in the first place”.

The Mirror added the claim that Hewlett lied about how he got his truck to Morocco”, pouring scorn on Hewlett’s claim to have travelled on a boat from Faro to Morocco, saying: “There is NO public ferry service between Faro and Morocco”. As we mentioned earlier, however, there is commercial sea traffic from Faro to Morocco and it is very possible that Hewlett put his truck on a commercial ship which did not normally carry passenger traffic.

For good measure, the Mirror also introduced the ‘gipsy angle’, writing: “Hewlett told friends he was offered money by ‘gipsy tourists’ to sell his own three-year-old blonde-haired daughter”.

The Independent on Sunday dutifully carried a similar story on 21 June headed: ‘Maddie suspect lied to police’.

This informed us, melodramatically: “Police are in a race against time to probe the lies told by convicted paedophile Raymond Hewlett”. It claimed that Hewlett had ‘lied to police on significant aspects of the case…it emerged that he had misled police about the make of vehicle he was driving at the time of her disappearance’.

But their article, in common with similar stories printed by other papers that day, once again omitted to point out that this claim was based purely on Verran’s dubious claims. The newspaper also claimed: “It has been established that he was in the vicinity of Praia de Luz when Maddie vanished”. Again, that was misleading. All that had been established, and on fact admitted by Hewlett himself, was that he had been living about an hour’s drive away from Praia da Luz at the time. Just like the tabloid press, the Independent on Sunday was stretching the term ‘in the vicinity’, giving readers the impression that Hewlett was much nearer Praia da Luz than he probably was.

‘No-one can give Hewlett an alibi’

Also on 21 June, the Sunday Mirror once again, in another article by-lined by Simon Wright, had a new angle on the story, this time sourced by quotes from Hewlett’s wife, once again raising questions as to whether the Hewletts were being paid by the media for the flow of stories from them. The Sunday Mirror headline ran: ‘No-one can give him an alibi’.

Their report told us: “German-born Mariana, 33, wife of Hewlett, confessed that a female friend Hewlett insisted could vouch for him on the day Madeleine vanished cannot remember where he was…Hewlett won't name the woman. Yesterday, the woman - whose identity the Sunday Mirror has learned - failed to turn up at a market where she normally sells food. Last night, Mariana said: ‘The truth is, she can't remember where Ray was. She can't give him an alibi. No one can’.”

So, hours before the Sunday Mirror went to press, their journalist was able to speak to Mrs Hewlett - and into the bargain they had someone in Fuzeta who could reliably report that the mystery woman who might be able to give Hewlett an alibi wasn’t at the Saturday market there, as she usually was. It certainly made for a good story.

On the subject of the ‘white van story’ Mrs Hewlett said the following: “We've never owned a white van. We had a grey van when we first arrived in Portugal in 2002. In August 2004, we swapped it for the Dodge and kept that until March 2008”. Yet according to Verran’s tale, Hewlett only bought the blue Dodge truck in June 2007.

The Sunday Mirror had more up its sleeve. Amongst other new developments to the story, we were now told:

· Hewlett befriended two families of Portuguese gipsies in the weeks leading up to Madeleine's disappearance.

· Police and the McCanns' private detectives cannot establish a link between the ‘gipsy theory’ and a ‘named suspect’.

· Hewlett told a friend [Verran again] that gipsies who ‘traded in children’ had offered him ‘good money’ for his own daughter

· A ‘former close pal’ of Hewlett, in the Portuguese town of Tavira - where his family used to park their truck - revealed how, in April 2007, Hewlett developed a close friendship with two families of gipsies. The article quoted U.S.-born artist Leonardo Leopoldo, 79, who has lived in Tavira (40 miles from Praia da Luz) for 10 years, as saying: ‘No-one spoke to the gipsies apart from Ray. He was always talking to them. There was talk in the area that they sold children to paedophiles. By the time, Madeleine was snatched, he was very friendly with them’.

Let’s examine one snippet from this account. Leonardo Leopoldo refers to how Hewlett ‘used to park his truck’ in Tavira. That suggests that his ‘truck’ - we may presume his blue Dodge truck - was a familiar sight in Tavira over a sustained period. That does not tally at all with Verran’s claim that Hewlett told him he’d traded in his white van for a Dodge truck in early June when he ‘fled’ to Morocco.

Leonardo, according to the Sunday Mirror, was ‘stunned’ to learn about Hewlett’s criminal record. He said: “We had grown fond of them. I thought they were lovely”.

The Sunday Mirror added another matter, but which, on analysis, added nothing whatsoever. Here it is, for the record:

“We tracked down another close pal of Hewlett's - British expat Jenny Day - whom the McCanns' private detectives have been keen to interview but unable to trace. Divorced Jenny, who’s in her fifties, admitted she could not provide Hewlett with an alibi and told how she had been shattered by revelations of his criminal past. Speaking at her beach-side apartment in Santa Luzia, 30 miles from Praia da Luz, she said: "I loved Ray, but not now. I met him ten years ago and thought he was a loving father. To find out that he had committed the crimes he had was shattering. I didn't shoot the home video being talked about and I cannot provide Ray with an alibi for the day Madeleine went missing”.

Perhaps the only thing of interest here is how both Mr Leopolodo and Ms Day both found serial child-abuser Hewlett both ‘lovely’ and ‘loving’.

On 16 April 2010, the Lancashire Telegraph reported Hewlett’s death. In doing so, they stated: “Shortly before he died, Hewlett admitted that he was staying near Praia da Luz, Portugal, when the three-year-old went missing in May 2007”. This once again is an attempt to put Hewlett very close to Praia da Luz at this time, when in fact there is no evidence to contradict his claim that he was then living around 35 miles away. The Lancashire Telegraph also repeated this claim: “He looked similar to pictures of a suspect seen near her apartment”. This was vague, not telling us whether it was the sketch of a man with a droopy moustache or the sketch of the ‘pock-marked’ man.

TWO SENTENCES REDACTED AS THEY WERE CONSIDERED LIBELLOUS BY THE MCCANNS

[size=18]There is some evidence that many of these stories linking Hewlett to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann were prompted by information supplied by the McCann Team, despite there being no hard or even credible evidence that he had any connection whatsoever with her going missing. The McCanns’ detectives appear never to have interviewed Hewlett or his wife, though both the Hewletts gave interviews to journalists on which several media articles were based.[

The ‘gipsy theory’ revived

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

CONTINUED IN PART FOUR

by **Tony Bennett** 23.11.12 23:05

The ‘gipsy theory’ revived

The Sunday Mirror on 21 June referred to the ‘stolen by gipsies’ theory and said: “Theories that Madeleine was snatched by gipsies have surrounded the case”. That is probably an overstatement, since for a long time the McCanns were emphasising the probability that a paedophile, not gipsies, had abducted Madeleine, so much so, in fact, that Chief Executive of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, Jim Gamble, invited Dr Gerald McCann to speak at a CEOP-run conference on the subject of abductions by paedophiles earlier this year. But to the extent that the ‘stolen-by-gipsies’ claim was featured in the press, it appears that the claim may have been promoted by members of the McCann Team. Neither the British nor Portuguese police have given any credibility to that suggestion.

It is not surprising, therefore, that the sensational claims in The Sun this September, about a letter said to have been written by the dying Hewlett to his estranged son Wayne, should have majored, once again, on the ‘stolen-by- gipsies’ theme. So far as we are aware, there is not one single reported instances of missing children having been stolen by gipsies in Portugal.

The idea that Madeleine was stolen by gipsies, on the order of a wealthy family somewhere, means that the McCann Team can combine the continuing theory that somehow Hewlett was involved, or knew about what happened, with the other theory they need to maintain, namely that Madeleine may well be alive - and, hopefully, reasonably happy.

F. The Sun article analysed - sentence by sentence

We now reproduce The Sun’s article sentence by sentence and offer comments.

QUOTE FROM SUN: MADELEINE McCannsuspect Raymond Hewlett confessed on his deathbed that he KNEW what happened to the little girl, The Sun can reveal. In a letter to his estranged son Wayne, he denied having anything to do with Maddie's disappearance.

OUR ANALYSIS: We do not know from this article when this letter is said to have been written. And of course, according to The Sun, it has been burnt, so absolutely nothing about it can be verified. It must be questionable whether Hewlett was capable of writing a longish letter if he was terminally ill with throat cancer and in a wheelchair. Then we have the claim that this letter was sent to his ‘estranged son’. How credible is it that he would choose to write to a son from whom he had been estranged for many years? Did Hewlett or anyone else know his address?

Further, did his nurses or anyone else at the hospital see him writing this letter? To whom did he give the letter, and did that person know where his son lived? We might also reasonably ask why Hewlett had at no time volunteered this information previously. If he really ‘knew what had happened’ to Madeleine, but (allegedly) waited until he was nearly dead to put something in a letter, what does that say about him? Why did he not ask to see the Portuguese police and tell them what he knew?

QUOTE FROM SUN: But he said he knew she had been stolen to order by a gipsy gang who kidnap children for wealthy couples unable to have kids or adopt.

OUR ANALYSIS: According to this, Hewlett claims to know the identity of this ‘gipsy gang’. Did he name any members of the ‘gang’ in his letter? Did he say where they could be located? If he did, why did his ‘estranged’ son Wayne destroy the letter? If he didn’t, what use is the letter? Further, is there really any hard evidence that gipsy gangs in Portugal or elsewhere across Europe ‘steal children to order’ (especially children as young as three) for ‘wealthy couples’? Where can we find information about other such cases? There does not appear to be any.

QUOTE FROM SUN: Hewlett, a serial paedophile seen near the spot where Maddie was snatched in Portugal, said they had a ‘shopping list’ of potential targets - such as a little girl with blonde hair like Maddie.

OUR ANALYSIS: Now we have Hewlett’s claim that not only is there a gipsy gang who steal children to order, but that they also had ‘shopping lists’ of potential targets, especially it seems ‘blonde young girls’. That would imply that Hewlett was in touch with the gang leaders of such gipsy groups and would most certainly be able to provide the police with information about this gang.

That Hewlett was ‘a serial paedophile’ is not in doubt, though his interest appears to have been mainly in teenage girls. But what of the claim that Hewlett was ‘seen near the spot’ where Madeleine was snatched? As we have seen, we have on record that Hewlett said he had on several occasions visited Praia da Luz. We know he was living 35 miles away from Praia da Luz at the time Madeleine was reported missing.

But who says he was ‘seen near the spot’ where Madeleine was allegedly abducted by someone, as the article claims? Nothing has appeared in the press to suggest that any witness has come forward and said that. The Sun appears now to have developed the exaggerated claim of several newspapers that Hewlett was ‘in the vicinity’ of Praia da Luz into a definite claim that Hewlett was ‘seen near the spot’. The Sun has several million readers. They would conclude from reading this article that Hewlett really was seen ‘near the spot where Maddie was snatched’.

QUOTE FROM SUN: Private detectives working for Maddie's parents Kate and Gerry are ‘extremely interested’ in Hewlett's claims. A source close to their ongoing investigation said: “What he says fits the No1 theory, which is that she was stolen to order”.

OUR ANALYSIS: The McCanns’ No. 1 theory has not, in fact, for most of the past three-and-a-half years, been that she was ‘snatched to order’. On the contrary, right from the very evening Madeleine was reported missing, the McCanns have pointed the finger - repeatedly - at ‘predatory paedophiles’. So much so, in fact, that the Chief Executive of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, Jim Gamble, invited Dr Gerald McCann to be the keynote speaker at a conference organised by him on abductions by paedophiles, as recently as January 2010.

The quotation above refers to ‘a source close to the family’. It needs to be said that hardly any of the thousands of articles about Madeleine McCann, especially by the Rupert Murdoch papers, The Sun, the News of the World, The Times, and the Sunday Times is published without the input of the McCanns’ chief public relations officer, Clarence Mitchell. He is indeed once again quoted in the article. He will no doubt also be the ‘source close to the ongoing investigation’ mentioned in the article. Mitchell, in practice, would not allow others in his circle to brief the press, without his oversight.

Thus whenever we read quotes about Madeleine’s disappearance from ‘a family pal’, or ‘a source close to the family’, ‘a source close to the McCanns’ legal team’, ‘a spokesman for the McCanns’ and so on, we know, in truth, that the quote emanates from Mitchell himself.

Finally, we might ask why the McCanns and their detectives are ‘extremely interested’ in Hewlett’s claims. One would have thought a much more likely set of reactions might be along these lines: “Why did he keep this secret from everyone for three years?”, or “Why did Wayne burn that letter if it had information about Madeleine in it?”

It might lead one to conclude that the McCanns were ‘extremely interested’ in the now-burnt letter that was handed to Wayne by a mystery man only because it suited their agenda. They clearly want the public to believe that not only was Madeleine snatched by gipsies for a wealthy family, but that she might as a result be alive, well, and quite happy. That has been a theme of many of the utterances of the McCann Team. Despite the very high probability that Madeleine is now dead, however that might have come about, The Sun’s recycling of the claim that she was ‘stolen to order’ for a wealthy family’ keeps in the public mind the notion that Madeleine is still alive.

SUN QUOTE: Hewlett died of throat cancer in April, aged 62, after persistently refusing to meet the McCanns' detectives. He became a suspect because of his appalling record of rape and abduction of children. And he was living as a nomad in Portugal with his second family when Maddie vanished from the McCanns' holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in May 2007.

OUR ANALYSIS: The Sun, in saying that Hewlett died in April this year, contradicted its own account, as we saw above, that Hewlett died ‘in December 2009’. The very latest that Hewlett could have written this letter, then, would have been during December 2009, and it is unlikely he could have written it during his last few days.

One would have to seriously question, therefore, why it then took so long after Hewlett’s death - a whole nine months - for the story about this letter to have emerged. The Sun claims ‘he became a suspect because of his appalling record of rape and abduction…’. In fact, as we saw above, the Portuguese police records show that they knew about Hewlett and were able to eliminate him from their enquiries at an early stage.

We might note at this point that the Portuguese Police were very interested in obtaining details from the British police about ex-pat British sex offenders living in Portugal - but the British authorities, to their shame, refused to help them. The Portuguese police were able to establish that Hewlett had been living in a camper van with his family on a camp site about 35 miles from Praia da Luz at the time of Madeleine’s disappearance. Clearly Hewlett, aged 62 at the time and in poor health, in no way matched the description given by the McCanns’ friend Jane Tanner of the person she said she saw, carrying a child, at 9.15pm on the evening Madeleine disappeared. She said she had seen a man around 30-35 with long black hair. It was some time after Madeleine disappeared that Hewlett apparently developed throat cancer, during 2008. But how he ended up getting expensive treatment in a private hospital in Germany is one of many questions that has not been answered.

SUN QUOTE: Hewlett's letter to builder Wayne, 40, was delivered to the son by a mystery man - thought to be a solicitor or a private eye - a week after he died.

OUR ANALYSIS: So Wayne says he had no idea of the identity of this ‘mystery man’? The letter was delivered - exactly how? Pushed through the letter-box? A knock on the door? Or a ’phone call beforehand and then an arranged visit? Was the mystery man personally handed this letter by Hewlett? And did he then take a special trip from Germany to Telford to deliver it? Or was more than one person involved in ‘delivering’ this letter? Of course, we have none of this detail. We have nothing to help confirm the authenticity of this account. No wonder then that the public is entitled to be highly sceptical as to whether it is true or not. If the account is true, then clearly either the Portuguese Police or Leicestershire police must interview Wayne Hewlett and insist that he either names the mystery man or at the very least describes in detail the appearance of the ‘mystery man’ who allegedly delivered the letter from his father.

SUN QUOTE: Most of it was an apology for how his vile crimes had affected his first wife Susan and Wayne. But then he went on to write about Maddie, who was nearly four when she went missing. Wayne, of Telford, Shropshire, said: “It was a bolt from the blue and I shook when I read it. He stated he didn't want to go to his grave with us thinking he had done such a horrible thing. He said he had had nothing to do with taking Maddie but did know who had. He said a very good gipsy friend he knew in Portugal had got drunk and 'let it out' that he had stolen Maddie to order as part of a gang.

OUR ANALYSIS: First, we are expected to believe that he had a ‘good gipsy friend’. Second, that the ‘gipsy friend’ got drunk one night. And, third, that this gipsy ‘stole’ Madeleine as part of a gipsy gang. Fourth, we are further expected to believe that Hewlett refused to reveal this information despite the world-wide hunt for Madeleine. Fifth, and finally, we are asked to believe that he spoke of a ‘gipsy friend’ of his, in a letter, but that he did not name the gipsy. Even by the standards of The Sun, that is stretching the credibility of this whole story way past breaking point.

SUN QUOTE: “My Dad said this gang had been operating for a long time and had snatched children before for couples who couldn't have children of their own. Maddie had been targeted. They took photos of children and sent them to the people they were acting for. And they said ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.

OUR ANALYSIS: Now we are asked to believe more things. We are expected to believe that these gipsies took clandestine photos of children, like Madeleine, and that before they were snatched, these wealthy children-buyers would say ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. And we are further asked to believe that Madeleine was bought in this way. So far as we are aware, there is no evidence of gipsy gangs stealing significant numbers of children, or indeed any children, for wealthy families. The quote from Wayne says: ‘Madeleine was targeted’.

Really? Let us pause for a moment to examine what that means. The implication is that these gipsies first of all took a photograph of Madeleine, then showed that photograph to a rich person, who then confirmed he wanted to buy Madeleine, resulting in - finally - the gipsy gang snatching her, using a mate of Hewlett’s. We need to consider the likelihood that these gipsies pulled all this off between the Saturday the McCanns arrived in Portugal and the Thursday the same week. Clearly they had had no opportunity to acquire photos of Madeleine before that week. Was Hewlett claiming that all this happened in the space of one week? Besides that, is there any evidence whatsoever of any person - gipsies or otherwise - taking a photograph of Madeleine that week? None that we are aware of (but see next paragraph).

We also need to consider that this letter, if it really was written, would have been quite a long one. If Wayne is to be believed, it dealt with a considerable number of issues. Furthermore, Hewlett gave along interview to a journalist in June 2009. Why did he not then take the opportunity to name his drunken gipsy friend?

Finally, it appears that Wayne and his mother had been estranged from Hewlett for many years - 20 years, as The Sun report says (below). Hewlett now had a new family. Wayne Hewlett, as we saw above, had previously gone on record to say that his father was a ‘monster’ who beat him savagely and whom he hated. How likely is it that after all that, Wayne would refer to him as ‘My Dad’?

SUN QUOTE: “Dad said the man told him it was nothing to do with snatching children for a paedophile gang or for a sexual reason. He said there were huge sums of money involved. And he totally believed what this man was saying”.

OUR ANALYSIS: So we are expected here to rely on Hewlett’s ‘belief’ in an alleged tale from a drunken gipsy. That is pretty thin grounds for accepting this story. The story that Madeleine was not snatched ‘for a paedophile gang or for a sexual reason’ appears to suit the McCanns’ need for a narrative about Madeleine’s disappearance that does not involve her being dead or handed over to paedophiles.

If the drunken gipsy really did know how Madeleine had been snatched, why should Hewlett believe that she had been snatched for a wealthy family rather than by or on behalf of a paedophile?

[Picture: Raymond Hewlett pictured talking to a Daily Mirror journalist ]

SUN QUOTE: The account fits with others surrounding the Maddie mystery. Several strange men were seen taking photos of children around the Ocean Club resort in the days before she vanished.

OUR ANALYSIS: This is at best a gross exaggeration. There is no such reference to ‘several strange men taking photographs’ in the Portuguese police files that we are aware of. Looking back through news reports, we see that on 10 May 2007 the Independent included the following in its news report on Madeleine’s disappearance: “There were new leads in the Portuguese newspapers yesterday, as there have been all week. A man who fled with a blonde woman after photographing young girls, a few days before Madeleine vanished, drove a car with British number plates. They might be the same ‘British’ couple caught on CCTV at a petrol station at Lagos, near Praia da Luz, hours after the abduction”. There is no source for this report, and the couple ‘caught on CCTV’ were very soon eliminated from the Portuguese police’s enquiries.

The following day, the Daily Telegraph reported: “It has also emerged that the McCann family had visited the town of Sagres, west of Praia da Luz, on the same day as a suspicious man was seen photographing children, especially young blonde girls, on the beach”. This appears to be the same report as the Independent’s. Similarly, the Sunday Times on 13 May reported: “Detectives are also investigating reports from a witness in Sagres, 16 miles from Praia da Luz, that a man was photographing children without permission. After he was challenged he left with a woman in a Renault Clio”.

There was one other reference to a man ‘behaving oddly’. It came from one of those staying with the McCanns in the holiday complex that week - Jeremy Wilkins. The final Portuguese police report said: “We have the testimony of the witness Jeremy Wilkins. He said that he saw an individual with a strange appearance behaving oddly. This was later confirmed to be a guest who helped with the search”.

Whilst on the subject of people taking photographs of children, there were reports in the British and Portuguese press in August this year of a 48-year-old man bring arrested and charged with photographing children without parental consent. He was said to have had over 80 photographs on his camera of boys all aged between eight and 15. The man, Rhys Jones, claimed that he was taking the pictures as he was researching children’s clothing. The man, Rhys Jones, was found to have been working with international clothing retailer Peacocks. He had been taking the photographs on a Portuguese beach about 50 miles from Praia da Luz. He admitted his behaviour was ‘absolutely stupid’, claiming he took photographs of boys in swimwear because he wanted to persuade Peacocks to stock boys’ swimwear. Certain sections of the press immediately linked this story to Madeleine’s disappearance, with one tabloid heading its report: ‘Maddie beach perv’. The headline and accompanying report could have influenced readers to think, once again, that Madeleine had been snatched by a predatory paedophile.

SUN QUOTE: And The Sun revealed earlier this year that a British expat thought he had seen Maddie in a white van driven by a gipsy couple the day after she was lost.

OUR ANALYSIS: This story has been thoroughly investigated by the Portuguese police and the white van and the ‘gipsy couple’ have been accounted for. This story first broke in The Sun (again) and was also written by Antonella Lazzeri (again).

The Sun article was headed: ‘Maddie in pyjamas the day after she disappeared’. Here are some extracts from the article:

“ A DRAMATIC sighting of missing Madeleine McCann the day after she vanished is being urgently followed up by [the McCanns’] private investigators. A man has reported seeing a girl he is now sure was Maddie lying in the back of a van. She was wearing pyjamas identical to the pair Maddie had on when she was abducted. The vehicle was white - and other witnesses have recalled seeing a white van near the holiday apartment in Portugal from where she was taken. A child in pyjamas was also seen being carried by a man at the resort. “New witness Carlos Moreira, 65, has told investigators the little girl he saw was with a man and woman who looked like gipsies. When shown a previously-unpublished e-fit of a suspect, he identified it as being the van's driver.

“A source close to Maddie's parents Kate and Gerry said last night the sighting was ‘highly significant’ and added: ‘It could be a key breakthrough’. Portuguese Mr Moreira said he only recently connected his sighting with the Maddie hunt because it was 160 miles from where she vanished. He was driving from Carregado, near Lisbon, to Alentejo on May 4 when he stopped at a snack bar in the Benavente region at 8am.

“He told The Sun: ‘I saw a white van with the back door open. I saw a girl, lying on a pile of clothes in the back. She was wearing a two-piece pyjama set, pink and white, or yellow. I saw her back, I could see her hands and feet. She moved one of her fingers but she was deeply asleep. When the van door was opened, she did not wake up, as if she was drugged. This girl was blonde and looked around four. A woman came out of the back of the van. I noted that a strong and tall man, wearing a suit, was in front of the snack bar. He looked like a gipsy. He was with the woman from the van, he was younger than her. He told her off for leaving the van’. Mr Moreira said the experience stuck in his mind - but he only realised it could be useful when he saw a cop being asked on TV why roads to the north or to Spain were not blocked after Maddie vanished”.

So this article in The Sun is the entire basis for the claims of ‘Madeleine being seen with gipsies in a white van’. The article is by Antonella Lazzeri. The source, Carlos Moreira, did not speak about his ‘sighting’ for over two years. When he did so, despite being Portuguese, he chose to speak to The Sun. The details he gives conveniently advance stories the media, as we have seen, were shortly to promote regarding Verran’s alleged conversation with Hewlett about his allegedly selling his white Mercedes van shortly after Madeleine disappeared.

These are good reasons for dismissing this story entirely. Carlos Moreira tells The Sun: She…was deeply asleep. When the van door was opened, she did not wake up, as if she was drugged”. Why does he say ‘as if she was drugged’? Was she simply not ‘deeply asleep’, as he has just said?

We should add that there was a reference in the final report of the Portuguese police to a ‘suspect’ having been seen ‘near a white van’ [NOTE: The whole of both the interim and final reports of the Portuguese police are contained in our new book on the Madeleine McCann case: ‘The Madeleine McCann Casde Files, Vol. 1’ ISBN 978-0-9563351-1-1]. This is how the final police report summarised this matter:

“A witness, Derek Flack, reported the presence of a suspect, who was allegedly looking at the McCanns’ apartment, near a white truck or van, referred to at pages 145 and following. It was not possible to identify this person, despite an artist’s impression having been computer-generated. However, we believe there are very strong possibilities that they were construction workers - engaged on a small building project nearby - who were there making small works, a gardener (see page 973), or possibly a Barrington Norton (page 833), a regular busker in Praia da Luz”.

SUN QUOTE: Wayne, who had no contact with Hewlett for nearly 20 years, said his father's letter seemed ‘very genuine’. He added: "I don't know if this is what happened to Maddie or not, but it does make sense. I can't believe he'd go to those lengths to make up some elaborate lie when he was so weak and ill”.

OUR ANALYSIS: Once again, The Sun tries to persuade us to believe this story using three similar devices: (1) Wayne thought the letter seemed ‘very genuine’, (2) he says it ‘makes sense’ and (3) he says he ‘can’t believe’ his father could tell an elaborate lie’. We are invited, then, to share Wayne’s thoughts and beliefs about this alleged letter. We are also told that Wayne cannot believe his father could tell an elaborate lie. Paedophiles like Hewlett are amongst the most devious people who walk this earth. Was he not capable of telling more than the odd ‘elaborate lie’?

SUN QUOTE: Wayne said he considered going to Kate and Gerry with the letter but was worried it could cause them more heartache if it gave them false hope. He added: “I actually burned it because it unnerved me so much. To have a letter from someone you hated for so long was just mind-blowing. I couldn't deal with it”.

OUR ANALYSIS: Here The Sun journalists contrive to come up with what they think will be a valid reason for believing why Wayne destroyed this letter, which would have been so valuable if it really did contain any credible evidence relating to Madeleine’s disappearance. Wayne, in his quote, says he ‘hated his father so long’.

We return to the point we made above. Would he refer to this hated man as ‘My Dad’? Wayne tells us that he burned the letter because it ‘unnerved’ him and was ‘mind-blowing’. Yet apparently it did not ‘unnerve’ him sufficiently to stop him talking about it to a friend. Nor did it ‘unnerve’ him so much that he was unwilling to talk to a Sun journalist about it.

We are further asked to believe that Wayne was so ‘worried about causing Kate and Gerry more heartache’, that when practically the whole world has heard time and time from the McCann Team the message that ‘just one scrap of information’ could ‘unlock the key’ to the whole mystery’, he thought better of it, for several months.

On top of that, he apparently did not even think of going to the police with this letter that, in his own words, he found so ‘genuine’, ‘believable’ and made such ‘good sense’. Yet he was happy to talk to The Sun about it after burning it. Here then are still more reasons for doubting that there is any truth whatsoever in this story.

SUN QUOTE: Wayne did not contact The Sun about the message. We learned of its existence through a friend. But now he intends to sit down with the Maddie detectives to tell them everything he knows.

OUR ANALYSIS: Wait a minute. He has destroyed the letter. So what guarantee is there that, even if the story is true, he can remember what exactly was in this letter that ‘unnerved’ him’. When did he burn the letter? Soon after receiving it back in December last year? Did he tell The Sun that his father gave him the name of the gipsy in the letter? If not, that suggests that no name was given.

So how are the McCanns’ detectives, or the police, or anyone for that matter, going to be able to find that gipsy? Are we expected to believe that Wayne has not already been in touch with the McCanns’ detectives?

Did The Sun itself not inform the McCann Team of this remarkable story before running the article? And what can the ‘McCann detectives’ possibly get from Wayne? His dead father wrote, in a letter he has now destroyed, of a drunken ‘gipsy’ who stole Madeleine - but it appears he did not even give his son the gipsy’s name nor how he could be contacted. What can Wayne possibly tell the McCann detectives that he hasn’t already told The Sun?

SUN QUOTE: The McCanns' spokesman Clarence Mitchell said last night: “We are extremely grateful to Wayne for coming forward with this information and the detective team will be interviewing him as a matter of priority”.

OUR ANALYSIS: The McCanns would no doubt say that they were extremely grateful to Wayne for giving them at least a faint glimmer of hope that their daughter could be found alive. Others might view the McCanns’ gratitude for this story emerging at this time as reflecting the fact that the story suited their current agenda.

G. A summary

Let us summarise and make a few final observations, First, one very important point about this The Sun article needs to be made.

Let us suppose, just for a moment, that all of this tale is actually true, and not just a product of The Sun’s desire to sell a few tens of thousands more copies of their newspaper on the back of yet another photo of Madeleine.

Let us suppose that this gipsy who got drunk while talking to Hewlett knows where Madeleine is. Clearly the ‘wealthy couple’ who are alleged to be holding Madeleine, if this story is true, would be devouring any media stories about the case. They would no doubt very soon have become aware of The Sun’s article of 1 November. Doubtless if they were holding Madeleine alive and were wealthy, they would have a ‘Google Alert’ set up for ‘Madeleine McCann’ and would have got the story within hours of it appearing in the online edition of The Sun.

So what would their reaction be? Would the publication of that story be more likely to lead to Madeleine being found in their care, or less likely?

Also, what about the ‘drunken gipsy’ who realises that The Sun and the McCanns’ detectives are now onto him? Does that make him more or less likely to be traced? Much less likely, of course. He will ‘go to ground’, and try to ‘disappear’ quietly, now he knows that detectives are after him.

Just a moment’s thought should be sufficient to realise that if Wayne’s story were true, and Madeleine were still alive, she could be put in much greater danger as a result of The Sun’s article.

Given the above obvious and immediate risks to Madeleine’s welfare the moment The Sun ran this story, would the McCanns really welcome its publication, and if so, why? Surely, if the story had any truth in it, they would get down on their knees and beg The Sun, Wayne, the police and everybody else to keep quiet about it until every ounce of information had been extracted from Wayne and every effort made, away from the glare of media publicity, to track down the gipsy group concerned - and of course the drunken gipsy whom Hewlett described.

To recite these matters and to ask these questions reveals the hollowness of this entire Sun article. It becomes ever more obvious that this is a story which benefits The Sun in terms of its sales…

REST OF SENTENCE REDACTED AS IT IS CONSIDERED LIBELLOUS BY THE MCCANNS

It does not benefit Madeleine who, if she really were alive and held by a wealthy family as claimed, would be placed at greater risk by this article. And if that drunken gipsy really was part of a gang that snatched Madeleine, he would now be making sure he was much better hidden and out of the way than before.

color=black]Madeleine McCann]

In our view The Sun has published an article that it knows fine well is untrue. It has done so partly to increase sales and make its owner a bit more money. But the article may also reflect the close relationship of The Sun owner Rupert Murdoch to the McCanns.

It can surely be no coincidence that after working for the McCanns for two years, the first job obtained by their chief public relations spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, was working as a public relations consultant for Matthew Freud at public relations company Freud Communications. Matthew Freud is married to Rupert Murdoch’s daughter, Elizabeth.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

by Tony Bennett, The Madeleine Foundation, 19 October 2010

by **sharonl** 24.11.12 11:10

New McCann suspect 'was questioned by police but had an alibi'
Two years on, privately funded investigators carry on search for missing girl

BY CAHAL MILMO , CHIEF REPORTER SATURDAY 23 MAY 2009

For two years, the investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann has charted an erratic course from Leicestershire to Morocco in its efforts to trace her whereabouts. Yesterday, its focus moved to a German hospital where a convicted British paedophile is being treated for throat cancer.

Raymond Hewlett, 64, who is wanted in connection with at least two sexual assaults in England and Ireland, emerged as the latest "individual of interest" to private investigators hired by Kate and Gerry McCann after it was revealed he was living with his family an hour's drive from Praia da Luz, the Portuguese resort where the three-year-old disappeared on 3 May 2007.

The former Scots Guard, who has convictions for the abduction and indecent assault, including attempted rape, of girls in Britain dating back to 1972, did not feature on a list of paedophiles with links to Portugal drawn up in the aftermath of the disappearance.

The Independent understands that the Briton, described by detectives as "cunning" and a "danger to children" was questioned during the initial inquiry but discounted after providing an alibi.

Two British investigators leading the McCanns' investigation are in Germany to speak to Hewlett amid suggestions from two police forces that he could be extradited to Britain to be questioned about unconnected sex attacks.

The twist comes shortly after the second anniversary of Madeleine's disappearance and her family's subsequent "awareness campaign", funded by donors and £1m in libel payments received by the McCanns and their friends, to try to ensure her case is not forgotten.

The McCanns marked the occasion with a series of media interviews and by issuing a computer-generated image of how their daughter would now look, aged six, in an attempt to gain new leads.

Yesterday, the gaunt features of Hewlett, propped up in a hospital bed, propelled the case back into the headlines.

Hewlett, who was travelling Europe and North Africa in a motorhome with his German wife and six children in 2007, was pictured on the front page of the Daily Mirror with his assertion that he was innocent of any involvement in Madeleine's disappearance.

Pictures of the long-haired Hewlett, who has variously worked on fishing trawlers and as a fairground operator, were printed next to artist's impressions of a long-haired man spotted outside the McCann's apartment .

Clarence Mitchell, the former BBC journalist who is the family's spokesman, was careful to manage expectations, confirming only that Hewlett was of "operational" interest to its investigation headed by former Detective Inspector Dave Edgar and former Detective Sergeant Arthur Cowley.

The officers, who have experience in "cold case" reviews, were hired by the Find Madeleine Fund to re-examine leads from the initial investigation.

Mr Mitchell said: "This is one line of inquiry ... Kate and Gerry are fully aware of the development and have been for a little while."

It is understood new information on Hewlett, originally from Blackpool, Lancashire, emerged after the latest media appeal by Madeleine's parents.

The Daily Mirror said attention was drawn to the Briton by a couple who met him while in Portugal, where he had been selling second-hand goods while touring camp sites and towns.

Hewlett insisted he was 30 miles from Praia da Luz at the time of the abduction, telling the newspaper: "I know exactly where I was. I wasn't anywhere near there [Praia da Luz]. I've done nothing wrong, nothing, nothing. " Hewlett is understood to have drifted around Europe, avoiding outstanding arrest warrants, after a string of convictions in Britain, including the abduction and sexual assault of a neighbour's daughter in 1972 and an attack in 1978 when he put a gun to the head of a 14-year-old girl during an attempted rape.

A spokeswoman for West Yorkshire Police said: "We are seeking him in connection with an indecent assault in 1975."

n The disgraced former Portuguese police chief who previously led the inquiry into Madeleine McCann's disappearance has been convicted of perjury.

Goncalo Amaral was given an 18-month suspended sentence by a court in Faro, Portugal. He was one of five officers charged over an alleged attack on the mother of another missing girl. Amaral was convicted of falsifying documents, the Correio da manha reported.

The McCanns are taking legal action for defamation over Amaral's "entirely unfounded claims" in the media, which included the allegation that Madeleine was dead and that her parents were involved in concealing her body.

Old habits: Retired police on the case

*After a long career pursuing villains in the name of the law and public service, many might expect Britain's police officers to spend their retirement as far away as possible from the dogged pursuit of wrongdoing.

Increasingly, that is far from the case. Rather than reaching for a set of golf clubs, newly-retired detectives and their uniformed counterparts are entering the nebulous and lucrative world of private investigation to deploy their skills tracking down debtors, countering industrial espionage and accepting cases that have baffled regular law enforcement bodies.

The latter scenario is the one that currently confronts the Alpha Investigations Group, the company headed by former detectives Dave Edgar, 52, and Arthur Cowley, 57, pictured right, which has been employed since last year by the Find Madeleine Fund. The two men, who between have more than 60 years experience in the Royal Ulster Constabulary and Merseyside Police respectively, are part of a growing body of professional police officers whose skills are in demand in the private sector for work that ranges from threats to the security of large corporations to pursuing missing funds through tax havens.
The Association of British Investigators (ABI), which represents about 500 companies, estimates that 70 per cent of employees in the industry are former police officers with the remainder recruited from the legal or technology sectors.

A reminder that Alpha Investigation Group does not exist
http://whathappenedtomadeleinemccann.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/mccann-detective-arthur-cowleys-bogus.html

Peter Heims, a veteran investigator with more than 50 years experience, said: "It is a natural progression for a lot of police officers. You do 20 or 25 years service and come out of the force with time and a desire for a second career. The skills you acquire as a detective or a uniformed officer are more and more in demand."

According to ABI estimates, there are about 10,000 private eyes in Britain with the £1.5bn industry growing at about five per cent a year. In the meantime, it seems customers such as Kate and Gerry McCann are reassured by the no-nonsense approach of the likes of Mr Edgar and Mr Cowley. Speaking earlier this month, Mr Edgar, a former detective inspector, said: "You don't start an investigation in Morocco or Spain or France or even Lisbon. This offence happened in Praia da Luz. That is where I think the answer is."

by aiyoyo 25.11.12 15:06

During
early 2008, there were reports of a man with a ‘pock-marked face’ (see
artist’s sketch in next section) having been seen close to the McCanns’
apartment in Praia da Luz. We now know from the Portuguese police files
(though we did not know at the time) that they showed photographs of
Hewlett to the 13-year-old girl who claimed to have seen someone near
the apartment. However, she was very clear that Hewlett was not the man
that she had seen. It was also revealed later that Portuguese police had
spoken to Hewlett’s wife, who had apparently given him an alibi. It
later emerged that the Portuguese police had established that his bank
card had been used in Lisbon (3 hours away from Praia da Luz) at the
time of Madeleine’s disappearance.

I wonder where the above bit is sourced from? "Winnower"?
If from the Police files, then surely the mccanns after having spent 100k on translation would have have been aware Hewlett was eliminated.

Their PIs harrassment of Hewlett out of the public eyes is one thing.
It's quite another thing to smear the man's name time and again in the Press when they cannot substantial their allegation at all.
One would have thought that the mccanns who sued the Press over what they claimed as smear of their good name should have known better than to do same to others. What they did to Hewlett's name proves they are hypocrites. Hewlett's colourful past is beside the point.

by russiandoll 25.11.12 17:31

could you elaborate on what you mean by Hewlett's "colourful past? " I am hoping you were not referring to his activities with children here......

by aiyoyo 25.11.12 20:20

Well, I was referring to his past records.........

by aniandr 26.11.12 22:11

Ok a realy dumb question. What is actually the main argument for British police to investigate a Crime comitted in another country? I mean, Thats actually realy Odd and very unnormal isnt it? And if they do it anyway, shouldnt there be a new clue that made Them dó it? A clue so important that the other country would open the case as Well? Im not i actually get it.

And how come This guy ender up ón the frontpage? he is dead. Thats not a great new clue its a dead point clue. And im not even an investigator. He cant realy bring anything new. Was he in morocco with a child resembling maddie ore what? Ore how come he is suspect once again?

Apart from janes discription the drawings all look like gerry. Uh - a clue?!

by russiandoll 26.11.12 22:43

let me get this straight....

"Well, I was referring to his past records........."

you mean his criminal records.......of assault and rape of children?

I would have thought a " colourful past " was the appropriate way to refer to maybe the life of

JFK, Mick Jagger, Mae West, Boy George, lots of lovers, a hint of scandal with a small "s"

not a predatory paedophile.

Hewlett might not have been involved in the Maddie affair, I do not believe that he was. He hardly had a good name to smear though,did he? Given the filth he had been involved in.

by Guest 26.11.12 22:47

russiandoll wrote:let me get this straight....

"Well, I was referring to his past records........."

you mean his criminal records.......of assault and rape of children?

I would have thought a " colourful past " was the appropriate way to refer to maybe the life of

JFK, Mick Jagger, Mae West, Boy George, lots of lovers, a hint of scandal with a small "s"

not a predatory paedophile.

Hewlett might not have been involved in the Maddie affair, I do not believe that he was. He hardly had a good name to smear though,did he? Given the filth he had been involved in.

***
I agree fully, but ... back to basics: who wants him to be a patsy in Madeleine's case?

BTW on a different note: has anyone heard anything again from Birch?

BTW2 Mae West often had me into stitches. Like "Is that a pistol in your pocket? Or are you glad to see me?" titter

BTW 3 "When I'm good, I'm good. When I'm bad, I'm better" ...

by russiandoll 26.11.12 23:03

no patsies desired of course in Maddie case, that would be another crime committed. I doubt Hewlett involved, think the issue resurfacing now is to distract, smacks of desperation to me.
Just surprised at choice of words....I got the point that was made though.

by Angelique 26.11.12 23:13

aniandr Today at 10:11 pm

You wrote:

"Ok a realy dumb question. What is actually the main argument for British police to investigate a Crime comitted in another country? I mean, Thats actually realy Odd and very unnormal isnt it? And if they do it anyway, shouldnt there be a new clue that made Them dó it? A clue so important that the other country would open the case as Well? Im not i actually get it. "

There is no reason why the British police should be "investigating" this case at all. They are actually in breach of UK Law and EU Law and Portuguese Law. They have no jurisdiction at all and Goncalo Amaral talks about this with Duarte Levy in the video posted by HiDeHo of the interview here

https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/t6031-video-mccanns-and-suspect-raymond-hewlett-a-clown-act-update-mcminute-vid-added?highlight=Duarte+Levy+video

They also discuss Hewlett having been investigated and decided he was not involved.

by Guest 26.11.12 23:18

Angelique wrote: [...] Hewlett having been investigated and decided he was not involved.

***
Yes, and that's in the files, which NOT have been released. Anyone on the PT and UK list of paedophiles.

by Guest 26.11.12 23:50

Châtelaine wrote:
Angelique wrote: [...] Hewlett having been investigated and decided he was not involved.
***
Yes, and that's in the files, which NOT have been released. Anyone on the PT and UK list of paedophiles.

Yes, according to the interview, it is held back in the unreleased files, so how come the media etc. got hold of it?

by Guest 26.11.12 23:51

Rhetorical question, Candyfloss?

by aiyoyo 27.11.12 9:12

russiandoll wrote:let me get this straight....

"Well, I was referring to his past records........."

you mean his criminal records.......of assault and rape of children?

I would have thought a " colourful past " was the appropriate way to refer to maybe the life of

JFK, Mick Jagger, Mae West, Boy George, lots of lovers, a hint of scandal with a small "s"

not a predatory paedophile.

Hewlett might not have been involved in the Maddie affair, I do not believe that he was. He hardly had a good name to smear though,did he? Given the filth he had been involved in.

Alright, not appropriate choice of word then.

Rotten reputation or not, smearing him by attributing to him a crime he didn't do is wrong.

The BIG question is why is TM rehashing this, and why doesn't Hewlett's family speak up for him?

WHAT is going on behind the scenes?

by russiandoll 27.11.12 14:56

agree with you on both points aiyoyo....it is a scandal to have a patsy to take blame for a crime

The Hewlett story being on the front page now is certainly interesting, the $64,000 question....what is going on "backstage" as CM would call it....?
would you not love to be a fly on the wall at these get-togethers?

by Ribisl 27.11.12 19:41

russiandoll wrote:agree with you on both points aiyoyo....it is a scandal to have a patsy to take blame for a crime

The Hewlett story being on the front page now is certainly interesting, the $64,000 question....what is going on "backstage" as CM would call it....?
would you not love to be a fly on the wall at these get-togethers?

I may be missing something here, but could these recent headlines not come from the papers' own initiative to sell more copies and actually have nothing to do with TM? Paedophilia is the biggest talking point of the moment and Hewlett, a convicted predatory paedophile who is known to have been questioned in connection with Madeleine, is such an easy target for questionable headlines. Moreover, he is conveniently dead and none of his family members are likely to object publicly because of his own appalling track record.

by aniandr 27.11.12 20:01

Angelique wrote: aniandr Today at 10:11 pm

You wrote:

"Ok a realy dumb question. What is actually the main argument for British police to investigate a Crime comitted in another country? I mean, Thats actually realy Odd and very unnormal isnt it? And if they do it anyway, shouldnt there be a new clue that made Them dó it? A clue so important that the other country would open the case as Well? Im not i actually get it. "

There is no reason why the British police should be "investigating" this case at all. They are actually in breach of UK Law and EU Law and Portuguese Law. They have no jurisdiction at all and Goncalo Amaral talks about this with Duarte Levy in the video posted by HiDeHo of the interview here

https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/t6031-video-mccanns-and-suspect-raymond-hewlett-a-clown-act-update-mcminute-vid-added?highlight=Duarte+Levy+video

They also discuss Hewlett having been investigated and decided he was not involved.

Thank you. I find it bizarre that that isnt the front page story. Spending millions on a cade without jurisdiction in time of crises. Now that would sell papers. Its beyond understandig whats going on. Thousands of jobs could been made, instead your goverment spend money on ...excuse me...crap. A case they will never solve as the anwser is in portugal who closed the case. Well well well....they do need a positive outcome if tjis isnt going to look totally idiotic so they pick a random dead paedo. OMG

by **Nina** 27.11.12 20:26

aniandr wrote:
Angelique wrote: aniandr Today at 10:11 pm

You wrote:

"Ok a realy dumb question. What is actually the main argument for British police to investigate a Crime comitted in another country? I mean, Thats actually realy Odd and very unnormal isnt it? And if they do it anyway, shouldnt there be a new clue that made Them dó it? A clue so important that the other country would open the case as Well? Im not i actually get it. "

There is no reason why the British police should be "investigating" this case at all. They are actually in breach of UK Law and EU Law and Portuguese Law. They have no jurisdiction at all and Goncalo Amaral talks about this with Duarte Levy in the video posted by HiDeHo of the interview here

https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/t6031-video-mccanns-and-suspect-raymond-hewlett-a-clown-act-update-mcminute-vid-added?highlight=Duarte+Levy+video

They also discuss Hewlett having been investigated and decided he was not involved.

Thank you. I find it bizarre that that isnt the front page story. Spending millions on a cade without jurisdiction in time of crises. Now that would sell papers. Its beyond understandig whats going on. Thousands of jobs could been made, instead your goverment spend money on ...excuse me...crap. A case they will never solve as the anwser is in portugal who closed the case. Well well well....they do need a positive outcome if tjis isnt going to look totally idiotic so they pick a random dead paedo. OMG

Imo there are a lot of dead paedos taking the can at the moment.

by russiandoll 27.11.12 20:28

Ribisi you might have a point there, it is going with the flow re paedophilia and what would be an even bigger sensational headline than to have Maddy and a paedo linked as appalling as that is.
As it is all about sales I can well believe that some journo has just trawled through the files.......
however it was the SY sensation about this line of enquiry that made me think the pink one had some input, why would the paper decide to run with that claim unless someone had told them it was happening? Does not sound like SY gave them that info.
It is a strange one, but then that's nothing new!

by **Tony Bennett** 27.11.12 20:39

ribisl wrote:I may be missing something here, but could these recent headlines not come from the papers' own initiative to sell more copies and actually have nothing to do with TM? Paedophilia is the biggest talking point of the moment and Hewlett, a convicted predatory paedophile who is known to have been questioned in connection with Madeleine, is such an easy target for questionable headlines. Moreover, he is conveniently dead and none of his family members are likely to object publicly because of his own appalling track record.

russiandoll wrote:Ribisi you might have a point there, it is going with the flow re paedophilia and what would be an even bigger sensational headline than to have Maddy and a paedo linked as appalling as that is. As it is all about sales I can well believe that some journo has just trawled through the files...however it was the SY sensation about this line of enquiry that made me think the pink one had some input, why would the paper decide to run with that claim unless someone had told them it was happening? Does not sound like SY gave them that info.

It is a strange one, but then that's nothing new!

No doubt the papers are eager to put pics of or associated with Madeleine on their front pages, but I tend to agree with you russiandoll that when the Mirror led with their front-page story - suggesting Hewlett abducted Madeleine - that they had had a tip-off. If as many of us suspect the SY Review was always intended to be an expensive whitewash, but would have to come up with some convincing explanation of what really happened to Madeleine, what better story to come up with to bury the whole story than to blame a dead paedophile and/or his associates?

Not many people realise that Alan & Cindy Thompson have ALREADY been interviewed in depth by the police about Madeleine and Hewlett - 3 years ago at Limehouse Police Station.

sharonl has covered this in her '40 Questions and Answers' article, published on another thread here tonight.

If we look in depth at the origins of the alleged Raymond Hewlett claims and how utterly threadbare the whole story is, surely to goodness DCI Redwood and his team wouldn't stoop as low as that after spending £4million-odd of the nation's money?

Would they?

by Guest 28.11.12 2:11

I think we should understand the pressure these policeman are under, and we should be careful with what we say. Anyone who has followed the case since 2007 knows just what a difficult job the Review team were given. We've no idea what they're doing really, and I should think they spend a great deal of their time having to ensure there aren't any leaks. We'll just have to wait and see what the result is.

by **Tony Bennett** 28.11.12 7:38

tcat wrote:We've no idea what they're doing really...

That's not quite right. They used up a wad of taxpayer's money commissioning an age-progressed sketch of Madeleine, then asked the entire UK population to contact the police if they saw a girl looking like her anywhere

by **tigger** 28.11.12 8:31

tcat wrote:I think we should understand the pressure these policeman are under, and we should be careful with what we say. Anyone who has followed the case since 2007 knows just what a difficult job the Review team were given. We've no idea what they're doing really, and I should think they spend a great deal of their time having to ensure there aren't any leaks. We'll just have to wait and see what the result is.

So what you're saying is that say 40% of the allotted time and therefore money is spent making sure nobody knows what they're doing the rest of the time? spit coffee

by Guest 28.11.12 11:45

I do because the case still has the potential to return to the media hysteria we saw in 2007/8. Mr Redwood had a taste of that when he gave his interviews. I'm sure they are well aware they have to be very careful.

by **PeterMac** 28.11.12 11:49

Or as an entered apprentice would say "I was taught to be cautious" !

by monkey mind 28.11.12 12:04

tcat wrote:I think we should understand the pressure these policeman are under, and we should be careful with what we say. Anyone who has followed the case since 2007 knows just what a difficult job the Review team were given. We've no idea what they're doing really, and I should think they spend a great deal of their time having to ensure there aren't any leaks. We'll just have to wait and see what the result is.

It’s a review, and a healthily staffed one at that. What pressure are they under do you think? I would genuinely be interested in your answer to that because I think the answer may be very revealing, may explain so much of what appears wrong in their *review/investigation*.

They don’t appear to be under any pressure from the media, on the contrary they seem to be positively drooling over their e-fit age progression and copious leads instead of applying scrutiny to the use of vast quantities of public money. Indeed much of the mainstream media seems bent on propping up whatever line the enquiry appears to take. Look at all the nonsense they perpetuated about being kidnapped by a family wanting a child, pulling retired Redwood cronies from the gutter and presenting them as dubious experts in order to prop up the 5 year on photo. I haven’t heard one positive thing from Grange nor one negative thing from the press.

If there is a public voice for scrutiny and accountability it certainly isn’t being heard in the mainstream media so it will be of no concern to Redwood and his cronies. No pressure there then.

So where exactly is this pressure that you refer to coming from I wonder?

And what is it’s aim?

by Guest 28.11.12 13:30

Pressure from the massive publicity the case received in 2007/8, and which it still has the potential to generate again I'm certain. The vast majority of the public are silent at the moment I agree, but we saw what happened with phone hacking last year, and with Savile/child abuse this year - every now and then the public react so overwhelmingly that authorities are caught off guard, if only momentarily. The MM case still has the potential to erupt into a similar maelstrom I'm sure.

Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Amelie McCann (aged 2): "Maddie's jammies!".

PART TWO

Amelie McCann (aged 2): "Maddie's jammies!".

PART THREE

Amelie McCann (aged 2): "Maddie's jammies!".

PART FOUR

Amelie McCann (aged 2): "Maddie's jammies!".

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

.

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

.

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

How low will they stoop?

Amelie McCann (aged 2): "Maddie's jammies!".

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Amelie McCann (aged 2): "Maddie's jammies!".

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

Re: Did paedophile Raymond Hewlett really know what happened to Madeleine McCann?

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