Daily Star-MADELEINE McCann’s parents hope to win a £1million libel payout this month from the ex-police chief who claimed they lied about their daughter’s disappearance.

[kweggie]

Anyone else know why they are suing him?

Yes, the Find Madeleine Fund. What is the purpose of the Find Madeleine Fund, now?

I am sorry but I don't think it is likely she is going to be found.

Piglet I agree with you. If one side of the story can be put in print, which casts aspersions on the investigators, then it seems reasonable to put the other side of the story in print - ie to expalin how the nvestigation proveeded, and its conclusions.
The question relates to whether the latter is libellous, not whether a retired prolice inspector can relate facts about a case he woked on - if that is an issue he would be bound by secrecy rules ayway, which is presumably not the case.
BTW, am very suprised this thread has nnot been pulled yet - bet it will have diappeared within the the hour....

cat- I have just re-read bobbledunks's post and I don't get what you are reporting?

not the first book, I see

Thanks for the link piglet- that link therefore assumes (to me) that the Mcanns are suing in order that the book doesn't impact on the hunt for Madeline continuing
Whatever the rights and wrongs of it, as far as they are concerned their little girl is still missing and everything they do is about maintaining the search
Their book was about keeping the profile high, his book is seemingly about him, the investigation and cash
Ed, whether you think she will be found or not is not really the point. Her parents still want to continue the search and do everything to aid that search, hence the maintenance of the fund and keeping her in the public eye
I can understand that

The fund started to find Suzy Lamplugh has continued long after her disappearance and the proof of her death which came a few years ago.

It's even survived the death of her mother who fought to keep her daughter's memory alive.

It's grown into a valuable charity working for women's safety which seems to me to be a fitting epitaph. That will possibly be the future of the Madeleine McCann fund, but what her parents decide to do with it is really up to them.

That's okay, isn't it? ed

It's a terrible thing, but I have been told that when a child goes missing, every hour that goes past makes it less likely that the child will be found alive.

I can imagine an experienced cop coming to the hard conclusion that there is now no hope.

Whether some of the rest of us want to accept it is a different question.

I think the Suzy La,plugh fund was a charity. The Madeleine fund is I believe a private company - ie not charitable status.

The Madeleine fund may become a charity if there's anything left and her parents have the will to do that work. Or it may not. As long as people continue to give and they keep filing accounts, it's up to them and their donors.

My point is that things can continue to have a purpose which grows and changes after the initial impetus is gone.

I wouldn't mind at all if it were a charity, but a lot of it is probably taken up with legal battles which don't really do anything to find their child.

imo of course

what do you mean by -,the ' initial impetus'? Finding her /what happened to her? Surely that is the whole point of the fund? I know there are sightings reported in the press every so often, but I don't know if this is due to publicity or not.

I think the legal battles are an unavoidable part of what's happened to them.

They have gone to court and won over lies that have damaged them in the public's eye and could have taken the focus off the search.

I think realistically there's no way to redress the damage done by those lies but that doesn't mean they should be allowed to stand.

Sadly, not many people read the outcome of libel cases and if they do, the thing that's likely to stick in their heads is that the McCanns got X amount of money, which they may unfairly think of as the McCanns cashing in.

I do agree with you that legal action is often unwise. The Diana Fund sued the Franklin Mint over copyright which bankrupted the fund.

That was a very stupid thing to do but then having to look at millions of twee porcelain figures of Diana isn't as hurtful or damaging as newspapers saying you killed your daughter and hid her body.

I don't know, LPO. We can speculate all we like about the motives but I don't see the point of defending their reputation, if there are other things that could be done with the money...ignoring the stuff written by that Portuguese chap might have given him far less publicity than fighting him at every corner.

And if there's nothing else that the money is needed for - I just don't know, it doesn't sit right to be using it for this.

What I'm saying kweggle is that things can evolve beyond their original purpose if the people who started them want them to and the people who donate money agree.

Quite often people donate money in response to a tragedy involving a child whether the parents ask for it or need it.

If you found yourself with loads of donations but no practical way of paying them back it might be a natural response to use them for something in the child's memory.

I've no idea whether the McCanns want to do that and I'm uneasy about speculating on their plans, so do mind if I stop now?

ed I think I've said all I should

Yes me too.

Ed, I'm not sure the reason for the action is so much about defending their reputation as it is about ensuring people keep looking. It read to me as if the point is, if people think that the Mcann's are responsible, then they will stop looking for her.

cat and bobbledunk

Not sheer speculation, it is the only logical possibility based on the facts.

I presume the ostensiblereason for the action is that suggetstion dhe is dead it might hinder attempts to find the child, if by some miracle she is still alive. If the reason for teh action is simply to protect their pofessional reputation/jobs etc, this is hardly in the spirit of the 'fund'.
This may well backfire, tho'. The man has written a book, the McCs got an injuntion to stop it being sold. The injuntion was lifted and the McCs lawyer was told to return the seized copies to the publishers so tehy could go on sale. (Did she do that?) If the McCs lose the libel case, they will have given massive publicity to the book.

I said I wasn't going to talk about this but ...

MrsGuyofGisbourne if some talentless Plod had lucked in by being involved in the murder case of the decade and didn't do anything to help but saw a chance to supplement his pension by accusing you of killing your daughter with absolutely no grounds wouldn't you have something to say about it?

limited by the same argument if you were a plod that was convinced negligent parents had harmed their child and nothing was done then wouldn't you do something about it? There's two sides to every coin.

Hmm, I find it hard to believe his intentions are altruistic, unless of course he's donating the proceeds of his book to some children's charity of course

To be fair, mince, I agree, but I was just stating that that argument cuts both ways. We don't know for sure the mothers reasons either. It could, at worst, be deflecting the blame.
No one here knows the truth of what happened, and I suspect we never will.

lisaro Alternatively, if I was a lazy and unscrupulous chancer who'd lucked in on the murder case of the decade I'd gamble that I wasn't going to be called on my lies and so would write a book full of nonsense secure in the knowledge that many people would believe it without question because I was a police officer and they were hungry for gossip.