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?

Yep, limited, and if I'd done something to my child it's possible I'd do all I could to make people believe I was innocent, including writing a load of lies in a book. Once again, none of us know the truth, so any of these things are possible.

Well, lisaro, I guess that's we differ.

We probably won't ever know the truth, so it's not worth speculating.

Best wishes.

I don't know whether we differ or not, limited, I'm just saying that each and every of those arguments work both ways.

Damn phone-best wishes to you, too.

I have no idea what I'd do if I'd been responsible for the death of my child. I cannot imagine it.

limited - is this a murder case then? I thought the contention of the parents is that it is most definitely not a murder case...?

I understand that the legal approach to libel is different to the UK, so the grounds that have to be met, and expectations of the participants are different.

I cant remember now exactly what they are claiming - it cant be that he has damaged the search can it? The official police report says that the case stalled because of non participation from the Tapas group.

I can't see how Amaral's book damages a search. He was taken off the case, so what he thinks doesn't matter. I assume the search wound down because of a lack of leads to pursue. I imagine that Scotland Yard, despite the couple of million spent so far, haven't uncovered any evidence to convince the Portuguese to reopen the case.

I too am surprised that the thread hasn't got pulled yet - threads about M McC never last long.

mrsguyofgisbourne are you asking why I don't want comment further? If so, it's because I don't want to speculate on the fate of a missing child. I'm not saying nobody else should. But I don't feel comfortable doing that.

That's all. No judgement implied.

I am going to comment on the 'Tapas group' as mellen calls them. Police ask you all sorts of things which is their right, within the law. And in this country, at least, you are entitled not to say anything.

If interviewed under caution you will be warned that your silence could be taken against you in court (or something like that, I don't know the correct words).

But no one in their right mind would say that someone who might face a potentially serious charge somewhere down the line should talk freely to the police without legal advice.

That's not to say they shouldn't help the police, but that they should be aware that sometimes things aren't always what they seem.

The Hillsborough inquiry published its findings yesterday. There were lots of things in the official police reports of the time which have turned out to be misleading or downright lies.

Absolutely - they clearly had the right not to cooperate. What I meant is that if there was a claim that the efforts to determine what had happened were damaged by a book, then the author of that book might draw attention to other documented explanations for why the case stalled.

limited - was not asking you why did not comment - just questioning your terminolgy re 'murder case'.

Sorry, guy that was a slip. . I should have described it as the missing person's case of the decade

mellen explanations that police officers give for their lack of progress in investigations should be treated with the same open mind as the reluctance of suspects to co-operate.

I could be wrong but don't think the 'Tapas group' were ever official suspects.

But if the police wanted to treat them as such, with the rights that official suspects have and the obligations the police also have about disclosure of evidence gained under caution, then what was stopping them?

I'm aware that the law isn't the same in Portugal as Britain but I don't have detailed knowledge of their police procedures.

Do you know if Portuguese police are allowed to speculate on motives or reveal conversations held in informal interviews or under caution if there hasn't been a trial?

Because they aren't in Britain.

I think that it was the refusal to participate in the reconstruction rather than being seen as suspects per se.
I dont know about police procedure - the document from the case shelving is available on-line if you want to read it, it is called something like an archiving report you can probably find it by googling.

I'd be willing to do as much as I safely could to help find a missing child.

I would be wary of participating in a reconstruction of her last movements in case the police were fishing for ways to incriminate me or anyone else.

It happened to Robert Murat, the half-Portuguese, half-British man who thought the police only wanted his help when they asked him to translate.

Everything in a case like this should be done with legal advice for everyone's safety.

I'm guessing now but maybe they didn't have legal advice at the time or did have but it wasn't in their own language or and they did speak to and English-speaking lawyer and were advised not to participate.

"It happened to Robert Murat, the half-Portuguese, half-British man who thought the police only wanted his help when they asked him to translate."

Do you think that they had identified him as having potential involvement when he was asked to translate?

I've no idea

"Do you think that they had identified him as having potential involvement when he was asked to translate?"

My memory is that he wanted to help, so he offered to translate, and then a NotW journalist thought he was acting strangely ("a bit like Ian Huntley" was the description, iirc) so mentioned her "concerns" to police.

Agree with everything limitedperiod says. Also, when it comes to paying legal fees, these days most lawyers in civil cases operate on a no win, no fee basis (though that is about to change), which means that the legal actions wouldn't have been paid for out of the Find Madeleine fund.

So its hard to see him acting as a translator as a example of the police fishing for ways to incriminate.

I dont think that the various lawyers are acting no-win no-fee here. Bringing libel cases are beyond the reach of the average person because of the huge fees involved,no matter how strong the case, that wouldnt be an issue if no-win no-fee was a realistic option.

No, it's not hard to see that happening.

Think about it. If the police asked you help them find a missing child, you would, wouldn't you?

If they were paying you for your translation services and you were suddenly also in demand by hundreds of foreign journalists keen to bung you a bit of cash for the same services you also would, wouldn't you?

And if you were a bit of a busybody in a small town keen to know the gossip on the biggest thing that's ever happened there, again, you probably would, wouldn't you?

That's how these things happen.

Being a bit of a know-it-all susceptible to flattery is what got Christopher Jefferies in trouble when Joanna Yeates's neighbour decided to shift the blame for her murder away from him.

Its hard to see it happening because suspicions were clearly raised after he started with the police (and independently of the police), who at the point he became an interpretor would have had no reason to think that he was any more involved than the next person.

As hackmum says, a reporter under pressure from her newsdesk and a terminal case of the Miss Marples informed on him.

I don't particularly blame her because, though I've never been an armchair detective, I have experienced a news editor screaming that I'm a useless fucking cunt who won't have a job unless I come up with a story.

It's not one of the most pleasant calls I've had. Not even in the top 1000.

Hopefully, the police are supposed to be above that kind of thing, weigh the evidence and do their own legwork.

These ones didn't bother.

I think that when the police tried to follow up on it one of the Tapas group said that she recognised him as someone she had seen carrying a child, so they probably had little option but to investigate further.

Good. You keep believing that mellen.

I have to attend to the dinner now, and possibly for the rest of my life

I think its pretty well documented that that happened? Are you saying that he wasnt reported by a journalist and identified by one of the friends?

I thought it was dark and she just recognised someone carrying something - not enough to say with any certainty that it was Murat or who he was carrying.