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Original poster

Madeleine McCann investigation

999 replies

lyndie · 06/05/2014 18:49

I saw today that possible excavations are to start in the resort where MM went missing.

Does anyone think the progress The Met have made is astonishing given the length of time that has elapsed? I can't help but wonder what progress could have been made if they had been involved at the start.

I really hope that somehow they can find out what happened and give her family some sort of closure. I know the ins and outs of what happened and her parents leaving her have been discussed at length on MN but from a crime point of view I would be very interested to see if the Portugese police had done enough or not.

OP posts:
hedwiggity · 10/05/2014 12:01

first thing i thought when i saw this was "big patch of waste land right next to the hotel and you never thought to excavate before ?? you numpties" i still hope she is found one day alive and well but i get funny feelings about things and i have a funny feeling she has been there all along :( so hope i'm wrong but that wasteland gave me shivers the moment i saw it

nomorequotes · 10/05/2014 12:11

You really hope she is alive?

If she is alive she will be wishing she wasn't. I hope she died quickly all those years ago.

hedwiggity · 10/05/2014 12:15

OMG nomorequotes that is a sickening comment i pray to god you dont have kids with that mentality wishing a baby dead !! i hope if she was alive she was taken to be sold to a loving family or something its called thinking positive ! jeez

MrsMaturin · 10/05/2014 12:17

Hedwiggity - are you living in a Disney film? There is no 'positive' side to human trafficking.

hedwiggity · 10/05/2014 12:30

No i don't live in a f***g disney film but i have this thing inside my head called a positive outlook i don't wish children dead just because they haven't been found and i don't think of the worst things that could have happened to them yes i do get strange feeling especially about waste lands right next to the crime scene that should have been investigated a few days after she went missing ..but i would like to think she is been looked after by some infertile couple who love her or something jeez If all the women on MN had the mentality you two posters have then everyone would just sit at home rocking back and forth thinking twisted thoughts driving themselves slowly bonkers how can you even begin to think those things without feeling ashamed at them !!

janey68 · 10/05/2014 12:31

I think it's pretty distasteful to 'hope' anything actually, other than that MM's siblings are able to grow up and have some semblance of a normal life. Anyone who holds out hope that MM can be found alive and unharmed clearly has no idea of the deep psychological harm from being unwillingly removed from ones family at a formative age. Even in the 'best case' scenario of having been taken to be part of a caring family, there would be huge harm done to the victim and her family.

There are no good outcomes here, just some which are (slightly) less grim than others.

nomorequotes · 10/05/2014 12:33

If she was taken for trafficking she would have been in Africa with a few hours. The child trafficking rings there are horrendous, what children suffer there is horrendous. I wouldn't wish that on anybodies child.

I am not making sickening comments, I am making comments related to the area, the close proximity to Africa and with understanding of child trafficking in North Africa.

janey68 · 10/05/2014 12:54

And agree with keinbock and nomorequote's comments about how many of us feel very uncomfortable about the determination of the mccanns to protect their reputation at all costs, which appears to have driven some of their actions; and also the financial side of all this. Not only the details of how some of the donations have been spent, but also the fact that literally millions of pounds of public funds have been poured into this one case, even though the lack of cooperation over a reconstruction are questionable, particularly when you consider that many many other children are missing and have never had anything like this spent on their case. I can't help wondering too whether some of the things which have only recently been confirmed (eg that the sighting of a man by one of the McCann friends is now considered to be irrelevant) could have been clarified far earlier in the case, at far less expense, if there had been full cooperation.
I do find it astonishing that for over 6 years, this man, reported by one of the McCann holiday group, was considered a suspect, and artists impressions were widely circulated, yet suddenly it's 'discovered' that he was an innocent holiday maker collecting his daughter from a crèche. I mean, how does that happen? Hmm

LaVolcan · 10/05/2014 13:06

yet suddenly it's 'discovered' that he was an innocent holiday maker collecting his daughter from a crèche. I mean, how does that happen?

It makes you wonder - where was this person all that time, to have not known it might have been him and come forward? Was he someone who decamped to the jungle of Borneo for six years or somewhere equally remote?

I can understand him being able to produce the pyjamas after six years: i have got photos of my children in pyjamas, so I would be able to say that yes, they almost certainly would have had those on holiday, and yes, if you have more than one child, you could have saved them to hand down to the next.

janey68 · 10/05/2014 13:25

Lavolcan- my point is more that why was this one sighting jumped on by the Macanns as almost certainly the 'abductor' taking away their child? This is what is presented in Kate mccanns book. This mis information drove things for a long time.
I can completely see why the innocent holiday maker didn't come forward... If the message being clearly given is that someone in that vicinity at the time is the suspect and you know that you were innocently collecting your child as you did perhaps each night, along with many other holiday makers, how on earth would it cross your mind that they are really talking about you? This is what I mean by the inconsistencies and lack of cooperation... It hasn't been helpful at all.

LaVolcan · 10/05/2014 14:18

Absolutely agree janey68 - and it's led to MN deleting posts of mine and other posters because we dared to say that Madeleine disappeared rather than was abducted.

Re the publicity: I was also puzzled by the vast number of posters with Look on them with the coloboma represented in the eye. I was commuting to work at the time, and used to see the posters at all the stations, and used to wonder what use they were - I hadn't been near Portugal/southern Spain/Morocco so how was reminding me in Reading or Paddington that she was missing going to help find her?

noddyholder · 10/05/2014 14:35

The eye defect was the thing they used in the first weeks as publicity gerry called it a 'great marketing ploy' even though they were advised not to mention it as it would endanger her as it was so distinct. Now they say it was nothing and barely visible when interviewed. these are the things people find strange.

HavannaSlife · 10/05/2014 14:53

Well if the pj released the details of her eye they obviously didnt tell the family not to mention it.

I don't see whats so odd about the family saying it was barely noticable when it wasnt their idea to mention it in the first place

noddyholder · 10/05/2014 14:56

Initially they told them not to mention it but the couple wanted it on their posters etc and said it was a good marketing ploy. Only later did they say she didn't have it,they had never made anything of it and it was just a fleck. There is a lot of changing of the facts.

noddyholder · 10/05/2014 14:57

It as their idea to mention it!

HavannaSlife · 10/05/2014 15:01

It says on that link that

Withholding information about such a distinctive feature is completely at odds with the advice given by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children

So even if it was the their idea it doesnt look yo me like it was the wrong thing to do at the time

noddyholder · 10/05/2014 15:02

yeah ok.

noddyholder · 10/05/2014 15:03

Like I said previously there are 2 sides to every case and the 2 on this one will never agree.

nomorequotes · 10/05/2014 15:03

What does the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children say about using public money to withhold information relating to a sighting of a man carrying a child?

noddyholder · 10/05/2014 15:04

the iris “is Madeleine’s only true distinctive feature. Certainly we thought it was possible that this could potentially hurt her or”—he grimaces—“her abductor might do something to her eye.… But in terms of marketing, it was a good ploy.

HavannaSlife · 10/05/2014 15:34

So what, they might have thought it was a bad idea or that it had the potential to hurt her, but thats obviously not what the national centre of missing children believe to be the case or the pj id have thought, seeing as they published the information

Joules68 · 10/05/2014 15:46

lol hegwiggitty funny feeling?? What's that all about?

LaVolcan · 10/05/2014 15:56

I don't see whats so odd about the family saying it was barely noticable when it wasnt their idea to mention it in the first place

But presumably the family were happy to allow the posters to be plastered up all over the place, plus wear t-shirts with Madeleine's picture on as Gerry certainly did, plus use a picture on the cover of the book 'madeleine', all with the distinctive eye feature? It then seems extraordinary to say a few months later that they never made much of it, and it was only a fleck. I am quite sure they could have found another photo for the book cover, for example.

It's these oddities that make one think, hmm, well I don't know what is up, but their behaviour seems very odd.

Deux · 10/05/2014 16:08

There were 2 sightings of men carrying female children that night with little mention made of the second sighting by the Smith family.

This is the one that is now considered relevant and it is this efit that was revealed on Crimewatch.

The Smith family statements and correspondence and transcripts of phone calls between the Portugese and the British from the official files are here.

www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/MARTIN_SMITH.htm

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