Madeleine McCann

[morningpaper]

Instead of starting lots of new posts about Madeleine, could I politely request that anyone who wants to post on the subject please post on this one thread? (N.B. Duplicate threads may be flamed hysterically.)

Please note that this thread is not to criticise Madeleine's parents or family, as this is not in the spirit of Mumsnet.

Please can I take the liberty to quote from this article:

"This is the real life of Kate and Gerry McCann, and it must now have become a place of agony beyond all understanding. Pity them, if you have any compassion at all, and demonstrate the minimum of grace: the ability to desist from judgment."

i think i'd have a better chance of being the sole winner of tonight's triple rollover than their ever finding that child at all, much less alive.

oh, it is all so so strange and disturbing and upsetting.

Didn't the parents say in one of the very first interviews that they'd spent the first week after Madeleine disappeared beating themselves to pieces with guilt about having left the kids on their own? And that they weren't going to do that any more as it didn't help to bring her back.

I've been wondering about the little (possibly American) girl found by the McCann's private investigators during their search. I haven't seen any media coverage about her and this struck me as an amazing event. Of course I understand that she will need a lot of psychological support and privacy, but I thought that the press would have highlighted her case in light of the recent focus on child abductions.

I haven't heard that story bubble99 - what is that?

Apparently the private investigators searching for Madeleine in Morroco (sp?) followed up reported sightings of a blonde girl living with a Morroccan family living in a remote mountain region. They found the girl who was an english-speaker and 'not with her natural family' according to reports.

I'll have a quick google but it was in several newspapers and also online (possibly Skynews, not that that is necessarily to be believed!)

I can't do links.

But if you google 'kidnapped american girl' it comes up, albeit in The Mail.

The report is according to 'insiders' so may not amount to much?

Another twist to the saga here

but all doctors? just can't see it.

I always found it strange that Jane tanner was the only one to have claimed to have seen a man abduct Madeleine, in fact I've read that she realized that she'd seen it happen as soon as Madeleine was discovered to be missing, and yet it took her two weeks to report it to the police?

has anyone seen

this?

My good god, life is so sad.

Remains in a plastic container, how shocking and end evil is that?

Wannabe - Jane Tanner did tell the police straight away.

She wasn't believed because there was a slight timing discrepancy betwen her guess of the time and someone else's. Also the man Gerry was talking to when she saw the man carrying the child in pink pajamas did NOT see anyone so she was not taken seriously.

But I have heard policemen say that witnesses often get things wrong or report very different things. A man broke into my neighbours flat. My neighbour and I both saw him clearly as he pushed past us on his way out. We gave very different descriptions, including colour of trousers and jacket. Did you see the C4 programme about the man convicted of killing Jill Dando? The witness reports of a man acting suspiciously in the road have very little in common, and many contradictory discrepancies.

The Express is a very unreliable newspaper. I have had personal experience of having been reported totally inaccurately, and with an unrelated picture of someone else used to prove that I was doing something I have never done! I would imagine the reported 'Prime Suspect' status is exactly the same as the 'arguido' status of the McCanns - simply that they will be asked questions for which they are entitled to have a lawyer present.

Message withdrawn

"Didn't the parents say in one of the very first interviews that they'd spent the first week after Madeleine disappeared beating themselves to pieces with guilt about having left the kids on their own?"

I had not seen that report. The reports I have read never expressed any sense that the parents had done anything remiss. News reports contained comments like "it was akin to eating in our own garden" and "it felt so safe".

The report that you mention Imaginary Friend could well do with being MUCH more widely circulated. It would certainly help to tame the hostile sections of the press.

Diario de Noticias
tinyurl.com/2y5nz8

Friend of McCann denounces powerful lobby of the family

Present on the night of the disappearance of a child, is one of seven people who spent holidays with the family McCann in the Ocean Club and were having dinner with Kate and Gerry in the restaurant. According to the Spanish newspaper El Mundo, his lawyer said: "My client is obliged to remain silent, it is what it can do to help research. And I am not talking about the secrecy that requires the Portuguese law, but the strange circumstances surrounding the case. "

The lawyer, who took over the case in September, said that his client until now have not had the opportunity to "say what he thinks about all this" and that the police only questioned on the fact that McCann left the children alone while dinning . So it will request the Portuguese police to be heard again and "correct some details and discrepancies" that emerged in the statements made by nine people in the restaurant that night.

But the same source also states: "My client wishes to bring to light the whole truth, does not intend to accuse or blame anyone, because this is the work of the police. And he is not interested who can get damaged."

Assuming a position critical of the development of the case, which he said he was far from being "a case of ordinary police," the English lawyer is even blaming the British government. "I think our government has a legal obligation to help McCann. What I can not understand is that they have received support that go well beyond what would be normal. These interventions were prejudicial to my client and to investigate the truth," said ."

One day I presume the truth will come out and until then this will get stickier and stickier and in the meantime there is a little girl who has been completely forgotten. I have to say that I don't believe much in the media, I think their "spokesman" does more harm than good, especially when he stated that on reports of some of the Tapas7 breaking ranks he had phoned them all and could deny it no one would be changing their statements while asking for protection...from him basically (erm, that is against the law matey!)

All I think of is little Madeleine and whatever happened to her has to come out for her sake and her sake only and the people responsible for that have to be brought to justice no matter who they are and how that would make people feel. She deserves none of this, she deserves the truth and god knows if that will ever happen.

Quattro, it was an interview with Kate and Gerry McCann very early on and it was published too. It seems to have slipped into the background somehow.

apologies if I'm on the wrong thread or this has been discussed but did anyone see the news report today about anthony bennett and the McCanns?
news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,91210-1293031,00.html?f=rss
does anyone else think this is an another attempt by mr. bennett to gain some publicity for himself? He made some statement about not wanting other parents to feel it's ok to leave their children alone... hmmmm. really? I think he is a truly appalling man.

how come this thread hasn't expired?

What an obnoxious git that Bennett man is.

God, that Bennett man is absolutely vile

Here is my tuppence-worth. I have been very interested in this case since the beginning but I'm not going to rehash all the issues here.

One thing that riles me is the oft repeated "if only they'd say they were sorry" line. Since when have Gerry & Kate McCann been accountable to Joe Public for their actions on May 3rd or at any other time?

We do not have the right to expect them to grovel in front of us or to plead for forgiveness. They have acknowledged feelings of responsibility and regret in a variety of interviews. None of us has any right to more than that.

zippi, the techs left it open so there'd only be the one thread on it.

FWIW, i think the poor girl is long dead.