Chris's Crime Forum

Chris
posted aug 11, 2007


Police: British girl may be dead

Portugal (AP) — Police investigating the disappearance of a four-year-old British girl at a Portuguese resort are now considering the possibility that she might be dead, a senior official says.

Investigators say Madeleine McCann vanished May 3 from an apartment where she was sleeping with her two-year-old twin siblings in a tourist complex on Portugal’s southern Algarve resort coast while her parents were dining in the hotel’s restaurant.

“In the past few days there have been some developments, some clues that have been found that could point to the possible death of the little child,” the British Broadcasting Corp. quoted investigator Olegario Sousa as saying during an interview in Portugal Saturday.

“All lines of inquiry are open, but this line has a little more intensity,” added Sousa.

Three days after she went missing, a Portuguese police spokesman based in the regional capital Faro said evidence pointed to a possible abduction which could have had “sexual” motives.

However, Portuguese newspaper Jornal de Noticias reported Monday that highly trained sniffer dogs brought from Britain found traces of blood on a wall in the room where the children had been sleeping on the night Madeleine disappeared.

The newspaper report, which did not cite sources, said investigators were analyzing if the blood was Madeleine’s. It also said there was evidence someone tried to wipe away specks of blood off a wall.

Police in Britain are reportedly testing samples to determine if it is blood, and the find has fueled speculation that the child could have been harmed or murdered in the room.

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Chris
posted aug 13, 2007


Madeleine McCann has now been missing for over 100 days. Portuguese police are now speculating that the child is dead. But according to a report from Fox news, parents Kate and Gerry McCann didn't hear that from the police, the learned of the theory in the media. There was no explanation on how that happened or why they did not contact the parents directly.

One of the detectives in-charge of the search told the BBC that recent evidence have prompted investigators to pursue a more intense theory that the British four-year-old may have been killed.

"In the past few days there have been some developments and clues that have been found that could point to the possible death of this child," Chief Inspector Olegario Sousa told the BBC in an interview. So now the cops are speculating about the child's death even though publicly they have stated they believe the child is alive and in Portugal.

According to Fox News The McCanns told British television outlets they still believe their daughter is alive, but that Portuguese authorities seem to be exploring a different scenario. "There's definitely been a shift. They haven't said that she's dead — on multiple occasions they (said they) believed they were looking for a missing child — but there's been a shift," Madeleine's father, Gerry, said in one interview.

http://tinyurl.com/3yqfts

Chris
posted aug 15, 2007

DNA test boosts parents' hope that Madeleine is still alive

Traces of blood discovered in the bedroom where Madeleine McCann was sleeping on the night that she disappeared do not come from the missing girl, The Times has learnt.

The conclusion that the blood came from a man follows two weeks of reports that the traces proved that Madeleine had been killed in the Algarve holiday apartment.

The finding will give fresh hope to Kate and Gerry McCann, who have said that they continue to believe that their daughter will still be found alive 105 days after she was taken from her bed.

The minute spots of blood, which were discovered on a bedroom wall by British sniffer dogs, had been sent for testing at the headquarters of the Forensic Science Service in Birmingham.

The four pages of technical results conclude that the blood did not come from Madeleine.

The analysis shows that the blood probably comes from a white man from the “northeast European subgroup”. However, this conclusion is only 72 per cent accurate owing to the poor condition of the sample because of its age and also that the bedroom wall had been cleaned with a detergent. The Forensic Science Service is carrying out further tests on the samples.

Detectives had already suspected that the blood came from a man who had injured himself while staying at the two-bedroom apartment after Madeleine disappeared. This explains why the blood was not discovered when Portuguese police examined the apartment in the first weeks of the investigation. The ground-floor apartment in the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz was cordoned off by police for five weeks after Madeleine’s disappearance before being handed back to its British owners.

Mrs McCann contemplated for the first time yesterday returning to Britain to live without Madeleine: “We know we will be going back and I guess one day we will wake up and it will be right. We never thought that we would go before she came back. Now we just don’t know. We have the twins to consider. “I can’t imagine how we came out as a family of five and going back as a four.”

The Times reported yesterday that Portuguese police have said for the first time that the focus of the inquiry is that Madeleine is now dead. Inspector Olegário Sousa, of the PolÍcia Judiciária (PJ), said: “The possibility of Madeleine’s death is the one that we are paying more attention. However, none of the other possibilities is closed.”

Mr Sousa confirmed that one of the dogs had found a scent indicating that a corpse had been in the apartment.

Kate and Gerry McCann, both 39, from Rothley, Leicestershire, are likely to face fresh questioning by police next week. The seven British adults with them at the Ocean Club are also likely to be requestioned.

The couple and their friends were dining at a tapas restaurant at the resort complex on May 3 while Madeleine was asleep in the apartment with her two-year-old twin brothers and sister, Sean and Amelie.

Mr Sousa said this week that the McCanns are regarded as witnesses and are not considered suspects. But he refused to rule out the possibility that their friends may have been involved.

Portuguese police are believed to have found some new evidence in the case about two weeks ago which led to officers saying that they now considered it possible that Madeleine, who disappeared shortly before her fourth birthday, was now dead. However, reports that they are hunting a mystery British man who had stayed in Praia da Luz at the same time as the McCanns have been dismissed. James Gorrod, 34, a solicitor from Exeter, said that detectives had cleared him and his wife of any link to her disappearance. They had raised suspicion because they were a couple who were on holiday with the McCanns and had hired a car with a child seat. However, it transpired that they were travelling with their two-year-old son.

Detectives in Portugal are expected to hold the first press conference on the investigation tomorrow for more than a month. A judge is expected to decide this month that the only official suspect in the case, Robert Murat, 33, should be cleared.

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Doreen
posted aug 20, 2007



'NEW SUSPECT' IN MADELEINE HUNT
BY PAUL CONROY
IN THE ALGARVE

10:30 - 20 August 2007



A new potential suspect in the Madeleine McCann case is being watched by police in the UK, it has been claimed.

According to unconfirmed newspaper reports in Portugal, British police are about to launch a major new operation this week.

They have asked permission from Portuguese police to arrest a man in connection with the disappearance of the little girl.



The man has not been named and it is not clear whether he is a suspect or a witness to whom detectives need to speak to again.

The newspaper, Correio da Manha, said: "English police have already requested search and arrest warrants with a view to at least one suspect residing in England, maybe involved or the person responsible for Madeleine's disappearance."

Detectives need to apply to Portuguese police for the warrants as they are in charge of the investigation into the missing four-year-old from Rothley.

It comes after police in Belgium confirmed that a possible sighting of Madeleine in a restaurant turned out to be another girl.

A woman had said she was "100 per cent certain" that a blonde girl she saw in a restaurant was Madeleine.

However, it turned out to be a Belgian girl eating with her father and his girlfriend.

In the latest development in Portugal, the Public Prosecutor's Office, which directs the police inquiry, authorised search warrants at locations that may be linked to Madeleine's disappearance.

Staff from the Ocean Club complex, where Madeleine disappeared on May 3, will be also be re-interviewed.

So far, the only formal suspect in the case has been Robert Murat, a British man living in the Algarve. He was named an "arguido", or official suspect, within days of Madeleine's disappearance. His home has been repeatedly searched but nothing has been found.

Meanwhile, her parents, Gerry and Kate, have not yet made a decision on when they would be returning to Rothley. In an interview with the Leicester Mercury last week, they said for the first time that they were facing up to the prospect of coming home without their eldest daughter.

Kate said: "We know we will be going back and I guess one day we will wake up and it will be right.

"We never thought we would go before she came back. Now we just don't know but we have the twins to consider. I can't imagine how we came out as a family of five and will be going back as a four.''

They have rented a villa in the Algarve until mid-September. No money from the £1 million Find Madeleine fund has been used.

Writing in his blog, Gerry said they had taken comfort from a British man who had visited them who had been through a similar ordeal.

He wrote: "It was good to talk about our emotions, the pressures and different coping strategies that we use in an ongoing trauma, with someone who has experienced a tragic event like ours."

http://tinyurl.com/33etlg
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Chris
posted aug 21, 2007



THE parents of missing Madeleine McCann met the brother of Ken Bigley, the hostage murdered in Iraq, to discuss the trauma of having a relative kidnapped, it has emerged.

Phil Bigley visited the couple in Portugal to offer his support, Madeleine's father Gerry wrote on the Find Madeline website.

The visit comes as hopes mount of a breakthrough in the hunt for the missing four-year-old.

Full results of DNA tests on blood specks found in the family's apartment are expected from a British forensic laboratory "imminently".

Portuguese detectives investigating the little girl's disappearance are understood to be poised to carry out a series of new searches in the Algarve, as reports suggest the police inquiry has now entered a "decisive phase".

They are also looking again at claims a pensioner disturbed an intruder in her apartment directly above the McCanns' holiday flat just two weeks before Madeleine vanished.

http://tinyurl.com/yw7jrw

Chris
posted aug 24, 2007


Rage of the McCanns after reports they killed Madeleine with sedatives

The family of Madeleine McCann were furious after a Portuguese newspaper claimed on its front page that police think she was killed by her parents.

The missing girl's normally mild-mannered father Gerry could barely contain his anger at the smear, which accused him and his wife Kate of accidentally killing their daughter with an overdose of sedatives.

He also hit out at anonymous police sources behind the whispering campaign being waged against the couple, signalling that their relations with detectives have sunk to a new low.

In a wide-ranging interview with British newspapers including the Daily Mail, Mr McCann also said he is considering going back to his job as a consultant cardiologist but his wife could not yet face returning to her GP work.

The couple, from Rothley, Leicestershire, do not rule out having another child but Mr McCann said they had not considered doing so and stressed that nothing could replace Madeleine.

It is 114 days since she vanished from her bed in the McCanns' holiday apartment in Praia da Luz while her parents ate tapas with friends in a nearby restaurant.

But in the past three weeks there has been a noticeable shift in the police investigation, with detectives saying they think Madeleine is probably dead. It has led to a tide of wild speculation in the Portuguese media about her fate, and the McCanns have had to endure innuendo implying that they or their friends were somehow involved in her disappearance.

Yesterday, Portuguese newspaper Tal & Qual went one astonishing step further. The weekly tabloid ran a front page picture of Mr and Mrs McCann alongside the headline: "Police believe parents killed Maddie".

Inside, the paper alleged Madeleine died as a result of an overdose of sedatives given to help her sleep. The McCanns, both doctors, have consistently denied giving their children any such medication.

Tal & Qual - which translates as "The way it is" - claimed Portuguese detectives "are almost absolutely certain that Madeleine was killed by accident by her parents".

The paper attributed its scoop to an anonymous source close to the investigation and even went on to speculate about the sort of prison sentences someone might get for the crimes of homicide by negligence, and hiding a body.

After learning of the story, Mr McCann was initially speechless, then said: "It's incredibly hurtful and incredibly untrue.

"Even if somebody could think that, there is just absolutely no evidence pointing in that direction.

"Without anything else, what that implies is that we somehow did it, we did it together, managed to dispose of Madeleine without a car, without anything, that the whole group was involved, that there must have been other people involved ... It is just so absurd, it is just not credible.

"But we will come through it. We will not stop and it will move on. My opinion of what has happened has not changed in 16 weeks.

"We know our facts, we know what we did. It does not bear any resemblance to this wild speculation."

Mr McCann made a blistering attack on anonymous police sources who have been feeding allegations to the Portuguese press, apparently in breach of the country's strict "secrecy of justice" laws preventing details of investigations being aired publicly.

He said: "I am disappointed that so much information is in the public domain in a country that supposedly has judicial secrecy.

"There have been whispers. There's either judicial secrecy or there's not.

"I would be perfectly happy if they said, 'Right, there is going to be nothing coming out anywhere', but that hasn't happened.

"You can't have it both ways. For Kate and I, it's an ongoing trauma and that in itself is incredibly hard.

"The wild speculation we have seen recently is detrimental. Ultimately there is an innocent four-year-old girl missing here. Some people do forget that is what this is about."

Until now, the McCanns have voiced strong support for the investigation, despite private concerns, but have been dismayed at the new direction the police investigation is taking.

The couple have several reasons for believing Madeleine was abducted, including that her favourite Cuddle Cat toy was placed by someone on a high ledge out of her reach and that one of their friends saw a man walking away from the apartment with what looked like a child in his arms.

Tal & Qual stood by its story.

The journalist who wrote it, Catarina Vaz Guerreiro, said: "I can't reveal my source but I have complete trust in them. I strongly believe the person that told us this information is telling us the truth."

But Portuguese media commentators said Tal & Qual was a "very bad sensational tabloid" not known for having good police sources.

The story was also dismissed by Portuguese police, who said it had "no authority".

Today, Mr McCann is due to be a guest speaker at the Edinburgh International Television Festival.

http://tinyurl.com/2tskep

Chris
posted aug 25 2007


Police Investigate Private Detectives Looking for Missing Girl Madeleine McCann

LONDON — A firm of private detectives that hired psychics to help the hunt for Madeleine McCann is being investigated by police for allegedly breaking Portuguese laws on criminal cases.

The company, Strongwood, claims that it is being funded by donations from more than 100,000 people to carry out inquiries into the disappearance of Madeleine from her bed in the resort of Praia da Luz 114 days ago.

However, Portuguese detectives have contacted officers in the Netherlands complaining that the company has broken laws that mean that only police can investigate criminal cases.

Strongwood, which is registered with the Dutch Ministry of Justice as a private investigation company, said that it had received donations totalling more than a team of three private detectives, an expert in children with a “special disorders” and a person with “special abilities” to Praia da Luz at end of last month.

A report of its findings concluded that Madeleine could have died before 7p.m. on the night that she went missing. Madeleine’s parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, have insisted that she was alive at 9 p.m. The company also claimed that the child was killed in her apartment before being taken to a beach in a white van where her body was dumped.

Nico van den Dries, chief executive of Strongwood, said that the company had been sharing information with Portuguese detectives and had not been told it was an offense to investigate criminal cases.

“We were asked to look at the case because some clairvoyants from America and the Netherlands were giving evidence to the Portuguese police and they were not following them up,” he said. “We are just doing it for the the expenses. We have been co-operating with the Portuguese and they have not said it is against the law.”

Inspector Olegário Sousa, of the Polícia Judiciária, said: “The investigation in Portugal only can be done by police forces. As the collection of funds was done in a foreign country, only the police in Netherlands can pursue what is clearly a fraud. No private detectives had worked with us or with our British colleagues.”

Willem Melius, from the Politie Zaanstreek-Waterland in the Netherlands, said: “In Netherlands the investigation of crimes is for justice and police but in case of missing persons it is different (but only inside the country). As soon as they discover it to be a crime they should alert the police. If Strongwood appears not to obey the rules the Justice Department will take steps.” Dutch police are already investigating a letter and map sent to an Amsterdam-based newspaper, De Telegraaf, which claimed to identify the location of Madeleine’s grave in the Algarve. Portuguese police searched the site but found no trace of Madeleine.

Madeleine’s father yesterday attacked police leaks that have fueled “preposterous” speculation about what happened to his daughter. McCann said he was disappointed that so much information had made its way into the public domain.

http://tinyurl.com/2z5xp4

Chris
posted aug 25 2007



Missing Madeleine may be alive and in Spain, parents claim

MADELEINE McCann may be alive and in Spain, her parents said yesterday.

Kate and Gerry McCann gave interviews to Spanish newspapers in which they insisted there was a "very real possibility" that their missing daughter had not been killed.

This appears to contradict Portuguese police statements acknowledging for the first time that Madeleine might be dead.

The couple refused to say whether police had told them their four-year-old daughter might be in Spain, but their interviews will fuel speculation detectives have a new lead.

It is 112 days since Madeleine vanished from Praia da Luz. The Forensic Science Service in Birmingham is still analysing blood specks found in Madeleine's bedroom in the McCanns' holiday flat.

Chief Inspector Olegario Sousa, the spokesman in the case, said the forensic results were needed to test the hypothesis Madeleine is now dead.

Unconfirmed reports this week said the inquiry was at a "decisive phase", with police set to conduct fresh searches in the Algarve.

The McCanns have acknowledged a "shift in the investigation", but they said nothing had changed in the past fortnight.


Mr McCann told El Mundo:

"The possibility that Madeleine is alive in Spain is real. We are seriously weighing up."

Mr McCann plans to travel to Scotland tomorrow to speak at the Edinburgh Television Festival on Saturday.


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