Madeleine McCann: Missing Hours, Found Again And A PR Disaster
MADDYWATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann.
THE SUN front page: “MADDIE DAD AGONY. Fiend hid from Gerry. He was already in room he tells cops.”
A source close to the family says: “When Gerry went to check on Madeleine at 9.05pm he realised the bedroom door was open. Gerry is firmly of the view the abductor was already in the apartment.”
It’s another theory.
“When he went in he saw Madeleine was asleep but the bedroom door was slightly open. He thought, ‘That’s odd’ because he had left it firmly closed. But all the children were asleep. So he just went in and closed the door again and came out about 9.10pm.”
Good to hear Gerry McCann joining in the mood of speculation?
“Gerry is convinced the man must have been hiding, and once Gerry went through the patio doors the only way out was through the window. The front door was locked so the kidnapper took Madeleine and climbed out the window.”
DAILY MIRROR front page: “HOW SHE WAS TAKEN. The McCanns’ story.”
“Stolen to order after being spied on for days
Abductor hid in flat as Gerry looked in on kids
He got in through patio doors and out by window”
Gerry is a “heart specialist”.
Says a source: “When Gerry leaves, the man realises he has only a few minutes. He thinks the only way to get out without being seen is through the window.”
And: “Initially he thought Madeleine might have got up and gone to the toilet, or to get a drink or something.”
So what has changed? Why a new theory now, with a new spokesman on hand and the McCanns named as suspects?
DAILY STAR front page: “SEVEN HOURS TO KLILL MADDIE. Police probe her ‘lost’ final afternoon”
DAILY EXPRESS front page: “MADELEINE: THE MISSING SEVEN HOURS.”
Police sources reveal that “despite exhaustive inquiries they cannot confirm the whereabouts of part-time GP Kate, 39, and her daughter after 1.29pm on May 3”. A source said Kate’s movements were “unaccounted for until she sat down to have dinner with friends at a tapas restaurant within their holiday complex at around 8.40pm”.
The last photograph of Madeleine was said to have been taken by Kate at 2.29pm on May 3.
DAILY MAIL: “McCanns: What we really did in the missing six hours.”
“Madeleine had high tea at 5.30pm with staff at the Kids Club. She was picked up shortly before 6pm by Kate and Gerry.”
The friend insisted: “Kate was never alone with Madeleine that afternoon. There were always other witnesses present. These details were all given to detectives during police interviews, so they know what Kate and Gerry said happened that day.”
So no missing hours, then?
THE TIMES front page: “MADELEINE McCANN: Matthew Parris laments a PR disaster.
“The fatal flaw of David Cameron and Kate and Gerry McCann” - Our correspondent looks at the baleful influence of the marketing men.
“Look what they’ve done to Kate and Gerry McCann. Here were two people deserving of the most intense public sympathy. On a superficial level they got it – by the media bucketload. Yet did you not sense from an early stage an undertone of irritation at the couple? I’ve sensed it everywhere I go: not a sign of doubt about their innocence, which most of us take for granted, but a feeling, nevertheless, that they in some way invited trouble – though we banish the thought as brutal and wrong.
“Which it is. So why the ungenerosity? I believe it is because Kate and Gerry McCann have allowed an impression to arise that they and their advisers are marketing their own tragedy. Where we would have expected to see parents distracted and disorganised by grief, we have seen a professionally run campaign to find out what the media want, and give it to them.
“This has been done for a most defensible reason: to enlist the entire European public as amateur detectives in the search for Madeleine. But now her parents have ended up looking like film stars in a Hollywood weepy.”
“Put up or shut up, Madeleine McCann police told” - Friend of McCanns counters claims of ‘lost’ six hours before girl vanished
DAILY TELEGRPAH: “Madeleine McCann: Gerry certain he was in bedroom with kidnapper”
THE GUARDIAN: “From prime suspects to hounded victims - how parents turned the media tide”
Posted: 22nd, September 2007 | In: Madeleine McCann Comments (1,536) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink
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February 21st, 2008 at 2:14 am
It’s just me again.
How come this keeps happening?
I know I have insomnia - but doesn’t Anorak have posters all over the world?
December 17th, 2007 at 6:19 pm
I have always wonder about the reportings on what the twins, Madeleines younger brother and sister says. A while ago they were quoted to have said “We love Madeleine” and this was reported by the parents. Now they have asked if their sister will be home for Christmas.
The twins are two years old - do they really talk in chorus, using the word “we” like that?
October 2nd, 2007 at 7:09 am
I watched this video by Spudgun as well:
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRvgK6M2_7Q
“The REAL Madeleine mccann Story by SPUDGUN
This is the story you WON’T be reading in the newspapers, or watching on TV.”
This is a very good summary of all the doubts piling up on top of the McCanns, burying them under suspicion, though I see that most people posting here are already very familiar with details.
In this video I saw photos of Jane Tanner and Philomena McCann and I just want to say these are two of the ugliest women I have ever set eyes on. And not just outwardly ugly either, but an inner ugliness that oozes out. The last photo of the McCanns is also revealing, as Gerry looks like a truly hideous person.
Perhaps the McCanns have made a grave mistake in splashing their pictures all over the world? Or will they become true celebrities in the end?
Would anyone want to be a patient of these doctors now?
October 2nd, 2007 at 5:17 am
[...] Madeleine McCann: Missing Hours, Found Again And A PR Disaster [...]
October 2nd, 2007 at 5:12 am
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIT31Is_Av8
This video posted on #1379 is a must-see!!!!!!!!!!!
I watched the video a couple of more times, because I was so shocked by it. What this video demonstrates is that the McCanns are themselves active and vital participants in the Team McCann PR machine.
And as thesheeplefightback says:
September 23rd, 2007 at 9:52 pm
#1379 “This was the one of the first interviews they gave - you know when they were happy with the Portugal Policeforce as they were going along with their version of events!”
So this shows that RIGHT FROM THE START the McCanns were craftily concealing their guilt of extreme child neglect. Kate is asked if she felt guilty and she replies “for a few days”, saying that after that everyone telling her she had done no wrong, that they would have done likewise, etc. made her feel “stronger”. In other words, she is saying that she no longer feels guilty at all, since everyone has convinced her she did nothing wrong.
How could anyone watch her say that and not shudder !?
Similarly, when Gerry is asked about lessons other parents might learn, he says that there really are no such lessons, for “we were in a very safe resort ..if you think about the millions and millions of British families who go to the Mediterranean each year…really the chances of this happening are in the order of one hundred million to one…”
Holy smokes! He is not even tellilng parents to avoid doing what they did.
After all, even now it would still be a 100 milion to 1 chance… they were just incredibly unlucky!… it was just like having dinner in your garden… blah blah blah. And the press joined in, incessantly lying about their table being “just metres away” from the children, when in fact it was a 120m walk away.
How on earth did these morally depraved people become symbols of grief-stricken, repentant parents who are suffering? And why are those like me who demand that they take responsibility for their callousness, carelessness, and abusiveness — are reviled as “cruel” people who only add to the suffering of the poor McCanns.
It’s just an absolutely topsy-turvy story. Who would have an ounce of sympathy for these monsters? It amazes me that any one does…
October 1st, 2007 at 2:10 pm
I watched the video posted on #1379.
I agree that their answers are contrived. Gerry makes sure he mentions that “even a low level of criticism” hurts, implying that very few people are accusing them of neglect. At every single point they both are minimizing their responsibility.
Both of them without any doubt show no remorse whatsoever.
Gerry also says that what they did was “no different to having dinner in your garden” — yeah, sure, they were out for hours in a place that was a 120m walk away, a full 70m straight distance, hidden by a high wall, etc. Meanwhile, they sedate their children and leave the doors unlocked?
Absolutely incredible how they methodically evade responsibility. And absolutely incredible that anyone would have the slightest sympathy for these monsters.
These people should be thrown in prison for child endangerment and defrauding the public of huge sums of money — regardless of whether the girl was killed by the mother.
But when you see how cold and remorseless they are, it is hard to believe the Portuguese police are wrong.
September 25th, 2007 at 7:31 pm
1553 WAI
What I mean is that my camcorder shows the wrong time for six months of the year even if I never leave the UK.
This is because in Spring the clocks go forward an hour (spring forward) and in fall they go back an hour (fall back).
I change all the other clocks in the house but the camcord is too complicated so it stays the same all year round. Therefore when it is really 1pm in the winter my camcorder would record it as 2pm because I would not have put it back in the fall.
September 24th, 2007 at 9:22 pm
Why is my post 1520 still “awaiting moderation”? Would just like to know what you think is wrong with it.
September 24th, 2007 at 8:52 pm
1565 bt
…and, if she was not in her bed, what kind of parent thinks casually “…oh, she probably just got up for a wee or a drink” and then goes back to the Bar ? This child was three !! don’t you think you’d just maybe have a look around to see where she was ?
September 24th, 2007 at 6:57 pm
1556
If Gerry said she was not in her bed, was this reported anywhere. I never heard it or saw it anywhere other than here. Clearly if he did say this then it is a big departure from what he is saying now
September 24th, 2007 at 6:55 pm
Have I missed something in all this ? I don’t seem to have read much at all about the other members of the Tapas 9 being interviewed at length. We hear various bits and pieces about what they may or may not have done/said, but for the most part they seem to have just gone to ground, and in fact - don’t even seem to be around the McCanns much either, don’t see them visiting them or anything.
September 24th, 2007 at 2:26 pm
1487 blunger
I agree with you completely on the subject regarding people commenting on the beauty of the missing child. Would a less comely child not elicit the same sympathy?
Seems not from the comments I hear daily and which infuriate me
September 24th, 2007 at 2:11 pm
# 1462 The Real Stig Says:
September 24th, 2007 at 12:46 am
“I am fine with the McCanns doing as they did. I would not personally have done it but I do not judge them for it.
The risk of the children coming to harm was minuscule. The McCanns were exceedingly unlucky. The chances of what happened, actually happening, was easily as tiny as the chances of wining the Euro Millions lottery - probably even smaller, given that several people have won it while cases like this are extremely rare.”
IT MIGHT BE RARE FOR A CHILD TO BE ABDUCTED,(not so rare considering the number of missing children) BUT IT’S NOT RARE FOR A CHILD TO BECOME SICK,SCARED, FALL OFF THE BED, NEED A DRINK OR A CUDDLE. CHILDREN CLIMB OUT OF COTS. THERE WERE NOT ONE BUT THREE CHILDREN LEFT ALONE IN THE ONE ROOM , SO THREE TIMES AS LIKELY FOR ANY OF THE ABOVE TO HAPPEN. SHOULD ONE OF THEM HAVE WOKEN UP AND STARTED TO CRY IT’S MORE THAN LIKELY THAT THE OTHER TWO WOULD DO THE SAME. EVEN IF THE WORSE SCENARIO OF ABDUCTION WASN’T TO HAPPEN THIS IRRESPONSIBLE COUPLE AS WELL AS THEIR IRRESPONSIBLE FRIENDS WERE LEAVING LITTLE CHILDREN EXPOSED TO AT THE VERY LEAST A VERY BIG UPSET FOR THE CHILD IF SHE AWOKE TO FIND THAT HER PARENTS WERE ABSENT.DIDN’T THEY THINK THAT IF ONE OF THEM AWOKE, THE ELDEST (in this case Madeleine) MIGHT LEAVE THE APARTMENT LOOKING FOR THEM? YET YOU HAVE NO PROBLEM WITH WHAT THEY DID THAT NIGHT AND FROM ALL ACCOUNTS HAD BEEN DOING ALL ALONG??????
PLEASE, PLEASE TELL ME YOU’RE NOT A PARENT!!!
September 24th, 2007 at 10:34 am
1547
An interesting case on this issue came to light a few years ago, when the now Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor (nice English name that), Roman Catholic Archbishop for England and Wales, was shown to have knowingly covered up child-abusing priests - on his ‘watch’ somewhere in southern England - and then moved them to other parishes, without telling the police.
The Children Act OBLIGES those in certain professions and walks of life to report known child abuse to the police and IMO he was jolly lucky to get away with having covered up this abuse without having been prosecuted.
I am not sure of it could be held ‘conempt of court’ in this country if a witness refuses to disclose evidence of a crime obtained during a confession in a murder trial but I suspect it would be.
Portugal is such a traditionally Roman Catholic country that I think the priests there might be treated more sympathetically if they refused to divulge what was said in the confessional
September 24th, 2007 at 10:24 am
1549 brandon flowers:
We are both I hope reasonably articulate in different ways.
Your posts are very articulate and IMO very close to the mark on what really happened
September 24th, 2007 at 10:21 am
1556
It was another clear lie by Gerry McCann. He never ‘went to check’. He was busy covering up his daughter’s death
September 24th, 2007 at 10:20 am
1557
Yes. Bringing in the cadaver dog was either one of the most expensive and disgraceful smears ever - a put-up job by both the Portuguese and the British police…
OR it was because there was genuine evidence - and a lot of it - that there had been a death in the apartment that was being covered up
September 24th, 2007 at 9:27 am
Woke up this morning thinking about Eddie and the scent of death.
We have discussed the pitiful attempt to discredit the dog’s findings.
What we haven’t discussed is what motivated the joint JP British Police operation to bring in a cadaver detecting canine in the first place.
There must have been grounds to believe that a cadaver could have been present in the apartment even before the dog was flown in.
Remember that, even with pet passports, moving an animal across Europe is not undertaken lightly and not without reasonable grounds from the police investigation point of view.
September 24th, 2007 at 9:12 am
# 1415 Judith C Says:
September 23rd, 2007 at 10:44 pm
(1413)Tony Bennett Says:
September 23rd, 2007 at 10:33 pm
quoted from Sunday Times:
“…,Gerry went to check on Madeleine and the twins Sean and Amelie at just after 9pm, perhaps at 9.05pm. He says all the children were safely asleep.”
I know I’ve mentioned this two or three times previously,and I can’t quite understand why others don’t seem to see it as fundamentally important: Mr. McCann, when first asked about his checking visit at 9.05 pm said that he DIDN’T see Madeleine asleep in bed but assumed she’d wandered off to his and his wife’s bedroom, BUT HE DIDN’T CHECK. Doesn’t anyone else remember this being reported? And doesn’t anyone else think it immensely important that this particular bit of ‘evidence’ has changed? Please post an answer to this otherwise I shall think I am nuts to be worried by it.
Judith C, this has also very much bothered me when I read it.How is it possible that if one of the children is not in their own bed, he doesn’t bother to find out exactly where the child is?? Not necessarily come to harm but if she has got up, is perhaps still awake and scared, or has cried herself to sleep behind a door trying to find her parents. This people are truly incredible, all of them.
September 24th, 2007 at 9:02 am
a new thread has come up
September 24th, 2007 at 9:01 am
blimey
google “missing priest” there’s quite a few
September 24th, 2007 at 8:59 am
BC? Portugal has a lapse of only minutes as it equates to GMT, you can check this yourself by double clicking on your clock (on your PC, no don’t get the clock out of the kitchen)
.
September 24th, 2007 at 8:58 am
Patricia (1540), No they don’t. Or, normally, on Saturdays either. But, as I say, I’m sure messages have disappeared from here.
September 24th, 2007 at 8:56 am
1550
Is he really/still missing? Is that true?
September 24th, 2007 at 8:53 am
I know this is fictional but in Father Dowling he often used to implicate them when he knew there was no remorse by ” actions” rather than words
Im still waiting for the person who said he was “found and back at church” link
for the missing priest
September 24th, 2007 at 8:48 am
1545tony bennett
your far more articulate than I am but I had a similar version
589
brandon flowers Says:
September 22nd, 2007 at 7:55 pm
tappas9 regularly sedate kids
3 may around 6 km doses m up and dies
gm becomes saviour convinces km to do exactly what he says
cant risk calling for help as twins already taken some, make twins sick
phones o b and t tells them to make daughter sick
ob goes round and agrees with km and gm
concoct abduction theory/ checking alibi as a time to remove m body
buys ice and wraps body in suitcase
go out to tappas
gm gives tanner nod to get suitcase speaks to bloke in alley for alibi
tanner removes case and takes to apartment
gives km nod and has idea to implicate murat as dodgy looking and convenient
km goes to apartment
screams theyve take her — no lie
goes back to tappas at last relieved to be able to cry and grieve
km then goes into hero mode searching calling etc
police sky informed
keep going on about abduction to delay police corrupt scene make them search further than the complex
make up cuddle cat lie window and unlocked door
maddie in o brien apartment
6 may suitcase leaves apartment goes somewhere hidden in church
25 days later car hired
press quietened down
go to see pope
ob and t drive body weighed down miles away and out to sea and drop body in case
pope visit bless photo
funeral done
penance to spend rest of life campaining for missing kids
forgiveness
my theory
September 24th, 2007 at 8:47 am
1547
a catholic priest woud try to convince them to confess in front of police.
September 24th, 2007 at 8:37 am
Good morning everybody. There’s no new thread yet, so i’ll put it on her.
Everyday it’s getting more disgusting, the Mccanns are getting more disgusting. I don’t know if it’s the work of antichrist, lucifer, belzebub and satanas together or they are only sent by them.
Even there’s “only” one child missing, it’s growing to the biggest crime in history, with many helpers!!!
Mr Clarence Mitchell is covering a crime,and all the press, repeating his BLOODY LIES is helping to cover these criminals, helping to misslead the entire idiotical humanity.They all should get prosecuted and put into jail, Mitchell is a criminal inventing lies, covering up the crimes, creating more crime, like always and like Satanas he/they want to turn round our world, make white to black and black to white. Such people are able to do anything.
And as you see now coming up with ex SAS, famous for doing very dirty jobs. What do they want to do? Catch some investigators, whilst they are investing? Or are they used as guards for Maddies grave? defending the childs shrine from detectives.
I wouldn’t be surprised that these megagigatera criminals would try to get the British Navy on their side to bomb Portugal. Heil holy crime! We are not malicious and not blind, but vomiting soon ( like Russels child) from this human horror,… We have realised that they not only got rid of Maddie, but also are trying to burry ALL and ANY cristian moral.
September 24th, 2007 at 8:33 am
COULD FATHER JOSE PACHECO GIVE EVIDENCE IF EITHER OF THE MCCANNS HAD MADE A CONFESSION OF A CRIME?
A Roman Catholic source has made this statement in recent days:
QUOTE: “A Catholic priest can reveal information obtained outside of confession, although they are not allowed to reveal any information that they obtain through confession. As far as I am aware there have been very few examples of priests ever revealing information obtained through confession (even after being tortured or threatened with a death sentence) and to do so is an extremely serious offence under canon law and would normally lead to laicisation [defrocking]”. UNQUOTED
September 24th, 2007 at 8:28 am
1505 Murder wrote: “O’Brien is a clinical pharmacologist…He was also away at his apartment (right next to the McCanns) for a very long time between 9:00 and 10:00″.
REPLY: I think the reports suggest that O’Brien was ‘away from the table’ nearly the whole time; I don’t think he was there at all until very late; one report I think has him returning to the Tapas bar ’shortlty before 10.00pm’.
When the job was done.
Does not the following fit the facts? - and explain the obvious lies told by Gerry and Kate McCann and their ’sources’ and some of the ‘Tapas 9′?:
1. O’Brien in the apartment with the McCanns until around 8.40pm/8.45pm and indeed way beyond until nearly 10.00pm
2. O’Brien during this time helping McCanns to clear up anything that needed clearing up after Madeleie had died/been killed and ‘arranging’ the scene to make it look like an abduction - shutters raised, windows opened, Cuddle Cat on ledge, bed & sheets etc. in disarray
3. Around 8.40pm/8.45pm Kate & Gerry McCann walk to Tapas bar (remember one witness unconnected to the ‘Tapas 9′ says they arrived as late as 8.58pm)
4. Gerry returns towards apartment to ensure O’Brien (and maybe one other) is ‘covered’/shielded as he takes Madeleine’s body, and bumps into Jeremy Wilkins. Probably he has one eye looking up to the apartment as they talk. He was acting as a ‘look-out’. According to reports, this conversation was at least 10 minutes long, possibly up to 20 (9.05pm to 9.25pm are common starting and finishing timres for this conversation) [in this respect I agree with the suggestions of Murder - post No. 1496]
5. Gerry returns to Tapas bar 9.20pm/9.25pm
6. Dr Matthew Oldfield despatched to the apartment for some reason - the story of him checking the kids is bogus - invented. Very convenient that he wasn’t sure if Madeleine was there in the bed and ‘the apartment looked lighter’. He is despatched to embellish the abduction hoax
7. O’Brien, having left the apartment and placed Madeleine’s body safely somewhere out of the way or on a boat, returns to Tapas bar at nearly 10.00pm. The whole ‘his child was sick’ story is again almost certainly an invention to cover for the fact that until around 9.50pm he was arranging the disposal of Madeleine’s body and by nearly 10.00pm he had probably returned from the nearby beach.
NOTE: If there was indeed a second sighting of someone carrying a small child in a blanket, then Tanner’s story confirms Madeleine being taken (albeit by a mystery abductor) - and maybe another Praia da Luz resident *did* see Madeleine being taken by O’Brien down towards the beach/port. On that analysis, Tanner would have given a vague description of the abductor when first questioned, throwing the police off the scent of O’Brien but confirming the abduction theory - and when later questioned would no doubt have supplied a description that was very different from O’Brien. Is it possible that on this second occasion she gave a description remarkably similar to that of Robert Murat? - in order to head the PJ (and the media) off in that direction?
September 24th, 2007 at 8:20 am
The police in Portugal have all the first statements from the tapas 9. Statements taken at the time are usually the accuate ones or at least give something to work against if they are changed. In a straight forward abduction there is no need for any statement to have changed.
If things have changed since then it will be clear that something suspicious is going on. The person who now says they saw them put to bed at 7pm, did they say that then? They might have done, so little is out there in the public domain.
When this first happened I said to my family I felt she was close by and that every room at the complex should have been searched just to make sure she had not wandered round to find one of her friends (when she could not find her parents).
As a family we have stayed at Mark Warner in the past. If I had been there then I would have actually insisted they look in all the rooms, open cupboards, open suitcases. No one would have minded. Its a children’s holiday resort. We chose it because it was child oriented. Eliminate the things you can eliminate early on so you can concentrate on other things.