Madeleine McCann: Gerry McCann Talks With Vanity Fair
MADDYWATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann
DAILY MIRROR front page: “MADELEINE: THE BIG INTERVIEW”
“Our regret”
“GERRY: I wish we have never gone to the tapas bar”
“KATE: I wish I’d seen the stranger watching us”
“READ THEIR HEARTBREAKING WORDS INSIDE”
Voyeurs, campaigners, police and handwringers come see the pain, the suffering the agony. Prepare to be heartbroken!
“Riddled with guilt, the distraught” Gerry will tell all to the Mirror. Well, not to the Mirror, rather to Vanity Fair magazine. Journalist Judy Bachrach spoke with Gerry in October near the family home in Rothley, Leicestershire
And the interview is not with Gerry and Kate. Only Gerry McCann was interviewed, says the Mail. Kate McCann’s words come via friends and family
Pages 4 and 5: “I WISH”.
It reads very much like a prayer, or a camping speech by Barack Obama. Says Gerry McCann:
“I wish I hadn’t gone to the tapas bar.
“I wish I’d have stayed in the apartment that night
“I wish I’d stayed in the room when I checked on her five minutes longer”
A wish…
Says Gerry McCann: “”At the time we did it, it was not irresponsible. Of course we feel guilty about not having been there and that is just something we have to deal with for the rest of our lives. You are not asking anything we don’t think about on a daily basis. We live this 24 hours a day”
Gerry says his world went “all black, with maybe tiny points of light” in the days after Madeleine vanished. “We can’t cry our eyes out every day because that’s not helping. So after three days I picked myself up…quicker than Kate could. Grief washes over you. It’s like a big wave, mostly I was able to beat it back”
And the Madeleine ‘Look into my eyes’ campaign? Says Gerry: “We thought it was possible this could hurt her. Her abductor might do something to her eye. But in marketing terms it was a good ploy”
THE SUN: “Life’s bleak but I cling to hope”
Says Gerry McCann: “People can support you in your darkest hours and in our case the darkest hour was of course when Madeleine went missing. Now it is just bleak”
In next month’s Vanity Fair: “The interview with Gerry came as it emerged GORDON BROWN has snubbed the McCanns’ request for a meeting; furious Kate EXPLODED when cops first told her she was a suspect; and family spokesman Clarence Mitchell has given a university SPEECH on the topic Missing Maddie McCann — the perfect PR campaign
“A pal of the McCanns said Kate, 39, believes the family were STALKED by Maddie’s kidnapper in the days before she went missing”. WOW
COUPLE hit back on film. Says Clarence Mitchell, the spokesperson: “It is not us being greedy. It is us being needy“
DAILY MAIL: “It’s all my fault, admits Maddie’s father”
Well, not quite. Gerry McCann is making no confession. He maintains that the fault lies with a kidnapper. Says the Mail: “Gerry McCann is tortured by guilt that Madeleine’s disappearance is his fault”
Will he tell all? Mr McCann tells Vanity Fair’s Judy Bachrach: “I can’t talk to you about the details of what happened. I live under threat from the Portuguese - if I do talk - of two years’ imprisonment”
“THIRD POLICE SUSPECT BREAKS HIS SILENCE” – Says Robert Murat to Vanity Fair: “All I can say is that I am innocent”
DAILY EXPRESS front page: “MADELEINE - MOTHER IS SHUNNED BY PRIEST”
Page 9: “KATE’S SCREAMS AS POLICE TOLD HER: YOU’RE A SUSPECT – KATE McCann screamed when told by police that she was a suspect in Madeleine’s disappearance, it emerged yesterday. Opening the door of her rented villa to a Portuguese officer the family had come to know, Kate, 39, shouted: ‘Do you honestly believe that I would murder my own child?’”
Gerry McCann is a “39-year-old cardiologist”. Facts!
On the speculation: “Gerry says bitterly: ‘Yes, yes, I know. Kate killed her in a frenzy, Madeleine was sedated by us, she fell down the stairs – in which case you would have thought they’d have found her body. I’ve heard all of that. There are a huge number of theories in the media. But what I want to know is, who told them all that?’”
DAILY STAR: “Anguished and painfully thin, his wife Kate was too upset to answer even a single question during the interview with glossy US magazine Vanity Fair. Gerry revealed in the 7,500-word magazine article he had to be coaxed by a counsellor into talking publicly about his daughter in the days after she disappeared”
DAILY RECORD: “Maddie’s Dad: Slim Chance Of Getting Her Back”
“Distraught Gerry McCann has admitted the chances of him seeing his missing daughter Madeleine again are ‘slim’”
VANITY FAIR: “Unanswered Prayers”
“After three-year-old Madeleine McCann disappeared on a family vacation in Portugal, her parents pursued a high-stakes strategy: media saturation. It succeeded beyond their wildest imaginings—winning the aid of everyone from J. K. Rowling to the Pope—and failed miserably. Getting the first in-depth interview with Gerry McCann since he and his wife, Kate, were declared suspects, the author re-traces their footsteps to their daughter’s empty bed”
And then a policeman appeared. His name Ricardo. “Because for months they used to have regular weekly meetings with the Portuguese police, and then they stopped,” recalls Gerry’s older sister Trish Cameron
“Do you have something to tell us?” Ricardo asked.
“No,” Kate replied. “Do you have something to tell us?”
“He nodded. “Yes. You are being made arguidos”…
Eight months of talking - read it all…
Posted: 10th, January 2008 | In: Madeleine McCann Comments (1,344) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink
Comments
January 10th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
man on the hill
I agree
January 10th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
Garth about the tiles
What I understood on portuguese TV rtp when they talked about this issue was that the blood specks found under 1 floor tile were the result of washed off blood that got into a crack (poured in). This was not visible to the naked eye, and it was not until one of the two sniffer dogs (the one specialised in smelling blood) was brought in and insisted in that area, that the investigators concentrated on the examination of that tile, found the crack and identified miniscule specks of blood (already diluted with water and chemicals used in cleaning products).
January 10th, 2008 at 3:47 pm
612
Grande Finale Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
602
Garth Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
“….Then follow up with the cleaner who was sent away on the morning of the third. followed by the fact that a large blue sports/tennis holdall was missed by MISS Tanner.
******************************************************************
Where did you hear that? That Tanner reported the holdall missing. Thanks
January 10th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
597
Thank you Ferdinand for answering my question.
I feel the same as you, half identifying myself to them at first, (as anyone would to anybody maybe being wrongly accused. A sheer nightmare. ), and also finding it impossible to later, because of their attitude towards children to start with, and also the way information seems to be either crazy, or constantly manipulated. As a result, I find myself having to make an effort not to be left with a split mind, and there doesn’t seem to be any end to the process. Which to me is a sign by itself that there is something twisted, wrong, with the information I get. And it is not due to the media only. Yesterday’s example :” They are thinking of making a movie” (their PR). “We are not going to make a movie… We wouldn’t make a movie unless…”(GM). Is it a tactic between them, the PR probing the public reaction, and as it is bad, GM correcting the shooting, or is it a faux-pas? And what do they really mean? Are they thinking of a movie or not?
Yesterday I mentionned a book by an American psychiatrist called Harold Searles. Something about The Effort To Turn The Other Mad (I am not sure of the title). He says there are techniques to turn people mad. A simple example with a dog : you teach the dog say to go left when he sees a square sign, and to turn right when he sees a round sign. After a while you show the dog a sign of a square with the angles slightly curved. For a while the dog will respond as if he saw a square sign. Then, as you curve the corners more and more, the dogs gets completely lost. Other ways are the sudden changes in mood, (mad anger, then sweet love-envy then gift). Another very efficient way is to say one thing at a level, and do the opposite on another level (like telling a child you want him/or her to be a good pupil and not giving him/her the opportunity to, by turning the TV as loud as you can when he/she starts working for instance. Or calling him/her your darling and hurting his/her feelings. Usually those who do that aren’t even aware they do it). Harold Searles says that in his job, he knows if someone is “mad” (schizophrenic), when he finds himself becoming schizophrenic with that person.
And I am finding myself becoming schizophrenic.
This is a reason for my interest in the case. There is a deeper one, but I want to know if someone else says it. I suspect really that many of us share it.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:45 pm
Firestar
I think your a bit off the mark thinking of K as a victim if indeed you still do. She has been playing the ‘big boys did it and ran away’ card from the beginning by trying to shaft G with the “… he is always leaving me with the kids while he plays tennis” diary entry. K is an hysteric, i am utterly convinced of that. Her silence and fits speak volumes from a sex economic point of view. And anyway who killed M? Hold on to your pity, save it until after the trial.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
618
Ian Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
602 Garth
——————————–
Ian, is my recollection of the height of the window resonably accurate? If it is I don’t think you could lean out and lower someone to the ground, you’d have to drop them the last bit which may cause bleeding (if they weren’t already).
I’ve had experience of dead bodies, incredably difficult for one persn to pick up and carry, they have no form, they just slip through your grasp, even small ones.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
599 Matt. Says:
“597…Ferdinand
So…what’s your secret theory…the one you are so reluctant to divulge on
the Forum ?”
I have deposited my theory to an independet posteress. But if there really is proof that Madeleine is dead, bodily fluids in the car, then my theory could be binned.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
Blimey, whose Freddy!
January 10th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
Ferdinand
No one in Glasgow leaves their door open unless they’ve nothing worth stealing, they’ve forgotten, or they’re high.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
610 Firestar
I forgot about that! The lichen on the window - not disturbed in any way. Yes thats a clincher regarding the window as an exit route.
Why is the door not possible though?
January 10th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
602 Garth
The cadaver dogs picked up a scent and led them there, is my understanding. They lifted the tiles because blood seeps under the edges and they hadnt dound any where the dogs were indicating. It was the logical thing to do.
Its an important point that there was no blood around the area, as it indicates someone cleaning the blood away but of course not lifting tiles. The suggestion would be that it was the perpetrator - the person who caused the blood to be spilled, not the MW cleaners. This is supposed to have happened before the anouncement of madeleine being missing.
The point is it suggests injury to Madeleine that couldnt have occurred in the 5 minutes or it would have still been there in the days following (forensics were carried out the next day - on the window at least, so I am assuming in the apartment also). Also if there was enough to flow, it suggests an amount likely to be easily visible.
Regarding Gerry, he looked down on the sleeping child and thought how lucky he was, source - the Spanish interview. He would have has to have entered the room to look down. We could argue all day on this point. It depends if he is as caring as he says and if the children meant as much to him as he says. Assuming its true, he’d have checked breathing, I always did - always did! We were so paranoid about cot death - but we STILL do that with our children - checking the kids means checking them properly. OK, if he didnt then he didnt and she could have been sedated, also the talk of undisturbed bedclothes starts to sound false…meaning both Gerry and kate are less honest than some think about the measure of their adoration - but thats not the impression being given.
Getting a 4 year old out of a window? Sounds easy. One thats awake and clinging to you might not be too bad. A sedated one? Not so easy. But lets assume that the window is carefully quietly opened and so is the shutter, the child lowered carefully to the ground…the abductor follows..maybe in a short time as you say? Possibly. But then picking he rup again and heading off into the lit up area - which after watching for a wekk (or more) the abductor would know was the main route to th apartments? Why not go left into the dark alongside the building or into an unoccupied room (there were unoccupied rooms we are told).
How long I wonder is required to walk from the window to the point Tanner allegedly saw him?
Its just the abductor one minute is a smooth operator behaving like an SAS man and the next he is a dumb arse who hast considered the most important, the most vital requirement - unobserved escape!
We can’t know for sure, we dont have enough information - but the police do have more than we do, they have access, could do timings.I fhtye think stranger abduction is unlikely - parking all predjdice, then I have to consider it unlikely too…and take it from there.
Sorry - too many words and kept getting interrupted this end - bloody work gets in the way.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
576 Chloe Spain Says:
“The thing is, though, that I think the risk the McCanns took was much greater than that kind of risk. You might regret having used the car because you had an accident but if you ran someone over because the brakes didn’t work and you knew this beforehand, you would feel guilty. I think GM should feel guilty about having left Madeleine alone, not just simply regret having done it because of the consequences.”
My goodness. So yes - GM should not only feel regret but guilt.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:32 pm
Garf,
We don’t know what type of tiles they were - whether they needed to be “dug up” as you put it, or simply lifted - we don’t know how they were attached to the floor, if at all. If any trace of blood was found in the space between two tiles, it would make sense to have a look underneath.
It has also been widely reported that the McCanns refusused access to the MW cleaners, so IF cleaning had been done, it may well have been done by the McCanns themselves.
You are often on this forum, and are well aware of the two pints I have noted above.
Please don’t ignore everything that doesn’t fit with your increasingly LUDICROUS defence of the odious ones.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
605 Garth Says: January 10th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
603 Matt. Says: January 10th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
601…Peter O
USA is entering a Recession….doubt if many there would want to
send living expenses now to a pair of Suspects in a Criminal Case.
————————————-
I must say, you two are making some very valuable points as usual.
+++++++++++++++++++
Flattery will get you……………… nowhere! Sarcasm even less so.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
602
Garth Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
554
Ian Says:
——————————————————–
Blood under the tile….. It would be quite plausible for the tile to have been cracked or the blood had found it’s way through poor grouting.
Cleaning…… There was a claim that the resort cleaners had been turned away on the grounds that it wasn’t convenient or something.
Exit through the window……….. If I remember correctly the window at the front of the apartment was quite high (shoulder to head high). Climbing out of that window with a dead weight would be quite difficult, a sedated or dead person is not going to assist you by hanging on to you. I can’t for the life of me imagine why anone would leave the building that way, surely they would exit by the same route as they entered. Walking out of an apartment with a child would be so much less likely to arouse suspicion than climbing through a window.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
609…Peter O
Ah…the plans of mice and men.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
602
Garth Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
There are so many holes in this theory that I don’t really know where to begin, but lets start with someone checking that children are safe, and missing an intruder armed with a dirty used hyperdermic full of sedatives and a child’s pink blanket..
Then follow up with the cleaner who was sent away on the morning of the third. followed by the fact that a large blue sports/tennis holdall was missed by MISS Tanner.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
556 brandon flours
551
Ade
I know who he is
I was pulling your leg
bastard
good to sees ya back and off the bog
January 10th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
608
Ferdinand Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
527 Karen Says:
“Ferdinand
It’s not a small risk to leave an apartment unlocked at night. If their valuables were stolen the insurance wouldn’t pay out.”
————————–
i reckon the door was locked until the window story didn’t hold water what with the moss etc.
i think they only remembered it was unlocked after that.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:24 pm
603 Matt. Says: January 10th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
601…Peter O
USA is entering a Recession….doubt if many there would want to
send living expenses now to a pair of Suspects in a Criminal Case.
+++++++++++++++
There will always be someone… Just look at the amounts collected via various religious congregations in the US every year.
$1 from 1% of the US population is a lot of dosh. $10 from 0.25% of the US population is even more dosh. That’s before “other markets” are tapped.
I’m not saying that people are going to fall over themselves to donate, I would hope that people will be able to see through what at best is very shallow attempt to procure money and at worst could be outright deception, in my opinion. Also, one would hope that there is much greater “freedom” for the mainstream media to criticise/take a counter view to the picture Team McCann would like to paint.
In my opinion Team McCann has always wanted to crack the US/North American market. With my cynical hat on they probably want to do this for much the same reason as European “pop/rock stars/actors” want to crack the US/North American market, in my opinion.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
527 Karen Says:
“Ferdinand
It’s not a small risk to leave an apartment unlocked at night. If their valuables were stolen the insurance wouldn’t pay out.”
I remember very well that the Glaswegian branch of my family left their houses unlocked and found nothing to it - something that we found very remarkable. That was indeed more than 30 years ago. However, I don’t feel that we are less save today than in the days of my childhood, quite the contrary. But safety is one thing, perception of safety is another.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Garth
You contradict yourself. First you say that there must be blood on top of the tile for them to suspect blood being underneath the tile. Then you acknowledge that the tiles were cleaned. So if the there was no apparent blood on the tile then maybe the PJ’s were good cops and decided to lift a few up to see what lied beneath and lo and behold - ‘blood’. I doubt they had enought time to pull all the tiles up and clean and then retile the floor. if you reckon you can do it under 90 seconds then film it and put it on you tube.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
602
Garth Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
554
Ian Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
My opinion is that the abductor had entered the apartment and sedated Madeleine prior to G’s check.
—————————————-
so do you think the abductor sedated the twins as well, which is why they didn’t wake up?
and if so, why didn’t it show in the mccanns drug tests?
was it because kate had taken them for a haircut, or waited the six months it takes for sedatives to grow out of hair, or both, or do you have some other explanation?
January 10th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
603
Matt. Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
601…Peter O
USA is entering a Recession….doubt if many there would want to
send living expenses now to a pair of Suspects in a Criminal Case.
————————————-
I must say, you two are making some very valuable points as usual.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
595
Brandon Flours
A new version (minus the 29 comments?) appeared in the 9th Jan online edition leaving out the hugely entertaining casting discussions.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
601…Peter O
USA is entering a Recession….doubt if many there would want to
send living expenses now to a pair of Suspects in a Criminal Case.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
554
Ian Says:
January 10th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
—————————————-
No problem with your long post. At least you seem to be more capable to debate just of late, unlike some of the one line wonders on here.
With regard to the claimed blood they found beneath a floor tile Im afraid I dont beleive. For a start, there must have been blood on the said tile prior to them digging it up. Enough infact to indicate more below the tile. Why even mention digging up a tile if they had already discovered Madelienes blood? Are they just trying to back up their claim that it was missed the first time around due to the cleaning? Possibly? However, the tiles had apparently been cleaned. And by whom? Not the McCanns but by the WM staff. Now of course I dont know any of what I have just said to be fact, like you, Im speculating and trying to read between all the crap we hear.
The abduction would have been easy to carryout in the said time scale. My opinion is that the abductor had entered the apartment and sedated Madeleine prior to G’s check. How would he recognise something wrong with a child asleep? He didnt move from the door remember. And at the time what would be so suspicious. Unless of course, and like you say, this person had been munching sardines of course. But seriously, what giveaway was there?
With respect to breaking open the window? You wouldnt need to would you? He was inside. I dont know how able bodied you are but I reckon I could do it in under 90 seconds. No problem.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
592 Ian Says: January 10th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
584 dcb
Edit…..
But will the public make donations? I suspect that they will not.
+++++++++++++++++
However, the readers of Vanity Fair? Other North American publications that quote or syndicate the Vanity Fair article? What’s say $1 of say 1% of the US population? That ought to be enough to be going on with? Just my opinion, etc, etc.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
595
brandon flours Says:
January 10th, 2008
—————————————————-
Why on earth was this not picked up by the tv news, the reporting of the last few days can hardly be described as balanced. Who could exert enough influence to squash this sort of info?
January 10th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
597…Ferdinand
So…what’s your secret theory…the one you are so reluctant to divulge on
the Forum ?