Madeleine McCann: Suing Amaral, Mark Lawson’s Fact And Fiction, And Bloggers Beware
MADDIE WATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann
THE GUARDIAN: “The Panama Mystery - Mr and Mrs Canoe’s case fascinates but can’t match crime fiction’s satisfying motives and denouement”
Mark Lawson does so love a good ending to a work of fiction and fact. A super-fiction. Take care you don’t confuse the two.
In his piece Lawson name checks them all: John and Anne Darwin, Radovan Karadzic, Fred and Rose West, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, Ian Huntley, Harold Shipman and…
As the trial was coming to a close, I was at the Harrogate Crime-Writing Festival, and newspapers were reporting the latest developments in the Madeleine McCann case.
Bingo! Where were you?
One of the reasons for the huge popularity of crime fiction is that the genre explores, in a sanitised environment, the fear and prurient fascination we feel when faced with murders and abductions. Real-life criminality and fiction have become a loop, communicating with each other: several of the books discussed at Harrogate featured missing children; in two years, expect a slew of novels about husbands and wives who mysteriously disappear.
Can you tell the difference between fact and fiction? Now read on…
THE SUN: “McCanns to sue cop over book”.
DEVASTATED Kate and Gerry McCann are to launch a legal blitz in Portugal after the publication of a scandalous book about the disappearance of their daughter Maddie.
In The Truth Behind The Lie, ex-police chief Goncalo Amaral details ludicrous allegations about the couple and the pals they dined with when Maddie vanished in Portugal last year.
Who gets sued?
The McCanns plan to take action against Amaral, Portuguese newspapers which reprinted parts of the £10 book and bloggers who discussed it.
Anorak did not discuss the book’s merit. We did not reproduce a single quote from the book. But can bloggers who did be sued effectively? Many are men and women of straw. What can the outcome be? Best for bloggers, perhaps, to avoid the matter? Or get a crack moderation team – like Anorak. But what, then , of freedom of speech?
Says Amaral: “This book is not revenge, it is not persecution. We can discuss the case in court if they want.”
In the context of a libel case, they might well…
DAILY MAIL: “We failed, says Maddie police chief… but he refuses to apologise to her parents”
Says Amaral: “’There will be no apology, I was just doing my job.”
As a writer…?
DAILY TELEGRAPH: “Madeleine McCann case: Portuguese police admit failings
The police detective who led the search for Madeleine McCann has admitted that there were some failings in the investigation but refused to accept responsibility for not solving the case…
Several hundred people queued up to collect copies of “Maddie The truth of the Lie” and many congratulated Mr Amaral for his courage to speak out.
BELFAST TELEGRPAH: “McCann case detective’s book to get English translation”
Who will review it if it published in the UK?
THE HERALD: “Sympathy for McCanns must be tempered”
Letters to the editor:
How kind Colette Douglas Home is to Gerry and Kate McCann (Comment, July 22). She uses many column inches pouring scorn on the Portuguese police (perhaps justifiably, I don’t know), showering Gerry and Kate with sympathy (I, too, feel for them), but only makes passing reference to the action that, had it not happened, would have prevented this heartbreaking event from occurring in the first place.
This is clearly their “decision to leave her sleeping while they met friends for dinner”.
- Allistair Matheson, Selkirk.
Colette’s opinion - that Gerry McCann is handsome and Kate McCann beautiful - is irrelevant. The eye of the beholder? Colette states: “And they will always carry the burden of their decision to leave her sleeping while they met friends for dinner.” What kind of parents, in a foreign land, needlessly leave their child, not yet four years old, asleep without a child-minder and out of sound or sight, while they indulge themselves with their friends?
The McCanns deserve all the anguish they brought upon themselves through poor judgment, and not endless public sympathy. Madeleine is the victim. I hope and pray that she is unharmed and is being looked after in loving care, however wrongfully.
- Donald C Irving, Ayr.
And on it goes…
Posted: 25th, July 2008 | In: Broadsheets, Madeleine McCann, Tabloids Comments (626) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink
Comments
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July 25th, 2008 at 12:33 pm
agw Says:
” You totally miss or are blinkered to the point. If the McCann sue for libel in this case ..then ALL evidence could be presented to the court. Not provable in a criminal trial evidence ALL evidence. It remains a highly dangerous route to take. Read Oscar Wilde’s tales of woe. There a trap was laid. Some should be extreme careful where they are treading in this particular case. ”
Now who suggested they should sue for libel? I certainly haven’t.
The McCanns plan to take action against Amaral, Portuguese newspapers which reprinted parts of the £10 book and bloggers who discussed it.
Taking legal action can mean a lot more than libel suits. One can sue for violation of ones privacy rights, or other personal rights. One can file a disciplinary complaint about a police officer. Even if he is an ex, he still has to attend to certain duties re. reticence. I expect something in these lines rather than a classical libel suit - indeed for the reasons you mentioned.
“I don’t argue…I administrate. -agw.”
I argue. -Ferdi
July 25th, 2008 at 12:33 pm
Ferdinand
Administrator: You totally miss or are blinkered to the point. If the McCann’s sue for libel in this case ..then ALL evidence could be presented to the court. Not provable in a criminal trial evidence, ALL evidence. It remains a highly dangerous route to take. Read Oscar Wilde’s tales of woe. There a trap was laid. Some should be extremely careful where they are treading in this particular case. …and don’t bother to come back and argue with me. I don’t argue…I administrate. -agw.
—————————
Ferdi, I thought all evidence had been presented to the public prosecutor and he didn’t even think it worth extending the arguido status any longer? Won’t all the evidence be in the files? What more could come out if they sue? Amaral might have other secrets not in the file and not in the book, perhaps?
But, of course, they may not sue anyway. I imagine he’s been very careful. It’ll probably be a book of ketchup. He only wants to make money, probably, IMO, so he won’t risk libelling them.
You’re right that it’s a seedy, vulgar and inappropriate thing for an (ex)policeman to do but the temptation to cash in must be enormous. Especially when his reputation has taken such a bashing with being taken unceremoniously off the case, coming up for trial himself etc. and I agree that it’s likely to embarrass the Portuguese authorities.
July 25th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
Mornin’ MrsT! I am a well Smudd and Melvyn is a little gem (but with a face only a mother could love)! Actually, I’m busy with kitten-management at the moment and today is the day they get to GO OUTSIDE!
July 25th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
Gloria Smudd Says:
July 25th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Cooooo-eeee!
——————————–
OK; I’m taking a guess here.
Lone Pigeon is away, and Coco has been sectioned, so the Cooooo-eeee is probably meant for the rest of us.
Even though we are not avian.
Hi, oh glorious one!
Still crawling over broken glass to get to the library and surf?
July 25th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
Maria Says:
July 25th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
“”"As it is, in the Mcs’ case, as you say, there are only about ten people who
think that!! (A few others on the dark site, perhaps, and one or two other
oddballs dotted about the place.)”"”
Er….Maria…Karen said that there were only about 10 of us here who thought
that. She was talking about on Anorak this morning.
Not countrywide.
I do hope you never ever get employed by MORI.
Your looseness with numbers is frightening.
July 25th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Gloria!
How the hell are you ….. and Melvyn
July 25th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Cooooo-eeee!
July 25th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Ferd
Look at the comment sections beneath the videos.
It’s hell.
July 25th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Maria…..you seem particularly vitriolic today….what’s got up your nose?
July 25th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Karen
I know. But, if even the suspect status is being dropped it means there isn’t even a case. No case. No charge. No evidence of ANY crime.
Better even than having to go through a trial and be cleared, in the technical sense of the word. Then, quite a few people might think there was “no smoke without fire”, as they will with poor Amaral, whatever the verdict.
As it is, in the Mcs’ case, as you say, there are only about ten people who think that!! (A few others on the dark site, perhaps, and one or two other oddballs dotted about the place.)
July 25th, 2008 at 12:13 pm
193 Karen Says:
” I’m busy conducting a war on YouTube - I don’t have time for grammar.
”
I thought YouTube is for videos? How can you conduct a war there?
July 25th, 2008 at 12:13 pm
Ferdinand came back with:
69 agw:
My point is exactly that this is most probably NOT a matter of libel, but a matter of professional misconduct.
We might assume for a moment that the facts in the book are overall true. However, a policeman’s job should be to collect the facts, then present them to the prosecutor.
It is up to the prosecutor to decide whether there is a case. Should the prosecutor think he has a case, he should bring charges, and then it’s up to the court to decide about guilt.
If the prosecutor says there is no case, because the police says there is no evidence, then every police officer involved has to accept this.
Amarals book is embarrassing not so much for the Mccanns, but for the Portuguese authorities. Amaral plays judge and jury, exploiting his position as the “former leader of the investigation”. His lunatic approach to consideration of evidence, as displayed in the latest interview, will hardly stay undisputed by the Portuguese police.
Administrator: You totally miss or are blinkered to the point. If the McCann’s sue for libel in this case ..then ALL evidence could be presented to the court. Not provable in a criminal trial evidence, ALL evidence. It remains a highly dangerous route to take. Read Oscar Wilde’s tales of woe. There a trap was laid. Some should be extremely careful where they are treading in this particular case. …and don’t bother to come back and argue with me. I don’t argue…I administrate. -agw.
July 25th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Maria
‘Their arguido status’
I’m busy conducting a war on YouTube - I don’t have time for grammar.
July 25th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
….and we know the Portuguese police don’t read Anorak, otherwise they wouldn’t have missed all that “evidence”, surely?
Karen, your words of wisdom appear wiser with every passing moment!
July 25th, 2008 at 12:06 pm
So CM thinks it’s going to be a “long, slow process”????
Clearly, he doesn’t read Anorak either!
July 25th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
hannasus
If I knew where to find it I would
July 25th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
Maria
They weren’t formally cleared - there arguido status was dropped.
If the crown drops a case it doesn’t mean the person’s cleared - it means the case isn’t going to court.
The British press are using hyperbole - as usual.
July 25th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
Good to see that the Grauniad, as ever, has got it wrong; the editorial on the Mosley case suggests that Parliament should look at Conditional Fee Agreements, apparently sublimely unaware that CFAs did not emerge from under the gooseberry bush and that Parliament has indeed looked at them…
July 25th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
“Kate and Gerry McCann were formally cleared of involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance when prosecutors lifted their status as “arguidos”, or formal suspects.”
From Sky….such idiots! …”formally cleared” indeed! Don’t they ever READ Anorak??!
July 25th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
Hi Noseycow - yes could well have been a GP from the midlands.
Brandon what was your comment?
Can we get Spudguns piece on there?
July 25th, 2008 at 11:57 am
Amaral scrubbed up quite well, didn’t he?
July 25th, 2008 at 11:57 am
Brandon
You are.
Tut - and me (occasionally) a proof-reader.
July 25th, 2008 at 11:57 am
Stig
The Portuguese are putting the police officers in question on trial, and Amaral too, for his alleged role in covering up the truth, protecting the officers, “perjury”, as it is reported. He has denied it.
It’s good that it’s all in the open and Amaral will no doubt have a fair trial in Portugal.
Unless you don’t trust the Portuguese police; some people don’t seem to when it comes to the recent decision to remove any suspicion from the Mcs.
I guess people will accept what suits their prejudices and nothing else.
Plus ca change……! Pick ‘n Mix!
July 25th, 2008 at 11:56 am
Brandon
Well done! Your doing much better than me.
July 25th, 2008 at 11:54 am
http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/UK-News/Madeleine-McCann-Family-Lawyers-Hope-To-Get-Access-To-Police-Files/Article/200807415055784?lpos=UK%2BNews_3&lid=ARTICLE_15055784_Madeleine%2BMcCann%2BFamily%2BLawyers%2BHope%2BTo%2BGet%2BAccess%2BTo%2BPolice%2BFiles
The mods must be having a fag !!!
July 25th, 2008 at 11:53 am
OMG
Sky published my comment !!!
July 25th, 2008 at 11:49 am
Stig
The McCanns are deified in the British press and Amaral is slagged off - what more do you want?
July 25th, 2008 at 11:45 am
How long until someone here pens a letter to the Vatican urging the beatification of Amaral? That lone warrior of justice, that fair minded and righteous seeker of truth, the only person who’s saintly integrity has allowed them to remain untainted and uncorrupted. The man’s obviously a saint, a martyr to the truth. Oh how badly this man has been treated by circumstance, the unfairness of it all!
====================================================
http://www.statewatch.org/news/2008/may/02portugal-report.htm
the five officers involved became aggressive, shouted and unsuccessfully tried to convince her to confess, after which the torture began. Two glass ashtrays were placed on the floor, and Leonor was forced to kneel on them, without being allowed to get up until she confessed. She showed Correia the scars on her knees, still visible four years later. She was then sat on a chair with a green plastic shopping bag over her head, and officers started striking her on the head with a cardboard tube, causing her haemorrhages resulting in blood descending to her eyes, and her hands were struck when she tried to take the bag off her head. She was told that she would not get out of there until she confessed, and was made to stand, sometimes with the bag on her head and sometimes without it, and punched and kicked on the side of her ribs, repeatedly.
The torture lasted for two days, after which she signed a confession, and she was then returned to prison, where her serious conditions led to her being taken to Odemira health centre. She was told by judicial police officers to tell the doctor that she had thrown herself down a flight of stairs in the Faro judicial police headquarters in a suicide attempt, threatening that if she spoke of any aggression, she would be interrogated again and would not survive. Cipriano said she did as they demanded in their presence, but told the prison officers and director of the prison what had happened once they left. The director ordered photographs to be taken of her, and for a legal-medical report to be drawn up as a result of her poor conditions.
…
Correia then spoke to Odemira prison director Ana Maria Calado, who confirmed Leonor Cipriano’s account, noting how shocked she was about her conditions, with black marks, haematomae and bruising in her face, mainly around her eyes, her head and ribs, mainly on her sides. She assured that the physical marks clearly indicated a violent aggression and not a fall down some stairs, something the legal-medical report also confirmed. She noted that Cipriano’s conditions worsened a week after she was tortured, as the blood that had gathered at the height of her brows was so much that it ended up falling over her eyes, leaving her practically blind for almost a month, and the director regrets not having ordered photographs of this period to be taken. She also said that relations between Cipriano and the prison guards and other prisoners were good, and that she did not believe that she had attempted suicide.
Calado expressed her surprise for a number of facts: a) that the judicial police did not take Cipriano to a health centre in Faro to certify that she had fallen down some stairs; b) that the day of her interrogation was chosen during Calado’s week of holidays, when she would never have allowed her to be picked up at 6 a.m. without a formal request by the judicial police; and c) that judicial police officers who arrived from Lisbon to investigate the allegations of torture proposed sharing the blame between the judicial police and prison, something she refused.
July 25th, 2008 at 11:44 am
Joana Morais has some interesting reading on her site. Maddie’s bed showed no sign anyone had been in it. Can’t wait for the book to be in English and on the internet.
July 25th, 2008 at 11:38 am
Oh Gawd - I’ve ended up getting into a fight on YouTube again. This is going to be worse than the ‘Torchwood’ horror.
I don’t know why the pros are so worried about the stuff on Anorak - nothing on here as ever been as bad as the comments on YouTube.