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 9:13 pm
OK-Gandy you got me there-what did happen?
July 25th, 2008 at 9:05 pm
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=PyW0riD54nY&feature=related
July 25th, 2008 at 9:02 pm
whoops Says:
July 25th, 2008 at 8:51 pm
OK-so what did happen to that little girl? I am leaning towards she got out and either fell somewhere never to be found-
—————-
Please tell us you’re not serious whoopsy?
July 25th, 2008 at 8:51 pm
OK-so what did happen to that little girl? I am leaning towards she got out and either fell somewhere never to be found-or was picked up by someone-or if something else happened and the Mccanns are responsible-they should make a guest appearance on the Paul Daniel’s show.
Maria you know who the highly esteemed Paul Daniels and Dibby Debbie are -yeah?
July 25th, 2008 at 8:16 pm
……..we nuns know little of such things but are occasionally allowed a little light entertainment such as a harmless TV comedy….
July 25th, 2008 at 8:13 pm
M and A
Ah yes! So it is. A dim memory of a Faulty Towers episode comes back to me, in which such a screwdriver figured prominently!
July 25th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
Noseycow Says:
July 25th, 2008 at 8:08 pm
whoops
Rich people are always tight - thats how they get to be rich!
****
And, most importantly, that how they STAY rich …
July 25th, 2008 at 8:08 pm
whoops
Rich people are always tight - thats how they get to be rich!
July 25th, 2008 at 8:05 pm
whoops Says:
July 25th, 2008 at 7:01 pm
Maria-just catching up had a funny half hour and decided to vacuum under the beds. Your list was very well written-I loved No 9-the girl who was ill after pretending to be Madeleine all day.
Shame on you-You wouldn’t help a friend hide a body? Me-no problem-Do it all the time,me-shifting couple of corpses tonight for a mate-least I can do he lent me his screwdriver for an hour last week and his missus always gives me free scrumps in the chippy where she works.
———————————————
You make me feel so mean and petty. Maybe the next time I’m asked to hide a body I’ll do it in a trice. I think people must me think of me as miserably unhelpful really… I really MUST change that reputation.
I know about scrumps but what’s a screwdriver?
M and a
A cocktail
July 25th, 2008 at 8:05 pm
OK, I’m off for supper. BBL if time permits.
Have a nice evening.
July 25th, 2008 at 8:04 pm
It was a corpse, but it seems it cannot be proven that it was MM…
Has anyone come up with an explanation as to WHO it could have been then
July 25th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Good evening
ABRAHAM: What did I miss???? Eddie did NOT smell any corpse scent in the BOOT of the Scenic? What about all of the excuses for that smell then? Dirty nappies, rotting meat …
GANDA: flattered to see that you posted TWICE today. You cannot change my mind though re the dogs
and especially not re the scent. IF they would react to living human SALIVA, they would NOT be usable in any single situation, let alone a serious one like this one. It was a corpse, but it seems it cannot be proven that it was MM…
July 25th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
She can’t be that rich if she has to dig it herself!!!!
July 25th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
No whoops
She was digging the pool in the garden a earlier this summer.
Its an olympic sized complete with diving board.
And it only takes up 1/10 of her grounds.
July 25th, 2008 at 7:48 pm
Noseycow-by ‘pool’ she means council baths-just trying to be posh!!!!
July 25th, 2008 at 7:41 pm
Just_me
You on form tonight!
Thanks for the link you mailed.
velly velly interesting 
July 25th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
anyway off for a dip in the pool….. have a good evening all
x
July 25th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
whoops - yeah, maybe the embarrasment of being friends with people like that.
July 25th, 2008 at 7:32 pm
I wouldnt tell a story on Gerry, I might get a heart condition in the future…. I dont wanna upset him lol
July 25th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
libel, libel, bash me with a bible !!
July 25th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
Just-me-or sheer embarrassment?
July 25th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
Whoops
It would take a saint not to have upset anyone in 40 years.
July 25th, 2008 at 7:30 pm
Karen -would she say-’I don’t know what has happened to my daughter lately-she’d gone all cold on me-seemed to want to freeze me out?’
July 25th, 2008 at 7:28 pm
Evening All
Maybe there has been no kiss and tell due to the fear of being sued.
July 25th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
I think we have something here-that is exactly why this case is so interesting-Gawd, I hate to think what skeletons would jump out of the closet-pardon the pun-if I was in the same situation-I mean, I didn’t try to freeze my friends, well not close ones anyway-but I’m sure I wouldn’t be squeaky clean-nor would most people in fact!
July 25th, 2008 at 7:24 pm
Noseycow
I think they’re worried enough about appearances to be capable of it. My mother would (she’s a lovely person - but to avoid embarrassment - she’d stuff me in a fridge and no mistake).
July 25th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Whoops
But thats precisely why this case is so interesting!
We never got any ‘I heard K shouting at the kids last year’ ‘I slept with G at uni’ ‘K&G had sex amongst the cadavers at Dundee’ stories did we?
July 25th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Elena
I’ve never actually read any of Coldwater’s posts.
I can’t remember why - either he sounded to ominous or he wrote in capitals.
July 25th, 2008 at 7:15 pm
The other odd thing-IMO, is, if the Mccanns were capable of such ingenuity-I would have thought that there would have been signs of this ability before now. Yet no-one has said anything untoward about them at all prior to this.
You would expect the Headmaster to say something like-’Yes Gerry always was a bit strange-He would report his pencil case missing-have veryone turn the place upside down-make all sorts of accusations about just leaving it alone for a few minutes and whoosh-gone-only for us to find that he’d spontaneously combusted it in the chemistry lab.’
Or Kate’s close friend saying-she was always a bit wierd–always trying to stuff us in the fridge if we fell asleep…..but no, nothing.
July 25th, 2008 at 7:03 pm
Karen,
Kind of disputes the “coldwater” theory though, doesn’t it?