Madeleine McCann: Beyond Parody
MADDIE WATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann
THE HUDDERSFIELD DAILY EXAMINER: “Time to close book on a tragic chapter”
Hilarie Stelfox speak to her readers:
They may have been guilty of neglect - and I certainly wouldn’t have left my children alone in a holiday apartment at that age - but that doesn’t make them murderers.
Further revelations are planned by the former head of the investigation in Portugal but I, for one, am now tired of the slurs and innuendo and will not be buying the book written by Goncalo Amaral, who is simply capitalising on the case.
Any more of this and Stelfox will put a parodist out of a job.
Posted: 26th, July 2008 | In: Madeleine McCann, Tabloids Comments (83) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink
Comments
July 27th, 2008 at 7:46 am
KM & GM are certainly the head of something! What though? All that power they wield. getting onto the British Government, etc. All will be revealed. I am going to read the book when it comes out for sure!
July 27th, 2008 at 7:09 am
From the Algarve and Lisbon Edition of The Resident:
http://tinyurl.com/6nvfr4
Updated: 26 July 2008
Former police chief’s book launched amid blaze of publicity
By CHRIS GRAEME
chris@the-resident.com
THE FORMER police chief who headed the investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann has stood by controversial and potentially libellous statements in his tell-all expose Maddie – The Truth of the Lie, Maddie, a Verdade da Mentira, published in Lisbon on Thursday, July 24.
In his book, ex-Polícia Judiciária inspector Gonçalo Amaral reiterates some of his controversial beliefs, which have been reported over the past year in some Portuguese-language newspapers.
Now Kate and Gerry McCann say they will sue the ex-inspector, who led the investigation for six months, for defamation of character and moral damage.
During a book launch and signing session at Lisbon department store El Core Ingles, Gonçalo Amaral, when asked by a British journalist what he thought of the McCann’s intention, replied ambiguously “a good person (i.e. an innocent person) doesn’t reply to provocations.”
Gonçalo Amaral made it quite clear that he did not fear any eventual legal court case against his book, saying “we can go to court and argue this case out”.
“I’m not scared because I live in a country where April 25 (Portugal’s democratic revolution in 1974) gave us back our rights, liberties and freedom of expression,” he said.
The former PJ inspector was also asked if he had written to book “only to earn money out of the McCann case.”
But he said he had already been contacted by British papers and offered “a lot of money” for excerpts of the book and first-hand accounts of the case but said that he had, through his publisher, refused the offer.
Gonçalo Amaral did tell journalists that there were “other things and facts related to the Maddie case” which had been left unsaid and that “not everything I know is in the book.”
When asked if he had written the book in a pique of revenge for being dismissed from the case, Goncalo Amaral said he felt no revenge in writing the book, adding that it was a description of the investigation carried out up until his departure.
“Our work is laid down here in the book,” he said.
Gonçalo Amaral also refused to give any further details over his allegation in the book that he was removed from the investigation after rumoured pressure from Gordon Brown and the United Kingdom in return for Britain’s agreement to sign the Treaty of Lisbon, which coincided with his dismissal from the case and the British government’s decision to sign the document.
In the book he criticises the British police as well as the friends of the McCanns who were with them in the Algarve.
And he claims the British police were slow to provide information asked for and took months to pass on a potentially vital witness statement.
He also calls into question the McCanns’ need to have a professional spokesperson and asks why their public image was so important to them.
The former Polícia Judiciária police inspector makes a number of other explosive suggestions in his book.
He also said that the case might not have been shelved if the information collected at the time of the investigation had been “valued differently” which could have happened “with another Ministerio Público,” – the Portuguese Prosecution Service.
The former inspector writes about “British government political meddling” and alleged “inconsistencies in the McCanns’ behaviour and the behaviour of their friends” with who they were on holiday in the Algarve.
The former inspector also he said that he had the feeling, at a particular moment, that the case would end up being shelved.
The former police inspector said that his only objective during the time he led the case was to discover the truth of the facts and that the book merely reflects the work carried out and developed by his team.
After the official book launch, the President of the Portuguese Union of Public Ministry Magistrates (SMMP), António Cluny, said that the comments made by Gonçalo Amaral offered “some food for thought.”
“I listened carefully to the statements made by the former PJ Inspector Gonçalo Amaral and they should be carefully considered,” he said.
The 224-page book sold out in some book shops within hours of hitting the shelves on Thursday morning.
Madeleine McCann, then aged 3, disappeared on May 3, 2007, while sleeping in a room at the Praia da Luz Ocean Club tourism complex, in Lagos, Algarve, while her parents were having dinner with friends at a nearby tapas bar within the same complex.
Not often we can praise anything about the Daily Mail but this was an excellent use of the Press Association’s haunting picture of a seemingly despairing Kate McCann leaving the Press Conference held after she and husband Gerry were told the Portuguese authorities had shelved the inquiry into Madeleine’s disappearance.
Edit - agw
July 27th, 2008 at 7:00 am
I think KM or GM may in fact be the head of the British Secret Services,allegedly, I mean how else would they be able to control………..well everything. At least with the Sunday Sport you get loads of fit burds, CDM is loads of bollox!
http://tinyurl.com/5nyet2
July 27th, 2008 at 4:19 am
Yes, very 5 minutes ago. I’ll drop your birthday riddle VQ, but it was a good one and I love trivia challenges!
I’m not Chenier, I’m meercat.
July 27th, 2008 at 2:32 am
This two thread business is getting old!
July 27th, 2008 at 2:06 am
Correio da Manhã announces a new article for today, Sunday.
July 27th, 2008 at 1:55 am
Evening all
July 27th, 2008 at 1:52 am
Mrs T, Tourettes Party - shake rattle and roll?
July 27th, 2008 at 1:27 am
Is the temperature in England as disagreable as it is in Holland right now?
I don’t manage to fall asleep.
July 27th, 2008 at 12:16 am
Mrs T
I can only conclude that they cannot think of anything better to write about…
July 27th, 2008 at 12:14 am
What thread lınk please am stuck ın cyber space
July 27th, 2008 at 12:11 am
Stalking perhaps?
July 27th, 2008 at 12:09 am
I’m not sure I would describe it as a party…
July 27th, 2008 at 12:08 am
The party’s on the other thread Saul
July 27th, 2008 at 12:08 am
Bloody Hell a Madeleıne thread wıth no one around
July 27th, 2008 at 12:03 am
Evenıng campers.
July 26th, 2008 at 10:09 pm
chenier Says:
My Google translate has become over-worked in recent months, and I think CdM doesn’t put stuff up on the web before the print edition has been sold.
cheiier, it was a translation I accessed at McCann files.
July 26th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
Mrs T, oh Mrs T-where? Not the quad bike stuff from earlier? pray tell.
July 26th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
‘Our Cheryl’ going off on one ….. a sight to behold chenier
July 26th, 2008 at 9:28 pm
Is is a ‘Tourette’s Party’ ?
July 26th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
Jo Says
‘… english people ,merry buggers really! ‘
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Love it!
Can’t wait to see the reaction of my sassenach friends when I call them ‘merry buggers’
July 26th, 2008 at 9:25 pm
Whoops just caught up-sorry I am no longer sure what is in the public/to be spoken about domain. Still-our lady in Guatemala is what it is about-No government help, no spin, no bloody privats jets-just grim determination.
July 26th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
Mrs T, that would be the Max Mosley thread, right?
July 26th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
Mrs T
Weren’t you invited either ?
July 26th, 2008 at 9:20 pm
MrsT Says:
July 26th, 2008 at 9:12 pm
Meanwhile, over on the other thread ……..
******
Its where the party is then? More international I bet?
Thanks for telling
July 26th, 2008 at 9:12 pm
Meanwhile, over on the other thread ……..
July 26th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Chenier
Its ust here people really start around 12h30 and even later .But it is what you call “clubbing” in the UK,going around pubs and all and getting trashed
They come back home when I wake up,around 10 in the morning (at week ends)
Not true tho”! I had (have)excellent parties with english people ,merry buggers really!
July 26th, 2008 at 8:52 pm
I’m sorry to say, Jo, that we English are not very good at partying. We need lots and lots of practise…
July 26th, 2008 at 8:45 pm
Chenier
Partying at 8 in the evening?
“I”m not in Court”,you say and I was just thinking,”Chenier,get ready to have a big pile of white shirts to iron
I”ll send you with my private jet if it happens in Portugal,dont worry and if you want to go to visit the “papa”,no problem at all but you must look like a victime and brush up…err… your stigma
NO children and NO dogs,please
July 26th, 2008 at 8:44 pm
Good point.
But the real issue is why I got left off the list as well!
July 26th, 2008 at 8:40 pm
people are partying?
Why wasn’t I invited ?